Tonight is the last time during this Lenten Season when Roman Catholic churches put on a fish fry at their church. They have been so doing, and I, to my pleasure, have been attending for some years now. I do so every Lent. Look forward to it
But this is the last time, this season, this very Friday. That is because next Friday is Good Friday and it just wouldn’t be right to be feasting on delicious deep fried cod while the Christ was laying unannointed in a local tomb. So this is shut down night, and after tonight I will just have to wait for the next Ash Wednesday. That is when one proclaims the starting of the next Lent by portraying, by a smudge of ashes on the forehead, an act of public penitence, something the Christ specifically forbad in the Sermon on the Mount. See Matthew: 6.
So here is something the churches (or some of them) got right. How to put on a fine fish fry.
And, others to the contrary, I have no problem giving the church good money for a good meal. There is nothing bad about getting value for value, is there?
Where did the whole idea come from? It is susposed to be a sacrifice, a giving up of better food or something. But given a choice, I would take a good fried fish dinner over a lot of other options. So how is that a sacrifice? It is another of those mysteries of faith.
Someone said that the thing got going when some Pope, a thousand or so years ago, owned a fish farm, and well……
Edwin.
Edwin Kagin © 2012.
I heard that too about how a Pope had a “conflict of interest” when the whole Fish Friday got started. No idea if it’s true but it sure sounds like it could be true. I also understood that during the Inquisition jews were executed for not having fish on a Friday. What would that Pope have said if he knew his edict would have resulted in death? Would he even care?
On a similar vein I understand that Elizabeth I extended the traditional catholic Friday ‘fish day’ to include other days of the week.
There wasn’t a religous reason for this, purely a desire to increase the fish trade and consequently the number of skilled sailors in England, so there would be more skilled seamen available for her Navy.
Religion being exploited for political gain.