I gave up eating meat for Lent this year. To be honest, this wasn’t a major sacrifice, as I didn’t eat that much meat beforehand. Still, inspired by a Bulgarian colleague whom I had dinner with during Orthodox Lent last year, I opted to split the difference between Roman Catholic (no meat on Fridays) and Orthodox (full-on vegan). So 40 days of no meat or poultry, but fish and dairy were okay.
I encountered one unexpected benefit of not eating meat: it makes ordering in restaurants (or on airplanes) a lot easier. Most of the time, when you redact all the meat dishes from the menu, you’re left with only a few things, or only one, to choose from, thus completely eliminating any choice-related angst. (See also: Barry Schwartz, The Paradox of Choice.)
I’ve heard
about people whose lives completely changed after quitting meat – you know, “I
have so much more energy now,” “I lost all this weight,” “Now I sleep a lot
better,” etc. I didn’t experience
anything like that, but maybe one needs to go full vegan for the transformative
effect. I’ve also heard about people who
were repulsed by even the thought of eating meat after a long time away from
it, or who had some kind of gastrointestinal meltdown after their first meat
post-vegetarianism. That didn’t happen
to me either, although the massive plate of spiegeleier
mit speck I ordered in South Tirol on Easter Sunday might not have been
the smartest way to break my meat-fast.
I suppose I
can feel good about this from a certain ethical perspective, as eating less
meat has all sorts of environmental
benefits. Although given the obscene
nature of my personal carbon footprint, any ecological points I can claim are marginal
at best.*
But giving
up something for Lent is not supposed to be about reducing stress, or about Getting
in Shape for Summer, or even necessarily about doing something good for Mother
Earth (although that’s probably closer).
It’s supposed to be about putting yourself in the right frame of mind,
through prayer, mortification, and self-denial, to contemplate the death and
resurrection of Christ, and to emulate, however poorly, his suffering. Now I will be the first to admit that my
opting for the tortellini rather than the beef tenderloin while sitting in business
class is not exactly the Stations of the Cross.
But it was just inconvenient enough to make me think about what I was
doing, and about what I was forgoing. It
was, in even the most modest way, a sacrifice, for someone whose life is pretty
comfortable and abundant, and who spends most of his time chasing after even more
comfort and abundance. This seems to me
like a gesture that is somehow good and right.
A reminder that the word “discipline” (which these days seems to signify
only “punishment”) comes from the Latin discere
(to learn). Maybe even (bear with me) a
feeble wave in the direction of the Eightfold Path, or to what JC
was referring to when he spoke of the idea of losing one’s life in order to save
it (Mk
8:34-35). A means of learning that many
of the things you do that make you feel good, many of which you don’t really
ever think about, and which strong forces are often trying to get you to do even more of, are not necessarily the things that will bring you joy.
* I’m not
even going to attempt to get into a discussion of the ethics of killing animals
for food. I can imagine a
not-too-distant future when people look back on eating meat the way people
today look back on slavery. Meanwhile, suffice
to say that I’ve come to terms with my hypocrisy on this issue.
