your adversary the devil

On Ash Wednesday, my wife spotted that a local supermarket (which is part of a chain) had a special offer on chocolate bars - two for one. On the first Friday of Lent, two of my boys visited the shop of a local petrol station (also part of a chain) where they also discovered a special offer on chocolate bars - in this case a special low price if you bought four.

Why do I mention this? Let's face it - chocolate is probably the number one thing to give up during Lent. I did two school assemblies this week. About half the children in each school had given up chocolate. Chocolate sales must go into a real slump once Lent begins.

So what would be the reasoning for retailers to decide this is a good time to start selling chocolate cheap?

One could be charitable and say they are trying to increase volume of sales to those who haven't given up chocolate (not so charitable really when you think of the problems we have in society with obesity and diabetes). That this would  put added temptation on those who have would be merely a side effect. Unfortunate, but unintended - and in any case, the responsibility for people to keep a Lenten fast is their own. These people are in business; their responsibility is to make money, to keep their businesses afloat, and their employees in jobs.

Less charitable would be to see it as a deliberate and cynical attack. They know that chocolate lovers are all but addicted to the stuff (after all, both sugar and caffeine which are in it are addictive) ... if they start offering it cheap they hope they will tempt those who have stopped buying back and their bottom line will return to normal.

Whichever it is, there is a lesson for us here. We live in a world where your Lenten disciplines are a blip on someones' flow chart ... a blip that has to be smoothed out, whatever the cost ... whether by selling more product to someone else ... or enticing you back into buying ... The world can be a tough place when you are trying to be spiritually minded. There are lots of temptations out there ... and plenty of people ready to exploit our weaknesses for their own ends.

Through Lent, it would be no harm to remember the verses from the beginning of the office of Compline: be strong, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seek whom he may to devour; whom resist, steadfast in the faith. (1Peter 5.8,9)