Eating Fish

[Woolybabe]

I hope this is not a silly question, but I have only recently started investigating Catholism as a lent study and then realised how much it made sense. I have heard that Catholics eat fish on Fridays, but I am not sure. Do you only eat fish on Fridays and if so why? Thanks. And apologies if it is a stupid question.

 

[Jennet]

Hello and welcome!

Someone will be able to give you a more learned answer to this than I can, but basically, it’s less about eating the fish and more about abstaining from meat. (Fish is just a popular substitute.) This abstinence is a form of self-denial by which we can honour the day on which Christ died.

 

[1ke]

I hope this is not a silly question, but I have only recently started investigating Catholism as a lent study and then realised how much it made sense. I have heard that Catholics eat fish on Fridays, but I am not sure. Do you only eat fish on Fridays and if so why? Thanks. And apologies if it is a stupid question.

Catholics abstain from meat. That doesn’t necessarily mean they eat fish. I hate fish. I eat a lot of cheese sandwiches.

 

[newyorkcatholic]

Catholics abstain for certain days as a penance, and currently this involves not eating meat of mammals or birds.

(In the past Catholics abstained from seafood and dairy on certain days too; Eastern Catholics still do this).

Any more questions? You’re in the right place to ask.

 

[grasscutter]

I love fish! In my small city the Catholic population must be rather large, because on Fridays at the grocery store there is always more fish for sale that usual.

And to the OP, (like one other poster said) it is a penitential devotion because Jesus died on Friday. Anything non-mammal that lives in the water is not considered meat.

 

[Carolus_Martell]

When we were growing up during lent it was either fish, macaroni and cheese or potato pancakes. No meat on Fridays during lent. btw the communion fast was 3 hrs.

 

[LemonAndLime]

I’m a vegetarian, and the idea of abstaining from “meat” on fridays (thus eating fish) has perpetuated the idea that fish isn’t considered meat which leads to many dishes served in restaurants, with fish, being considered suitable for veggies.

I would word it more that it is traditional to eat fish and no other meat. Fish is still meat!

 

[cjmclark]

I love it that here in the US the fast food restaurants kicked it up a notch and started offering the double fish-wich during Lent. It always cracks me up to see the fish sandwich advertisements ramp up this time of year even here in the South, which has a (relatively) small Catholic population.

 

[johnnyjones]

I’m a vegetarian, and the idea of abstaining from “meat” on fridays (thus eating fish) has perpetuated the idea that fish isn’t considered meat which leads to many dishes served in restaurants, with fish, being considered suitable for veggies.

I would word it more that it is traditional to eat fish and no other meat. Fish is still meat!

But fish is not the meat of a bird or a mammal which is what the church teaches can not be eaten on the specified days.

 

[TeenageConvert]

It’s because we do penance on Fridays by not eating meat, fish being the exception (I don’t think anyone really knows why, but the best explanation I’ve heard is that fish was what poor people ate back in the middle ages, so fish was allowed as a way to humble the upper class who were used to eating red meat)

I love it that here in the US the fast food restaurants kicked it up a notch and started offering the double fish-wich during Lent. It always cracks me up to see the fish sandwich advertisements ramp up this time of year even here in the South, which has a (relatively) small Catholic population.

:hug3: I see you’re in SC too

 

[LemonAndLime]

But fish is not the meat of a bird or a mammal which is what the church teaches can not be eaten on the specified days.

But it is still meat.

 

[catharina]

When we were growing up during lent it was either fish, macaroni and cheese or potato pancakes. No meat on Fridays during lent. btw the communion fast was 3 hrs.

Going back even farther into Catholic practices -

when I was growing up during Lent, yes, the above dishes might be
served but since I lived in Chicago where it could get unseasonably
hot any time (even during Lent) tuna salad and devilled eggs and such
were also served so no one was stuck in a hot kitchen.

Abstaining from meat was the rule in Lent and outside of Lent, every Friday.
The fast before receiving Holy Communion was from 12midnight the night before Mass.

 

[cjmclark]

Going back even farther into Catholic practices -

when I was growing up during Lent, yes, the above dishes might be
served but since I lived in Chicago where it could get unseasonably
hot any time (even during Lent) tuna salad and devilled eggs and such
were also served so no one was stuck in a hot kitchen.

Abstaining from meat was the rule in Lent and outside of Lent, every Friday.
The fast before receiving Holy Communion was from 12midnight the night before Mass.

Abstaining from meat on Fridays outside of Lent is still the rule. The US bishops simply have a dispensation to waive that abstention provided a suitable act of penance is offered in its stead. That’s something I (as a Catholic in the US) didn’t know until a few years ago, and I imagine there is probably a pretty sizable number of Catholics who aren’t aware of it here, being as religious education in recent years has been spotty in general.

 

[Tantum_ergo]

Abstaining from meat on Fridays outside of Lent is still the rule. The US bishops simply have a dispensation to waive that abstention provided a suitable act of penance is offered in its stead. That’s something I (as a Catholic in the US) didn’t know until a few years ago, and I imagine there is probably a pretty sizable number of Catholics who aren’t aware of it here, being as religious education in recent years has been spotty in general.

Right. The U.S. bishops received the Indult in 1965 (when I was 9), so I remember year-round Friday abstinence very well.

As Lemon and Lime (one of our posters ‘across the pond’) would tell you, the UK Bishops recently (I think Sept 2011) reinstituted year-round Friday abstinence for their dioceses.

And there is JUST ENOUGH AMBIGUITY in the texts of the Indult that one could --and many Catholics do-- argue that outside of the Lenten abstinence, one is only “ENCOURAGED” to do penance, and is not ‘required’ to do so, although since the Universal Norm is Friday abstinence and since the Church is universal, one would think it rather strange that some groups of Catholics MUST do a penance and some other groups of Catholics don’t have to, based upon where they live. It’s not exactly as though the majority of US Catholics can be held up as model Catholic Christians compared to non-US Catholics when it comes to practice of voluntary penance and an understanding of the sense of sin. . .

 

[cjmclark]

Right. The U.S. bishops received the Indult in 1965 (when I was 9), so I remember year-round Friday abstinence very well.

As Lemon and Lime (one of our posters ‘across the pond’) would tell you, the UK Bishops recently (I think Sept 2011) reinstituted year-round Friday abstinence for their dioceses.

And there is JUST ENOUGH AMBIGUITY in the texts of the Indult that one could --and many Catholics do-- argue that outside of the Lenten abstinence, one is only “ENCOURAGED” to do penance, and is not ‘required’ to do so, although since the Universal Norm is Friday abstinence and since the Church is universal, one would think it rather strange that some groups of Catholics MUST do a penance and some other groups of Catholics don’t have to, based upon where they live. It’s not exactly as though the majority of US Catholics can be held up as model Catholic Christians compared to non-US Catholics when it comes to practice of voluntary penance and an understanding of the sense of sin. . .

Unfortunately, we as Americans tend to be legalistic by nature, and finding little loopholes like that delight us just enough that we generally fail to see the greater implications of exploiting them.

 

[catharina]

Abstaining from meat on Fridays outside of Lent is still the rule. The US bishops simply have a dispensation to waive that abstention provided a suitable act of penance is offered in its stead. That’s something I (as a Catholic in the US) didn’t know until a few years ago, and I imagine there is probably a pretty sizable number of Catholics who aren’t aware of it here, being as religious education in recent years has been spotty in general.

Absolutely correct.

Yet in previous times, there was NO substitute penance available to anyone.

 

[johnnyjones]

But it is still meat.

In the original Latin of Pope VI’s apostolic constitution Paenitemini- the word used for meat is carnis. In modern English meat can refer to any animal flesh.

BUT, in Latin it refers to mammals and birds ONLY- so fish, amphibians and insects except mammals and fowls are not

So, according to the Catholic church, which is all that should concern you as a professed Catholic, you are wrong.

 

[LemonAndLime]

In the original Latin of Pope VI’s apostolic constitution Paenitemini- the word used for meat is carnis. In modern English meat can refer to any animal flesh.

BUT, in Latin it refers to mammals and birds ONLY- so fish, amphibians and insects except mammals and fowls are not

So, according to the Catholic church, which is all that should concern you as a professed Catholic, you are wrong.

No. Kindly point out where in the Catechism I am required to define meat as flesh apart from fish.

According to latin, if I was speaking latin, I would be wrong. We no longer speak latin, we are speaking English, so I am using the english definition.

 

[Tantum_ergo]

No. Kindly point out where in the Catechism I am required to define meat as flesh apart from fish.

According to latin, if I was speaking latin, I would be wrong. We no longer speak latin, we are speaking English, so I am using the english definition.

But the original Latin as understood in the time defined meat differently from the English definition of meat. That’s the thing. Meat was considered the flesh of warm blooded creatures. Fish are cold blooded; ergo, fish was not meat according to the understanding of the time regarding what was and was not meat.

Remember, at the time meat was defined that way, the medical profession also believed that the liver was the ‘seat’ of the body’s function, and that humanity could be divided into four groups based upon the ‘humours’ of the bodily fluids --melancholic, choleric, sanguine, and phlegmatic. We sure don’t understand our body that way today–our understanding of the human body has developed. So has our understanding of meat.

You cannot insist on a 21st century "English definition’ to define a 3rd century Latin word. . .

 

[Mrs_Sally]

It doesn’t matter. The rule is to not eat meat. Nothing says you must eat fish! We abstain from meat because we remember Christ’s sacrifice of his body (his “meat”/carne). If you choose to eat mac n cheese every Friday or codfish, it is all the same.

The thing that cracks me up about the rule is how everyone seems to think it is so hard, especially for children, but I don’t know any child who wouldn’t eat a mac n cheese dinner. And most adults I know could easily have spaghetti and marinara sauce for dinner without thinking about it, but on Friday they think you are starving them!