SOMEBODY NEEDS TO HEAR FROM YOU TODAY

By Tim Rohr

A few days ago I posted about the questionable merit of giving up stuff for Lent we shouldn't be doing anyway. In this post, I want to address another non-traditional lenten trend: fasting from social media. 

The bishops of the Philippines recently promulgated an official call to their flocks to fast from social media for Lent:

"In our present time, fasting must also address the new realities shaping human life. One of the greatest influences today is digital media. Thus, we invite the faithful to undertake a Digital Media Fasting as a contemporary expression of conversion and renewal."

The letter does an admirable job of explaining why such fasting is needed. However, there is the assumption that social media activity is for pleasure, entertainment, and otherwise selfish purposes. 

They are probably right about the majority of users. However, I would recommend something different. But first, allow me to go back to my previous post wherein I addressed the pope's call to abstain from "harsh words and rash judgment" for Lent - a recommendation I was critical of because giving up wrong behaviors for Lent is hardly a meritorious sacrifice, not to mention the implication that it would be quite okay to return to such behaviors after Lent.

I was pretty much spiritually formed before the "spirit" of Vatican II became the new Zeitgeist and fasting from just about everything except for food became the new normal. 

I can still recall my second grade teacher, a Benedictine Nun named Sister Mary Paul (only nuns can have a female and a male name and it sounds right), who had us write down two things: 1) what we were going to give up for Lent; and 2) something good that we were going to do. Then there was this ceremony with the whole school where those pieces of paper with our intentions were put in a box and placed on the altar during a school Mass and later burned. It was cool.

The lesson there, at least back then, was not just what we were going to give up, but what we were going to do that would be a "good." 

So rather than just tell folks to give up "harsh words and rash judgment," which, like I said, is stuff we shouldn't be doing anyway, how about imploring the faithful to go out of their way to share encouraging and complimentary words to people they would not normally be inclined to say such things to? That would be a real penance, wouldn't it!

The same is true for social media. I don't support fasting from social media for Lent. I support using it for good. There once was a day when I used social media to do what most still do: broadcast and argue my politics. However, I save that sort of thing for actual interactions with people where and when I think I can make a difference. 

Today, and for the last several years for the most part, I scan Facebook, X, etc., looking for things I can use to encourage and build up myself and others. Social media is a great public forum to both learn and share good things. 

So don't fast from social media for Lent. Use it for good. Somebody needs to hear from you today.