Meat on fridays?

[Curious_Hobbit]

Can someone give me a clear answer on whether or not we as Catholics should eat meat on Fridays? My dad is very adamant that we must give up meat on fridays, but few years ago at an apologetics class my parish priest (who is unpopular with some members of our community for keeping our church orthodox) insisted that it is no longer an obligation. Rather he said that the church recommends that you try to make a weekly sacrifice. Can someone please give me a straight answer on what Catholics should do on this matter? Please provide quotes from the CCC or the magesterium or other resources. Thanks!

 

[thistle]

Can someone give me a clear answer on whether or not we as Catholics should eat meat on Fridays? My dad is very adamant that we must give up meat on fridays, but few years ago at an apologetics class my parish priest (who is unpopular with some members of our community for keeping our church orthodox) insisted that it is no longer an obligation. Rather he said that the church recommends that you try to make a weekly sacrifice. Can someone please give me a straight answer on what Catholics should do on this matter? Please provide quotes from the CCC or the magesterium or other resources. Thanks!

It depends which country you live in. All Catholics are required to do a Friday penance. In most countries you can choose which penance to do, not eating meat being one of them.
In other countries not eating meat is the mandated Friday penance.
It is up to the Bishops Conference in each country to decide.

CCC 1438 The seasons and days of penance in the course of the liturgical year (Lent, and each Friday in memory of the death of the Lord) are intense moments of the Church’s penitential practice.36 These times are particularly appropriate for spiritual exercises, penitential liturgies, pilgrimages as signs of penance, voluntary self-denial such as fasting and almsgiving, and fraternal sharing (charitable and missionary works).

Can. 1253 The Episcopal Conference can determine more particular ways in which fasting and abstinence are to be observed. In place of abstinence or fasting it can substitute, in whole or in part, other forms of penance, especially works of charity and exercises of piety.

 

[wsxyz]

Can someone give me a clear answer on whether or not we as Catholics should eat meat on Fridays? My dad is very adamant that we must give up meat on fridays, but few years ago at an apologetics class my parish priest (who is unpopular with some members of our community for keeping our church orthodox) insisted that it is no longer an obligation. Rather he said that the church recommends that you try to make a weekly sacrifice. Can someone please give me a straight answer on what Catholics should do on this matter? Please provide quotes from the CCC or the magesterium or other resources. Thanks!

The Church obliges (not recommends) you do to penance on Fridays. Canon law states that the Friday penance Catholics must do is abstinence from meat. But permits national bishops’s conferences to alter this law.

vatican.va/archive/ENG1104/__P4O.HTM

The US. Bishops conference in 1966 decided that abstinence from meat was to remain the preferred Friday penance, but allowed Catholics to substitute another penance.

usccb.org/lent/2007/Penance_and_Abstinence.pdf [from #18]

The upshot is that you should abstain from meat on Fridays, but you may substitute another penance if you have a good reason. I have been advised by my pastor that praying 5 decades of the rosary is a good substitute.

Abstaining from meat is usually the easiest penance to do on Fridays, so for most Catholics it makes sense to abstain from penance.

 

[TeenageConvert]

Can someone give me a clear answer on whether or not we as Catholics should eat meat on Fridays? My dad is very adamant that we must give up meat on fridays, but few years ago at an apologetics class my parish priest (who is unpopular with some members of our community for keeping our church orthodox) insisted that it is no longer an obligation. Rather he said that the church recommends that you try to make a weekly sacrifice. Can someone please give me a straight answer on what Catholics should do on this matter? Please provide quotes from the CCC or the magesterium or other resources. Thanks!

as otheres, and your priest have said, you must do penance every Friday, but on Fridays during Lent, no meat.
On alll the other Fridays, you can choose your penance(In America, I know in England they decided to go back to requiring no meat on Friday, because it was causing confusion, just like this)

It’s not a bad idea to abstain from meat every Friday though, it’s a lot easier to remember in my opinion.

 

[oneGODoneCHURCH]

Can someone give me a clear answer on whether or not we as Catholics should eat meat on Fridays? My dad is very adamant that we must give up meat on fridays, but few years ago at an apologetics class my parish priest (who is unpopular with some members of our community for keeping our church orthodox) insisted that it is no longer an obligation. Rather he said that the church recommends that you try to make a weekly sacrifice. Can someone please give me a straight answer on what Catholics should do on this matter? Please provide quotes from the CCC or the magesterium or other resources. Thanks!

It is the norm of the universal church to abstain on all fridays unless is is a solemnity. However, each conferrence of bishops can make suiteable substitues in their diocesee.

If you are a vegitarian is it really penence to not eat meat on friday? Or you live on a pacific island were you eat seafood daily would not eating meat be a penence? For everyone else the norm is still to give up meat on that day.

 

[BrianIndy]

I don’t consider praying the Holy Rosary a penance. I consider praying the Holy Rosary a luxury.

 

[puzzleannie]

Can someone give me a clear answer on whether or not we as Catholics should eat meat on Fridays? My dad is very adamant that we must give up meat on fridays, but few years ago at an apologetics class my parish priest (who is unpopular with some members of our community for keeping our church orthodox) insisted that it is no longer an obligation. Rather he said that the church recommends that you try to make a weekly sacrifice. Can someone please give me a straight answer on what Catholics should do on this matter? Please provide quotes from the CCC or the magesterium or other resources. Thanks!

missing info
where do you live
the source you want is the direction of the bishop of your diocese or the bishop’s conference of your country, it is not in the CCC, and the magesterium is not a book or a website it is the sum of the Church’s teaching authority. This is a discipline, not a dogma, so it can change with time and circumstances.

It is most likely the answer you got at that time and place is correct for that time and place. Nobody is telling you not to abstain from meat on Fridays, they are telling you it is an option among any penitential practice or prayer. Even in dioceses, such as those in England and Wales, and recently Steubenville Ohio, that are restoring the practice the bishops make it very clear this is NOT binding under pain of sin.

 

[Monica4316]

Can someone give me a clear answer on whether or not we as Catholics should eat meat on Fridays? My dad is very adamant that we must give up meat on fridays, but few years ago at an apologetics class my parish priest (who is unpopular with some members of our community for keeping our church orthodox) insisted that it is no longer an obligation. Rather he said that the church recommends that you try to make a weekly sacrifice. Can someone please give me a straight answer on what Catholics should do on this matter? Please provide quotes from the CCC or the magesterium or other resources. Thanks!

I think in the US, you’re encouraged to give up meat but if you can’t, you can do another sacrifice. But giving up meat is still the encouraged thing.

 

[Fone_Bone_2001]

It’s far from clear that - in the United States - any obligation binding under pain of sin exists to perform a penitential or charitable act on Fridays:

jimmyakin.org/2004/07/since_tomorrow_.html

jimmyakin.org/2004/07/more_on_friday_.html

That said, everyone agrees that at the very least, performing a specific penitential or charitable act for Fridays is at least strongly urged, and the universal norm for the Latin Church - what the standard would be without bishops’ conferences’ adjustments - is indeed abstinence on all Fridays except solemnities. And every year will have at least two solemnities on a Friday: Friday in the Octave of Easter, and the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. (This year we also had the Solemnity of the Annunciation on a Friday)

 

[thistle]

I don’t consider praying the Holy Rosary a penance. I consider praying the Holy Rosary a luxury.

CCC 1460 The penance the confessor imposes must take into account the penitent’s personal situation and must seek his spiritual good. It must correspond as far as possible with the gravity and nature of the sins committed. It can consist of prayer, an offering, works of mercy, service of neighbor, voluntary self-denial, sacrifices, and above all the patient acceptance of the cross we must bear. Such penances help configure us to Christ, who alone expiated our sins once for all. They allow us to become co-heirs with the risen Christ, “provided we suffer with him.”