Posted on 03/18/2014 5:53:22 AM PDT by marshmallow
PERTH, Australia (CNS) -- Several Australian bishops said they would support re-establishment of year-round Friday abstinence in Australia, following the lead of England and Wales.
Auxiliary Bishop Peter Elliott of Melbourne, Bishop Geoffrey Jarrett of Lismore and Bishop Michael Kennedy of Armidale are among prelates who said they support Friday abstinence from meat -- without sanction of sin -- almost 30 years after it became non-compulsory in Australia.
In 2011, the Catholic bishops of England and Wales restored Friday abstinence.
Friday penance regulations in England and Wales were relaxed in 1985, as they were in Australia, allowing Catholics to perform an alternative form of penance. U.S. bishops ended obligatory abstinence in 1966.
Looking back at the decision to end Friday abstinence in Australia, Bishop Elliott said it was a "big pastoral and spiritual mistake."
"I can understand why that happened, in the mood of that era, but I believe it failed to take into account human psychology," he said.
Friday abstinence was a universal practice that Catholics were obliged to fulfill under pain of sin until Pope Paul VI issued his apostolic constitution on penance in 1966. The document gave bishops, acting through their episcopal conferences, the ability to establish the norms "they consider the most opportune and efficacious" in regards to fasting and abstinence.
(Excerpt) Read more at catholicnews.com ...
>> “If you are driven away by the prospect of foregoing meat one day a week, that says a lot about you, not the Church.” <<
.
Scripturally, we are to forego only that which is ‘unclean.’
To do otherwise is to add to scripture, which is forbidden.
.
I’ve not eaten meat on Friday but a couple of times in my life. We always had fried fish on Fridays. It was a tradition in my family. When I became Catholic I told the RCIA class that it would not be hard for me to just eat fish on Fridays because I had already been doing it basically all my life. Not long before she died I asked my mother why she always cooked fish on Fridays and she because she liked fish! She goes on to say that fish was about the only food that anyone in the Bible ate so that was another good reason to eat fish. Fried fish, mostly catfish or flounder, hushpuppies and cole slaw, and of course with a big pitcher of ice tea to wash it all down with. Mama always had to have coffee with her fish. The only time she would drink coffee in the afternoon is when she ate fish. Breakfast sometimes was catfish and grits.
Indeed. I believe in fasting and I certainly believe in repentance. What I don’t believe in is penance. Men can’t atone for their sin themselves. Man’s best is still sinful (see Isaiah 64:6) so we would have to atone for our sinful penance. CHRIST bore the sins of His people on the cross. He paid the price! It is all about HIM!
“For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.”
— 2 Corinthians 5:21
“But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.”
—Isaiah 53:5
Thank you Jesus (and bible gateway)
Matthew 15
New International Version (NIV)
That Which Defiles
15 Then some Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus from Jerusalem and asked, 2 “Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don’t wash their hands before they eat!”
3 Jesus replied, “And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition? 4 For God said, ‘Honor your father and mother’[a] and ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’[b] 5 But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is ‘devoted to God,’ 6 they are not to ‘honor their father or mother’ with it. Thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition. 7 You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you:
8
“‘These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
9
They worship me in vain;
their teachings are merely human rules.’[c]”
10 Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen and understand. 11 What goes into someone’s mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them.”
12 Then the disciples came to him and asked, “Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this?”
13 He replied, “Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots. 14 Leave them; they are blind guides.[d] If the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.”
15 Peter said, “Explain the parable to us.”
16 “Are you still so dull?” Jesus asked them. 17 “Don’t you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? 18 But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. 19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. 20 These are what defile a person; but eating with unwashed hands does not defile them.”
Dear friend, have you ever sacrificed something you wanted in order to demonstrate your love for someone else? That is the concept behind a Friday abstinence. It is a personal discipline, that rises from the heart, out of love for the One who gave His life for us, on a Friday.
At one time, the church mandated this form of abstinence for precisely that purpose. Midway through the 20th century, the Catholic church, acknowledging that some catholics, due to societal constraints, found themselves in situations where such a sacrifice was no longer possible, proffered the notion of substituting another form of personal sacrifice on Fridays. Sadly, most Catholics heard "okay to eat meat on Fridays" but not the part that followed.
Abstinence should come from the heart. I choose to abstain on Fridays, for that very reason, not because it is mandated or in the Bible. In so doing, it becomes a personal journey with our Lord that draws us closer together. Given the increasing number of Americans who consider themselves "vegetarians", mandating a meatless Friday has no effect on them.
What could you sacrifice for one day each week, as an act of love for Jesus Christ?
Well said!
wrong... research your history
The catholic church made a deal with local fishermen to get people to eat more fish
I am not going to sacrifice meat eating for the church to make a buck
it doesn't, however the church has Christs' authority to make its' own institutional rules. If you want to be a Catholic, there are rules to follow. This was a pretty easy penance to engage in, and it reminded you, every week, that a little penance went a long way. The Bible does, however, say that we should keep holy the lord's day....do you attend church services EVERY week?
wrong....interpret history correctly....under your scenario, the church made no money, the fishermen did.....
I noticed even in Iraq at the bigger FOBs lobster and steak were served on Friday’s. So the Ol’ padre could have his “fish.”:)
If you’re going to research history, you must follow it through to the end. For much of Christian history, flesh meat was a delicacy for landowners and out of reach for most of the population. Fish was the one protein the poor could add to their primarily porridge based diet without spending a lot of money or endangering themselves by poaching.
The meals of the wealthy, conversely, consisted of course after course of cattle and game. In essence, you’re complaining that the church forced the rich to eat like poor people once a week.
I don’t expect much from the American bishops, after all they gave us the NAB translation whose copyright they own.
We also had the worst translation of the mass which was finally re-done a few years ago. (I believe 2011)
That was the gift of the American bishops as well. Hopefully the generation coming up will re-do the actions of the former generation of bishops in America.
Which Bible do you use?
For general use, the KJV.
It is the most reliable of the English whole Bibles.
I also use many related aids and completely Biblical teachings. I reject all that requires sorting or selecting portions out of scripture.
Any theory that leaves portions of the word as untrue, or not to be followed is most likely false at its foundation.
>> “I don’t expect much from the American bishops, after all they gave us the NAB translation whose copyright they own.” <<
.
That which is copyrighted is strictly for profit, not for truth, or reading.
.
For most of the first thousand years or so of Western (Christian) Europe, meat - mutton, beef, poultry, and especially venison - was a delicacy that only the rich could afford, and fish was the food of the poor.
So much so that the London apprentices petitioned their masters' guilds that they only be forced to eat salmon twice a week.
You can't believe everything you read around the internet.
The Douay-Rheims (Challoner revision) is pretty good but rather Latinate-sounding (no surprise there). It was heavily relied on in the KJV New Testament. The RSV (Catholic edition) isn't bad either. I was raised on KJV, but it has its drawbacks, among them inaccurate translation and scholarship that has been superseded. Its language, however, is without peer save for the Douay. The 17th century scholarly Englishman spoke and wrote the purest and most graceful English the world has ever seen -- whether he was in OxBridge, Westminster, or Douay.
My personal fave at the moment is the Knox Bible by the immensely scholarly and talented Msgr. Ronald Knox (he also wrote detective stories; pretty good ones). It is everything a 'dynamic translation' should be - unlike the poor excuse for same exemplified in the NAB and the "old, lame duck" Mass translation.
I must read the whole thread before commenting.
I must read the whole thread before commenting.
I must read the whole thread before commenting.
I must read the whole thread before commenting.
I don't know if I'd go so far as to say that in every case, because 'the laborer is worthy of his hire', but it certainly is a strong temptation.
We see it not only in the NAB (and the bishops' insistence that that be the only version used at Mass) but also in the music publishers like OCP and GIA . . . they would rather print copyrighted music by their own questionable modern "composers" than decent Catholic music that's public domain or under someone else's copyright.
But there's a new movement afoot in the Church to distribute music more freely. I hope it takes off.
From your earlier reply:
“To do otherwise is to add to scripture, which is forbidden.”
If you are using the current KJV you are missing seven books. So you may not have added to scripture but you have subtracted.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.