What is the Point of Fasting?

Questions from the Unsettled Mind

Christians and Jews of the ancient world practiced periods of fasting pretty seriously. Jesus did too, including those forty days in the wilderness prior to his temptation. But many Christian communities around the world don’t fast at all. Some Protestants suspect the activity, thinking it confuses genuine spirituality with mere ritual. They believe that the essence of prayer is spiritual, so that, once one has understood and begun to practice prayer, fasting becomes an unnecessary, really, a spiritually immature relic of Jewish practice. This line is taken in other cases too, for they sometimes insist that it’s the faith, not the water of baptism which saves. Similarly, they will tell you that it’s what’s in the heart, not what’s in the grape juice and crackers, that makes their “Lord’s Supper” effectual. The notion that God places any premium on the physical, such that the physical might function as the conduit of divine grace, is viewed merely as all that sacramental nonsense from the Catholics.