Do you practice Friday penance?

  • Thread starter Thread starter justbeinfrank
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
J

justbeinfrank

Guest
Just wondering how many people know that Friday penance is still required!
 
I abstain from meat on Fridays. Even though it’s no longer an obligation outside of Lent I do it on my own. I think doing any kind of penance out of free will is the best way.
 
I also am surprised that virtually no Catholic I meet realizes what the US Bishops actually say on this matter: Friday is still to be recognized as a day of penance. You can perform whatever act of penance you choose, however meat abstinence is still given “first place.”

See below:
catholicculture.org/docs/doc_view.cfm?recnum=5303
  1. Among the works of voluntary self-denial and personal penance which we especially commend to our people for the future observance of Friday, even though we hereby terminate the traditional law of abstinence as binding under pain of sin, as the sole prescribed means of observing Friday, we give first place to abstinence from flesh meat. We do so in the hope that the Catholic community will ordinarily continue to abstain from meat by free choice as formerly we did in obedience to Church law.
Click to expand...
I brought this up with one of my Priests and asked him if he abstained from meat on Fridays. He says he did not and he had a “personal objection” to that sort of practice. He did agree that we should turn our mind to penance on Fridays and on every day (good advice, of course), but meat abstinence, he said, was simply an old custom put in place by a Pope long ago, as a response to an economically troubled European fishing industry.

Personally, I choose to follow the Bishops. I pray that I will be able to incorporate greater acts of penance and charity into my Fridays. But as a starting point, meat abstinence and fasting are sorts of discipline that, when observed in the right spirit, can truly turn one’s mind more to Christ and his suffering. Granted, going without meat for a day is no great sacrifice, but the point is it’s a nice starting point to help you keep your thoughts on Christ’s Passion.
 
Over the last several years, I’ve only heard one priest in his sermon speak of the requirement for Friday penance. Since I’m old school and grew up during the pre-Vatican II period, I’ve simply continued the discipline of abstaining from meat on Fridays. If for some reason I slip up and forget to abstain, I then substitute some other penance.
 
Scotty PGH:
…but meat abstinence, he said, was simply an old custom put in place by a Pope long ago, as a response to an economically troubled European fishing industry.
Click to expand...
I believe he might be right about the origin of it, but I would have to give him the great, “So what?” Even if he could demonstrate that meat abstinence was an imprudential decision (which merely stating its origin does not), it is still bound in Heaven.

It’s like that great part in Brideshead Revisited. Cordelia complains that the nun disciplined her for not putting her shoes on the proper side of the bed. She says the Blessed Mother would not care where her shoes are. Brideshead retorts that maybe the BM doesn’t care, but she most certainly does care about obedience.

Scott
 
Scott Waddell:
Scotty PGH:
…but meat abstinence, he said, was simply an old custom put in place by a Pope long ago, as a response to an economically troubled European fishing industry.
Click to expand...
I believe he might be right about the origin of it…
Click to expand...
This is not the first time I’ve ever heard this – Indeed, not even the first time in this forum – But it just smacks of an anti-Catholic polemic.

Which pope?

How long ago?

Ask your priest to be specific, or withdraw the statement.

tee
 
No meat on Fridays for me…and for doing this for just over a year, I think I only slipped up 3 times…twice I caught myself and stopped and once was on purpose…I wish I was as perfect and successful in ALL things Catholic as this VERY EZ and no effort penance is…besides… I LOVE fish and any reason to eat a pizza must be holy 😃
 
I don’t have much experience with this because I just learned that the Church still requires Friday penance. When I abstain from meat on Friday, can I add an intention?

For example, can I ask God to accept my penance “for the conversion of” somebody?

Or is the intention sort of superfluous because I’m not doing it of my own will but rather out of obedience to the Church?
 
I’ve only recently learned this (near the end of last year), so I have started saying the divine mercy chaplet, and I’m planning to add other prayers and such as well during Lent, hopefully to keep throughout the year.
 
We are called to do some kind of penance on Friday. Not eating meat works good for me. If I go to a meeting on Friday, and meat is all they are serving for lunch, I say an extra rosary that day.

God bless,
Deacon Tony
 
40.png
tee_eff_em:
This is not the first time I’ve ever heard this – Indeed, not even the first time in this forum – But it just smacks of an anti-Catholic polemic.

Which pope?

How long ago?

Ask your priest to be specific, or withdraw the statement.

tee
Click to expand...
I too would like an answer to this question once and for all… since this is one of my husband’s “big beefs” regarding what he calls “The power of the Church”…Oh, BTW, did I forget to tell you that he is a very liberal Catholic and we constantly battle over the Faith …😦 Oh, and I abstain from meat on Friday…or I make some other sacrifice…
 
From Fr. John Hardon’s Pocket Catholic Encyclopedia:
**PENANCE. **The virtue or disposition of heart by which one repents of one’s own sins and is converted to God. Also the punishment by which one atones for sins committed, either by oneself or by others. And finally the sacrament of penance, where confessed sins committed after baptism are absolved by a priest in the name of God. (Etym. Latin paenitentia, repentance, contrition.)
Click to expand...
I pray that we all do penance everyday, given the above definition. However, Friday is especially significance to the Catholic Church as a day of penance because it is the day that Christ was crucified.

I abstain from meat and make a special effort to do one or more acts of corporeal or spiritual mercy.
 
…but meat abstinence, he said, was simply an old custom put in place by a Pope long ago, as a response to an economically troubled European fishing industry.
Click to expand...
This is funny! There must have been economic troubles in St. Augustine’s day too.

St. Augustine:
“Keep the flesh under by fastings and by abstinence from meat and drink” (Letter 211, AD 423)

“For, according to St. Augustine (De oratione et jejunio, sermo ccxxx, de temp.), abstinence purifies the soul, elevates the mind, subordinates the flesh to the spirit, begets a humble and contrite heart, scatters the clouds of concupiscence, extinguishes the fire of lust, and enkindles the true light of chastity.” CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Abstinence
Click to expand...
Maybe he just should have said, “abstinence … is good for the economy.” 😃

Or perhaps fasting in NT times was just a by-product of “economic troubles.” :rolleyes:
 
… sort of superfluous because I’m not doing it of my own will but rather out of obedience to the Church?
Click to expand...
“Obedience is better than sacrifices.” (1 King 15:22)

"Obedience deserves praise because it proceeds from charity: for Gregory says (Moral. xxxv) that “obedience should be practiced, not out of servile fear, but from a sense of charity, not through fear of punishment, but through love of justice. … Therefore, properly speaking, the virtue of obedience, whereby we contemn our own will for God’s sake, is more praiseworthy than the other moral virtues” (*Summa Theologica of St. Thomas Aquinas, *IIb, 104, 3)
 
I ate a couple of meatballs this past Friday without even thinking about it. I came home for lunch, and unconsciously fixed the first bit of left overs I found in the fridge. My wife, however, made sure that I performed not just one act of penance, but many, many acts… 😦 of course, she called these "acts of charity".:nope: uh-huh.
 
40.png
Lorrie:
I abstain from meat on Fridays. Even though it’s no longer an obligation outside of Lent I do it on my own. I think doing any kind of penance out of free will is the best way.
Click to expand...
Me too…
 
Yep… I ALWAYS abstain from meat on Fridays as well as some additional supplementary act which because of an unpredictable Friday schedule can take on various forms. Of course being a vegetarian requires the additional “supplementary act” ;)… Last Friday it was “bread & water” till sunset (I know, what a “lightweight”)… But I make a point to pray the Sorrowful Mysteries which call the mind to the spirit of the day. I also try as much as possible to alter my choice of music through the day while in the office to something more meditative or specifically Christian. At any rate, Friday has taken on a very distinctive aura since I’ve began practicing the penance.
 
I usually try to abstain from meat, but since my parents aren’t that religious, I can’t always do that, because of what they cook on Fridays outside of Lent. So usually I try to give up meat and something else on Fridays, for if I am forced to eat meat.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top