Haddock is served during a fish fry in the parish hall of St. Mary’s Church in Altoona, Pa., Feb. 16, 2013. The parish Lenten Friday fish fry is an opportunity for Catholics to see themselves as part of a larger family of faith. (CNS photo/Bob Roller)
Few things are constant in our home except the nightly debate over dinner. If one kid likes spaghetti and meatballs, then two don’t. Eggs? Yuck, says the middle one. Tacos, lasagna, rice, beans, baked carrots — even pie — there’s always at least one dissenter in the crowd.
No one is starving at our house. But we do tend to obsess over what we eat. Given that, you’d think that Fridays during Lent would be a meal minefield with our house of five abstaining from meat.
Truth be told, those Fridays are the only time of year when there’s no fight about dinner. It’s always understood — cheese pizza.
It’s almost a relief to not have to make a decision. We know what we’re having, but more important, our kids know why.
Traditionally, Catholics aged 14 and over are required to abstain from meat on Fridays during Lent (and to fast on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday), but as long as our kids have been at the dinner table, they’ve gone meat-free with us. OK, they might not know exactly why we’re skipping the pepperoni, but they know it has something to do with church and Lent.
I’ll admit, meat-free Fridays during Lent is an easy sell in the kid world. After all, cheese pizza tastes pretty good. But I think there are some deeper lessons to consider.
For starters, it shows we are making a sacrifice. Granted, it’s not like dying on the cross for the salvation of all — thank you, Lord — but it does show a willingness to go without as a sign of obedience and respect.
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Most of the time, we don’t think of a hamburger as a token of love, but if that’s our favorite food and we make a point not to savor its juicy goodness on a Friday during Lent, that means something. If you’ve ever witnessed the magnetic power of a chicken nugget in the presence of a toddler, you understand what I mean.
Like many families, we are on the go most days of the week. We don’t eat at the same time and, of course, not everybody likes what we are having.
That makes our Friday night cheese pizza dates even more meaningful. They are an opportunity for the five of us to be together and catch up on what we’ve missed between soccer games, band practice and Girl Scouts meetings.
I think it also helps knowing that we aren’t the only ones following crazy rules about what we have to eat and when.
By now, my 8-year-old knows the drill about no meat on Fridays during Lent. He sees the signs for the weekly fish fry at our church and even though he and his sisters don’t like fish, they beg us to go. (For the French fries, naturally.)
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So, we take a break from our cheese pizza party at least once to join the fried food fun with the rest of our parish.
If we are trying to raise children who see themselves as part of a larger family of faith, it helps to put them in situations where they can see it in context. Two cheese pizzas at home on a Friday night is not the same thing as a church hall full of people who believe the same way we do. It helps to celebrate our faith and share it with others joyfully.
Lent is supposed to be a time of prayerful reflection and repentance. But there can be happiness and laughter in that time as well. We can use our Lenten abstentions as a way to teach our children about sacrifice, community and tradition.
All it takes is a cheese pizza.
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Bothum is a freelance writer and a mother of three.
I moved to Philly more than 20 years ago form Pittsburgh. Back in the Burgh, a Friday fish fry was not only part of the Catholic traditions, they were a HUGE competition to see who was the best. The town I grew up in had 6 to choose from at any time of the year, not just during Lent. But I agree, the Philly area does not have a large Eastern European food culture. You have to go west to Harrisburg (AKA Pittsburgh East) to get a good old fish fry dinner. You also do not get the volunteers in the Parish like you still see back in the Burgh. Such a shame b/c is is great food, cold beer and a great way for the communities to come together for a few hours. When i moved here, i asked around for local fish fry dinners and folks looked at me like I was from Mars………
I’m curious as to where there is a Lenten fish fry in the Philadelphia diocese. I’m in the suburbs west of Philadelphia and there are something like 30 or 40 Catholic churches within a half-hour drive of my house, mostly between myself and the city. I was looking and looking for any that had a fish fry for this past Friday. I am from a different city where there were at least a half-dozen Catholic fish fries to choose from on any given Friday of Lent. However, the only regularly occurring fish fry I could find near Philly was St. Josephs in Downingtown which is only held 3 times in Lent and doesn’t start till later in March. I noticed that there were several options in the Harrisburg diocese (60 miles away from me) and the diocese north of Philadelphia (at least 45 miles away from me) as well as in Delaware just south of Chester and Delaware counties in PA. I ended up driving south to Delaware (15 mile drive) which had several fish fry options, went to St. Mary of the Assumption which had great fish, a bake sale for the youth group and was extremely crowded. I can’t even find a directory of local fish fries using the “search” option on CatholicPhilly.com , and I see people asking this same question (where are the Catholic fish fries in Philly?) on other sites and nobody knows of any and they usually get directed over to North Jersey. Depressing to have so few options in Philadelphia when if I were in Pittsburgh, Harrisburg, Cleveland, Cincinnati etc there would be no problem finding a nice fish fry to benefit the church.
Fish Fry nights simply are not a traditional practice during Lent in the Philadelphia Archdiocese, and never have been, whereas they are very popular in other areas of the country. This is a reality of the Catholic culture of this area, and every area is different.
Never ate meat on Fridays–Lent or no Lent.