Quote Originally Posted by biogirl87 View Post
NoRush, one part of your post really struck me and I felt I needed to comment on that. The part of your post I felt I needed to comment on is the part that I bolded. While I agree that extreme low calorie diets done with little knowledge or information are a bad idea in general, fasting generally tends to not be a bad idea if it is done correctly (in a Biblical way). When done in a Biblical way, following Biblical principles, letting God guide you in fasting, fasting can be beneficial for you. I know several people for whom regular times of fasting have been beneficial. One of them has actually been able to gain weight after fasting and this person does both short-term fasting and up to twenty-one fasting on a regular basis. I should also mention that fasting is not starvation. When people have times of proper, regular fasting, the times that they don't spend preparing and eating meals are the times they spend in prayer with God. As far as I know, this is the only proper way of true fasting and to my knowledge all other fasting (as some people may call it) is just people depriving themselves of certain foods. I would agree that depriving your body (using your in a general sense here, not meaning your body specifically) of certain foods for long periods of time is a bad idea.
Religion does not have exclusive rights to the word "fasting". There is no "as some people may call it", if people are abstaining from food for a period of time, no matter what the reason, they are fasting. You can fast for religious reasons, political reasons, medical reasons, health, weight loss... religion is only one of many reasons for fasting