How do You Like Your Muskrat?
It’s “Lent,” so Catholics have to abstain from meat on Fridays, right? Not in southeast Michigan according to the March 9 Michigan Catholic, the newspaper of the Archdiocese of Detroit, in an article titled, “Muskrat Love? It’s a Lent Thing for Downriver Area.”
As usual, Catholics can break their rules anytime they want! There is a local “tradition” from the 1700’s, when French trappers and traders in what is now southeast Michigan were allowed by their priests to eat muskrat in place of fish during Lent.
Comment – The Great Lakes and rivers of back then were teeming with fish! My guess is the trappers and traders were too lazy to fish, so the priests gave them a free pass.
“Although there is no documentation of the original dispensation,” the archdiocese allows the eating of muskrat during Lent because “there is long-standing permission – dating back to our missionary origins in the 1700’s.”
The article featured one church that has muskrat dinners, and described various ways in which muskrat can be prepared. One priest said he preferred his muskrat marinated in a secret recipe based on a French liqueur! Another local connoisseur said he likes it sautéed in butter and garlic.
Catholic Canon Law says:
Canon 1251: “Abstinence from eating meat or another food according to the prescriptions of the conference of bishops is to be observed on Fridays throughout the year…
Canon 1252: “All persons who have completed their fourteenth year are bound by the law of abstinence…”
How do Michigan Catholics get around these laws? In 1987 a Michigan bishop determined (rather lamely) on this muskrat issue that:
“Although muskrat is a warm-blooded mammal and technically flesh, the custom has been so long held along Michigan’s rivers and marshes that it was ‘immemorial custom,’ thus allowed by canon law.”
Ohhhh……I get it! All Catholics have to do is call something an “immemorial custom,” and they can void their own laws! No wonder so many people are Catholic!
Hebrews 13:9b says, “For it is a good thing that the heart be established with grace; not with meats, which have not profited them that have been occupied therein.” May God give Catholics repentance from Rome and its silly rules about food, and the grace to turn to Christ ALONE for the forgiveness of sins and eternal life.
As usual, Catholics can break their rules anytime they want! There is a local “tradition” from the 1700’s, when French trappers and traders in what is now southeast Michigan were allowed by their priests to eat muskrat in place of fish during Lent.
Comment – The Great Lakes and rivers of back then were teeming with fish! My guess is the trappers and traders were too lazy to fish, so the priests gave them a free pass.
“Although there is no documentation of the original dispensation,” the archdiocese allows the eating of muskrat during Lent because “there is long-standing permission – dating back to our missionary origins in the 1700’s.”
The article featured one church that has muskrat dinners, and described various ways in which muskrat can be prepared. One priest said he preferred his muskrat marinated in a secret recipe based on a French liqueur! Another local connoisseur said he likes it sautéed in butter and garlic.
Catholic Canon Law says:
Canon 1251: “Abstinence from eating meat or another food according to the prescriptions of the conference of bishops is to be observed on Fridays throughout the year…
Canon 1252: “All persons who have completed their fourteenth year are bound by the law of abstinence…”
How do Michigan Catholics get around these laws? In 1987 a Michigan bishop determined (rather lamely) on this muskrat issue that:
“Although muskrat is a warm-blooded mammal and technically flesh, the custom has been so long held along Michigan’s rivers and marshes that it was ‘immemorial custom,’ thus allowed by canon law.”
Ohhhh……I get it! All Catholics have to do is call something an “immemorial custom,” and they can void their own laws! No wonder so many people are Catholic!
Hebrews 13:9b says, “For it is a good thing that the heart be established with grace; not with meats, which have not profited them that have been occupied therein.” May God give Catholics repentance from Rome and its silly rules about food, and the grace to turn to Christ ALONE for the forgiveness of sins and eternal life.
posted by Robt. B. at 2:51 PM
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