Do You Have to Fast to Be Faithful?

Ramadan¹ is underway, Lent is wrapping up, and Passover is upon us. When we consider these holy days from an anti-diet viewpoint, there are thought-provoking issues, questions, and concerns that arise from the observance of their traditions regarding the role that food plays in them. Whether you are familiar with these faiths or not, you may have heard that food restriction plays a part in observing Ramadan, Lent, and Passover. You may not have heard how to balance traditional observances with eating disorder recovery.

Ramadan is a Muslim commemoration of Muhammad's first revelation, the beginnings of what would become the Qur'an. It occurs during the ninth month of the Islamic calendar and is a month that includes fasting from food, water, and sexual activity between sunrise and sunset. Ramadan began on April 1st and will continue until May 1st of this year.

Lent is observed by Christian denominations worldwide as a preparation for Easter. In Western churches, it is a 40-day fast that begins on Ash Wednesday. Though the rigidness of fasting rules was relaxed during the Second World War, many people still fast on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday and give up foods that they view as "bad" or “unhealthy” during Lent.

Passover is a Jewish celebration of freedom commemorating the Exodus of Israelites escaping from slavery in Egypt. Where it falls changes year to year; Passover is observed this year from April 15th until April 23rd. While the main observances of this holiday revolve around a special home service and meal called the seder, there are also food rules involved in observing Passover.

These observances honor long-held traditions and involve the community, prayer, and some sort of diet adjustment. In the case of Ramadan, daylight fasting of both food and water; in the cast of Lent, fasts of varying durations and the restriction of specific foods; in the case of Passover, the eating of matzah and prohibition of eating chametz (leavened bread, or any food that contains wheat, rye, barley, oats or spelt).

Regardless of your denomination (or lack thereof), it’s not hard to see the impacts of religious thinking on society in general. When we look at these three distinct religions, whose observances involve food limitations, we can see in evidence what society at large tells us about our relationship with certain foods. The ideas of purifying ourselves and our bodies through restriction and the inherent goodness of “using willpower” to limit what and how often we eat are not limited to people who follow specific religious teachings.

However, if you do subscribe to Islamic, Christian, and/or Jewish faith and traditions, this may be an especially difficult time for you to be dismantling diet culture. First of all, let me say that your desire to live at peace with your body by nourishing it the way it asks to be nourished is not a failing. I hope that you have people around you who can support you in whatever you decide about observing these traditions during this time.

It may endanger you to participate in fasting or restricting. These behaviors can trigger a mindset that you are working to avoid and exacerbate eating disorder symptoms. You may be praised if you lose weight during an extended fast, which may tempt you to increase the duration beyond your religious observance or engage in other disordered behaviors to try and lose more weight. Your body may stay the same, and people around you might question your adherence to the fast, even though science shows us that not all bodies change with a decrease in calories.

Your faith is undoubtedly a pillar of your outlook, family, and community. The thought of not participating in these observances can be hard to grapple with for many possible reasons. The idea of fasting may also be upsetting to you. It may even be dangerous.

We have a rule about this in Judaism; pikuach nefesh is a law that states that the preservation of life overrides virtually all other laws. This means that if Passover will endanger your life, you don’t keep Passover. To risk your life through any sort of eating disorder relapse or threat to your recovery due to Passover is, to put it plainly, forbidden.

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In the Qur’an, it is stated that fasting during Ramadan has some exceptions: children, the elderly, those who are pregnant, menstruating, traveling, and those who are ill. As we continue to grow and evolve societally, we see more and more that mental health and its correlations to physical health cannot be ignored. Whether your relationship with food could become more burdensome due to a fast, or you risk a complete relapse into an eating disorder or disordered eating, you may consider yourself too ill to participate in the food-related aspects of Ramadan.

In its modern iteration, Lent often brings with it a subtext of “giving up sweets,” but it can be anything. Those around you may use the time as an excuse to kick off a diet. You may have grown up with the ingrained belief that you must honor God by keeping your body “pure and strong” for him; health is what is owed as payment for the life that God gave you. However, our modern understanding of health supersedes what we were taught by our parents, who were taught by their parents, and so on. You may view nourishing your body and honoring its needs as far more indicative of gratitude to God than the methods of restriction you were taught in your formative years.

In all of these observances, we tend to focus on the giving up of food, and with good reason. It is an enormous (and for many of us, distressing) ask. A thought I will leave you with is that fasting and restriction are not the only ways to participate in Ramadan, Lent, and/or Passover. Instead, you can choose to take something on.

Often, there is a call to increase prayers and study of your holy book. Spending time in your cultural community, especially helping others, is a way to honor your faith. In the case of Ramadan, these acts of service connect with one of the foundational principles of Islam.

For Passover, you may seek to donate time and/or money to organizations that seek to free oppressed peoples in commemoration of the Exodus. In observing Lent, you may choose to take on acts or habits that reflect the teachings of Jesus Christ or meditate on self-improvement that can be made.

You may also, in all instances, choose to give up something that isn’t food-related, such as social media, television, alcohol (provided it is medically safe to do so), gossiping, shopping, and so on. This might be something you select because you want to explore your relationship with it or think it will truly be a challenge.

You might select something that you’re considering giving up, anyway. Your faith and worth as a person are not determined by how well you restrict yourself during this time of year or at any time.