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A new meatless option?


Prophet Zacharia

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35 minutes ago, JerrySTL said:

I was raised Roman Catholic and was taught that seafood wasn't meat as it wasn't warm-blooded. So during Lent we could abstain from meat by eating lobster, clams, oysters, shrimp and fish.

The rumor was that the Pope owned a bunch of fisheries.

I noticed quiet a few commercials for fish sandwiches at restaurant chains.   We were raised Catholic too and fish Friday was a thing during lent.  

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I read several web pages today on the origin of meatless Fridays in Christianity.  The basic conclusion is no one knows but it wasn't done to intentionally increase the sale of fish to help poor fisherman, as one widespread rumor claims.

Taco Bell recently told the Pope it would pay the Catholic Church $50,000,000 per year to change the Lord's Prayer to, "Give us this day our daily taco."

The Pope asked for advice from the College of Cardinals.

One Cardinal spoke up, "It sounds like a good idea to me, but what are we going to do about our existing contract with Wonderbread?"

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With a little more research, I think the passage below sounds more realistic than some of the unrealistic junk I've read about the origin of meatless Fridays in Christianity.

Originally, few people besides the rich regularly ate meat in ancient times and the Early Church's edict was intended to be a reminder and demonstration of faith, where veggies and fruits would be consumed.

But, since "meat" refers to warm-blooded animals, "fish" was the "loophole" people began to use to replace meat - and it was something many non-rich consumed.

So Friday became the "Fishday" I knew so well as a boy going to Catholic School in the 50's and 60's.  Of course, we knew you didn't have to eat fish!

There Was No Requirement That People Eat Fish

It is important to note that the Church’s directive called for abstaining from eating meat and did not mention, let alone require or even encourage, the eating of fish on Fridays.

The Church’s objective in calling on the faithful to abstain from eating meat on certain days was to provide them with a simple exercise to aid in their spiritual development.

Human nature being what it is, people usually react to new rules by looking for loopholes which enable them to comply with the letter of the rule but not necessarily the spirit of the rule.

In its abstinence rule, the Church simply required its members to abstain from eating meat with the idea that people would limit their food to vegetables and grains on Fridays.

Meat is generally considered to be the flesh of warm-blooded land animals. Fish, on the other hand, are cold blooded water dwelling creatures. Using this technicality, people began consuming the flesh of fish in place of the flesh of animals on days of abstinence.

Fish thus became a part of the culture of the Catholic Church.

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