When Fasting Feels Impossible

Ash Wednesday arrives. Lent begins. The Church calls us to fast and abstain.

And you think: My whole life is already a fast.

When you can’t eat most foods, traditional fasting practices can feel overwhelming, or meaningless. Here’s how to approach fasting with celiac disease.

The Challenge

Already Restricted

Your diet is permanently restricted. You’ve already given up:

• Most restaurant food
• Most convenience food
• Most social eating
• Spontaneity with food

Giving up more feels crushing.

Food Anxiety

If you have any anxiety around food (common with celiac), fasting can trigger it. The sense of restriction. The focus on what you can’t have. The complicated relationship with eating.

Limited Options

With fewer foods available, losing more options can make meals nearly impossible. If you give up meat on Fridays but can’t eat most fish preparations, what’s left?

What the Church Actually Requires

The Rules

For healthy adults:

• Ash Wednesday and Good Friday: Fast (one full meal, two smaller meals) and abstain from meat
• Fridays in Lent: Abstain from meat

The Exceptions

The Church has always made exceptions for:

• Those with health conditions
• Those who cannot fast safely
• Those for whom fasting would cause harm

Celiac disease may qualify you for modified practices.

Talk to Your Pastor

If fasting feels impossible, discuss it with your priest. He can help you discern what’s appropriate for your situation.

This isn’t about getting out of Lenten discipline. It’s about finding the right discipline for you.

Alternative Approaches

Different Sacrifices

Instead of food restrictions, consider:

• Giving up screens for an hour daily
• Silence instead of podcasts
• Extra prayer time
• Giving away possessions
• Serving others

Sacrifice isn’t only about food.

Simplicity Instead of Restriction

Maybe your Lenten practice is:

• Eating simpler meals (not fewer)
• Avoiding expensive treats
• No eating out (relying on your own cooking)
• Plain food instead of elaborate food

Simplicity can be its own discipline.

The Fast You Already Live

Perhaps the most honest approach: Recognize that celiac is itself a form of ongoing fasting.

You fast from:

• Bread at restaurants
• Most communion options
• Eating without thought
• Food freedom

This isn’t nothing. It’s real sacrifice, lived daily.

Lent with Celiac

Embracing the Desert

Lent is about the desert. Celiac puts you there permanently.

Maybe your Lent isn’t about adding restriction. Maybe it’s about deepening in the desert you already inhabit.

Finding God in Hunger

Not physical hunger (that’s not the goal), but spiritual hunger:

• Longing for wholeness
• Desiring healing
• Yearning for God’s presence
• Waiting for resurrection

Lent is about longing. You know longing.

Solidarity with the Hungry

Your restricted diet gives you insight into food insecurity. You know what it means to not be able to eat what’s available.

Maybe your Lent includes:

• Donations to food banks
• Awareness of food access issues
• Compassion for those who can’t eat freely

Practical Approaches

Friday Abstinence

Options for meat-free Fridays:

• Eggs (if you eat them)
• GF fish preparations
• Beans and legumes
• Rice-based dishes
• GF pasta with vegetables

If none of this works for you, discuss alternatives with your priest.

Ash Wednesday and Good Friday

If full fasting isn’t safe:

• Simplified meals instead of restriction
• More time in prayer during “fasting” hours
• Almsgiving instead

The Spirit of the Law

The point of fasting is:

• Detachment from comfort
• Space for God
• Solidarity with the poor
• Preparation for Easter

If food restriction isn’t the right path for you, find another way to the same destination.

A Prayer for Lenten Days

Lord, I want to fast with Your Church.

But my body makes the traditional path difficult. Help me find my own way to the desert.

Show me where to sacrifice. Show me how to create space for You. Show me the fast that fits my life.

And receive whatever I can offer, not the fast of those with easy choices, but the fast of one already constrained.

Let this Lent be real. Let it bring me closer to Easter, to resurrection, to You.

Amen.

Your Lenten Path

Lent isn’t one-size-fits-all. The Church knows this. That’s why exceptions exist.

Find your path. Make it real sacrifice, real discipline, real movement toward God.

That’s the point. Not the specific form, but the genuine offering.

Whatever you can give, give it. God receives it.