Three religious traditions overlap this year, providing a rare opportunity for collective reflection | Kat Eghdamian

For the first time in decades, three major religious traditions - Christianity, Islam, and the Baha'i Faith - will observe their sacred fasting periods at the same time

• Making sense of it is a column about spirituality and how it can be used to navigate everyday life

I remember the first time I truly felt the power of fasting. It was during the Baha'i Fast, in the quiet hours before sunrise, when I woke in darkness to eat.During those still moments, I felt something unexpected: clarity. The hunger I had feared was not an enemy but a teacher. It stripped away the excess, revealing a heightened awareness, a quiet strength. Fasting was not about deprivation, but about making space - literally and symbolically.

Religious fasting has always carried a critique of the status quo. It challenges the idea that fulfilment is found in the material world. It asks us to consider the nature of our attachments and reassess what we truly need. It's no accident that many of history's great thinkers - Mahatma Gandhi, Simone Weil, and Nelson Mandela - used fasting not just as a spiritual discipline but as a means for stripping away illusion and encountering a deeper truth.

Dr Kat Eghdamian is a human rights expert, writer, and adviser on religion, ethics, and social justice. With experience working across multiple continents, she explores how faith and moral frameworks shape identity and society.