What is the purpose of Lent?

Answer 1

Lent recalls the 40 days Jesus fasted and prayed in the desert in preparation for His ministry. The 40-day season of lent is a time for us to take stock of the way we're living and set aside those things that distract us from having a deeper relationship with God. It is marked by greater prayer, fasting and almsgiving in preparation for the celebration of Easter, and is a journey that follows the path of Jesus through His terrible suffering and death on the cross. These were great acts of love and forgiveness ending with the celebration of His glorious resurrection on Easter Sunday.

Answer 2

People do not DO Lent, though that is besides the point. Christians take part in Lent because Jesus did not give into the temptation Satan tried to put on Jesus while he spent 40 days in the desert.

Answer 3

Lent, in some Christian denominations, is the forty-day-long liturgical season of fasting and prayer before Easter. The forty days represent the time Jesus spent in the desert, where according to the Bible he endured temptation by Satan. Different churches calculate the forty days differently. The purpose of Lent is the preparation of the believer-through prayer, penitence, almsgiving and self-denial-for the annual commemoration during Holy Week of the Death and Resurrection of Jesus, which recalls the events linked to the Passion of Christ and culminates in Easter, the celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. In Western Christianity (with the exception of the Archdiocese of Milan which follows the Ambrosian Rite), Lent begins on Ash Wednesday and concludes on Holy Saturday. The six Sundays in Lent are not counted among the forty days because each Sunday represents a "mini-Easter", a celebration of Jesus' victory over sin and death.

In those churches which follow the Byzantine tradition (e.g. Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholics), the forty days of Lent are calculated differently: the fast begins on Clean Monday, Sundays are included in the count, and it ends on the Friday before Palm Sunday. The days of Lazarus Saturday, Palm Sunday and Holy Week are considered a distinct period of fasting. For more detailed information about the Eastern Christian practice of Lent, see the article Great Lent.

Answer 4

Lent is a forty day period when Catholics give up something or promise to do something. It is when Jesus went into the desert for forty days before his death without food or water. It ends on Easter and begins on Ash Wednesday.

Answer 5

Lent began so we could look over our lives, and see what we did wrong. Also, Lent is the annual call to purify our souls for the great feast of Easter, figure of the eternal Easter, for which our souls must be perfectly pure.

Answer 6

Lent is the representation of the time Jesus was fasting in the desert for forty days while being tempted by the devil. This is the time leading up to Easter and His Resurrection after the third day.

Answer 7

In Lent we celebrate Christ's suffering, death and Resurrection.