This Lent, Keep It Simple

Most Catholic parents do a great job of teaching their kids about Holy Week and Easter, such as by focusing on Christ’s Passion and Resurrection and making sure the family attends Holy Week services and Easter Sunday Mass. It is also important that children understand what the Lenten period prior to Holy Week is all about and how these 40 days can help prepare oneself for the greatest feast of the Christian year.

One of the most common ways children are instructed to prepare during Lent is to participate in the “The Big 3” – Prayer, Fasting, Almsgiving. You and your kids certainly can’t go wrong continuing that tradition. More for only the adults in the family, may I offer a suggested alternative or additional way to prepare during Lent? This approach is referred to as “The K.I.S.S. Plan.” You’ve heard in the non-religious sense the K.I.S.S. principle being “Keep It Simple, Stupid.” But in the religious sense of preparation for Easter during the Lenten season, this acronym stands for “Keep It Simple, Sinner.”

Basically, this idea for a new way to approach the upcoming 40 days is to avoid taking on too much or too little. The solution is for moms and dads to simplify their disciplines, focus their intentions, and concentrate more clearly on their spiritual goals. To keep it simple this Lent, simply try the three-part plan of one sin, one add-in, and one give-up.

First, for the one sin component, concentrate on one fault that is getting in the way of your relationship with God and with others. You might want to study the traditional seven deadly sins as a guide for which sin to choose (pride, lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, anger, envy). Make it a priority during Lent to understand why you keep committing this fault and what steps you can take to stop or at least curtail the amount of times you sin in this way.

Some people find that the best way to break the habit of committing one of the seven deadly sins is to find the sin’s opposite virtue to focus on, pray for, and try to develop into your new habit. Here are the seven virtues which are contrary to and can help one overcome the seven sins:

• Humility overcomes pride;
• Chastity overcomes lust;
• Temperance/moderation overcomes gluttony;
• Generosity overcomes greed;
• Diligence overcomes sloth;
• Patience/meekness overcomes anger;
• Kindness/charity overcomes envy.

Next, for the one add-in, add to your daily or weekly schedule one positive activity that will deepen your prayer and spiritual life. This is especially important if you already think you are too busy to add anything else onto your impossibly busy schedule. You can’t be too busy for your Lord. You should put this add-in on your smart phone’s calendar/reminder app so you will be pestered to not forget to complete this activity. Some suggestions for one thing to add include:

• Get up a few minutes earlier than normal each of the 40 days and spend those few minutes in prayer, such as praying a Rosary or merely thanking God for another day and asking for his blessings on you and your family. You might try choosing a “Morning Offering” prayer to recite each morning. 
• Pick a time during each day when you will read one chapter from a Gospel. If you combine Matthew and Mark, or combine Luke and John, each pairing adds up to slightly more than 40 chapters, so pick one pair and you can read through two entire Gospels during the Lenten season;
• Attend the Stations of the Cross at a parish one evening each week in Lent. 
• Attend Eucharistic Adoration at a parish for one hour each week in Lent.
• Attend a weekday Mass at a parish besides the weekend Mass you will be attending with your family. Check out to see if there is a Catholic church that might not be your family’s parish, but is closer to your workplace and offers a more convenient time for a before-work or lunch-hour weekday Mass.  

The third component of the “Keep It Simple, Sinner” three-part plan is probably an action you have taken in previous Lents.  Give up something by denying yourself one thing you really like or are attached to. For it to make an impact, this one give-up has to feel like a significant deprivation, but is has to be doable enough so that you won’t give-in instead of giving-up.

For example, giving up each day 10 minutes of entertainment screen time (i.e., scrolling social media and watching TV) isn’t significant, and giving up all screen time 24/7 for the entire Lenten season might not be doable, but putting away your phone/devices/TV remote each night starting at 9PM might be the perfect balance of deprivation and achievability. 

When we enter each Lenten season, we anticipate the impactful events of Holy Week and Easter that will soon follow, when we will praise God for the mighty acts of our salvation in Jesus Christ. However, we would do well to remember that it is not enough to be saved by merely believing in the Resurrection and thanking Christ for His Passion.  Through prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, as well as taking time this Lent to complete a simple plan of subduing one sin, adding-in one spiritual act, and giving-up one temporal act, we will be rejecting the world, the flesh, and the devil while fortifying our souls.