{"id":5241,"date":"2016-02-14T00:18:00","date_gmt":"2016-02-14T00:18:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=5241"},"modified":"2026-10-02T01:35:29","modified_gmt":"2026-10-02T01:35:29","slug":"getting-beyond-fat-tuesday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=5241","title":{"rendered":"GETTING BEYOND FAT TUESDAY"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

[This post was meant to roll earlier this week, but weak internet connections prevented it. Hopefully, there is value in giving thought to fasting, even if the Ash Wednesday starting line has already passed!]Mardi Gras (aka Kanaval, aka Fat Tuesday, aka, Carnival) is celebrated in Haiti with a fervency that (I would imagine) rivals that of New Orleans. I took the opportunity last Friday afternoon to speak to my adult\nEnglish class about the big day. The students told me about the parades and bands\nand drinking and raucous celebrations. But when I asked them if they knew why it\u2019s called \u201cFat\nTuesday\u201d, nobody could say.<\/p>\n\n\n

Do you know?<\/p>\n\n\n

Here\u2019s a simplified version: Fat Tuesday is, of course, the\nday before Ash Wednesday. (My students tell me few Haitian churches recognize\nAsh Wednesday in any significant way – most had never heard of it.) Centuries ago, many Christians began \u201ccelebrating\u201d\nthe season of Lent as a time of fasting and repentance. Some people found it\nhelpful to rid their houses of food that might tempt them or that would go to\nwaste before the arrival of Easter – dairy, eggs, beef.\u00a0 In\ntime, this purging of the kitchen took on a celebratory feel \u2013 the last hurrah coming\nthe day before the leanness of Lent, getting “fat” before the fast. From there, it was only a short jump to\nthe notion of \u201clet\u2019s eat, drink and be merry today and repent tomorrow”. \u00a0Nowadays, I would guess, Mardi Gras is\ncompletely disassociated from even a passing thought of Lent or repentance or\nfasting in the minds of most observers worldwide.Historians believe that the name “Carnival” came from the Latin carne vale<\/i> – “farewell to flesh”. Apparently a reference to fasting from meat, but supremely ironic if you read “flesh” in the biblical sense, huh?<\/p>\n\n\n

I wonder how the yearly number of Mardi Gras celebrators compares to the number of Lenten “fasters”.<\/p>\n\n\n

When I told my Haitian students that nobody in Indiana (where I come from) even acknowledges Mardi Gras, they couldn\u2019t believe\nit. But when I reflected on it later, it struck me that in the United States, it\u2019s\nnot exactly that we don\u2019t celebrate Mardi Gras, it\u2019s more like we refuse to limit Fat Tuesday to one day a year!Surrounded by an abundance of things, activities, and food – with the TV and radio constantly urging us to get more, more, more – we find it a struggle to get serious, and to stay serious, about our relationship with God.\u00a0Look at how the Lord warned the Israelites in Deuteronomy 8 about His fears that bringing them into the promised land – “a land where bread will not be scarce and you will lack nothing” (v.9) – could potentially lead them to FORGETTING Him!\u00a0“10 When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the LORD your God for the good land he has given you. 11 Be careful that you do not forget the LORD your God, failing to observe his commands, his laws and his decrees that I am giving you this day. 12 Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down, 13 and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied, 14 then your heart will become proud and you will forget the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.”<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n

Fasting is all about refocusing – taking our eyes off the gifts and returning them to the Giver.<\/p>\n\n\n

I hope to take the next few posts to reflect on the practice of fasting. (And I also plan to share some thoughts and photos from this past week’s OMS staff retreat.)P.S. Here was my Fat Tuesday indulgence…<\/p>\n\n\n

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[This post was meant to roll earlier this week, but weak internet connections prevented it. Hopefully, there is value in giving thought to fasting, even if the Ash Wednesday starting line has already passed!]Mardi Gras (aka Kanaval, aka Fat Tuesday, aka, Carnival) is celebrated in Haiti with a fervency that (I would imagine) rivals that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5242,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5241","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5241","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5241"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5241\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5243,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5241\/revisions\/5243"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5242"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5241"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5241"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5241"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}