There aren’t enough pancakes.

I’m sitting out the feast to prepare for Lent.

Today is Shrove Tuesday.

Tonight, many churches are having pancake suppers. We pull up to the table for one final feast on the evening before Ash Wednesday and the penitential season of Lent.

I love pancakes.

But the thought of engaging in this innocent revelry turns my stomach.

Perhaps it is the ongoing stream of excess with which we’re being swamped. Billionaire weddings. Private jet flights and horseback riding on the taxpayer dime. A vice president who flies a plane full of his favorite food to Italy.

These days, being able to have whatever you want (and more) is celebrated as virtue. It is flaunted in the faces of those who struggle. Those who are trying to get by. Those who have lived their lives working hard, paying their taxes, believing that would be enough.

If I am honest, my discomfort is not only about “them.”

I want to shove aside those rich, syrupy stacks of pancakes and all the sides. I want to turn over the tables.

Not only outside of myself.

But within.

Lent is not about finger-pointing. It invites me to look at my own appetites — the ways I reach for comfort, distraction, safety. The small indulgences that promise relief but leave me restless. The habits of consumption that feel harmless, until I sit quietly, long enough to notice my heart ache.

No food or drink or binge-watching can fill the hunger inside me.

I know. I’ve tried many times, in many ways.

I’m hungry. Starving for the bread of life. For true peace. For generosity. For grace. For forgiveness.

This Lent I pray to be filled with good things – gifts that can be shared with others.