Lenten Fridays

Today is a Friday of Lent, and because we send our kids to a public school, there happen to be two meat choices on the lunch menu. I think the people that set up the menu must have been reminded about Lent at some point, because the menu for the rest of March just came home, and there is a meatless choice for the next couple of Fridays.

To be quite honest, my kids rarely buy lunch, considering what I think is healthy and what they (meaning the school system) think is healthy differs markedly. Furthermore, I don't expect everyone to cater to our beliefs. I support the separation of church and state. But there is a large Catholic population in this area, and I do know that a good percentage of the children that go to our school rely on buying school lunches. In my mind, it is good to know that the powers that be care.

However, I really do wonder about this whole meat free Friday thing. In fact, I have big issues with it. I remember, as a kid, going meatless on Ash Wednesday, the Fridays of Lent, and furthermore, many Fridays throughout the year. Did I care? I wept with joy at the thought of not being forced to eat meat on Fridays! There was a reason I turned vegetarian once I left my parents house. I just didn't care for meat. So if the point of fasting is to gain spiritual focus, which includes using self discipline and performance of penance, than the point was lost on me. It was easy to give up meat. Now giving up ice cream, that would have been hard.

Another senseless point is the age requirements as set by Canon Law. Apparently anyone healthy between the ages of 14 and 59 are required to perform abstinence during the Fridays of Lent. Well, I can tell you this: my 10 year olds are eating peanut butter and jelly today. They would have preferred to have some salami or even buy the coveted pepperoni pizza stick on the menu today. But they are old enough to give something up, and more importantly, they care about it. For them, the abstaining from meat is a hardship. They don't need to be 14 to understand that. And they won't magically be able to not do it once they are 60 years old. My dad is 77. He is well out of the age range according to the church. But the man loves meat! In my mind (and I don't know what he does), he should not be eating meat on the Fridays of Lent.

You can call me blasphemous, call me Beelzebub. Whatever. I just don't think that the Catholic Church has progressed well into the 21st century, or maybe I just shouldn't be a Catholic anymore. Come to think of it, I disagree with many of their teachings, some of the bigger ones included (another post, another day). But does abstaining from meat make sense in this day and age? How about cell phone/smart phone free Fridays instead? That scenario, I could see being a hardship for many, possibly truly teaching the lesson of self-discipline and penance much more than not eating meat.