[Phantom Hoover]

Christians don't do meat on Friday? Huh??

in catholicism at least it stopped being mandatory (except on lent) after the second vatican council, but it's a long-running custom; also i think it only ever applied to red meat

[Mongoose]

Yeah, fish never qualified as "meat" for whatever reason, which is why you start seeing all the Filet o' Fish commercials every time Ash Wednesday rolls around.

[Mebber]

Reminds me of some not-so-serious "vegetarians" who abandon meat as food, but not fish. I can understand that if it's just based on personal taste or health concerns, but not if they say they're not eating meat for moral reasons and the like (don't wanna say that's common, it's just i met some who did). That seems kinda silly to me.

"Aww, the cute lamb. I'm not gonna eat that... how can YOU eat that, you monster!? - Oh! Fish fingers! Yummy!"

[BloodEagle]

Fun fact: plants exhibit fear.

[FUBAR-BDHR]

Yeah, fish never qualified as "meat" for whatever reason, which is why you start seeing all the Filet o' Fish commercials every time Ash Wednesday rolls around.

Of course fish never qualified as meat since most of apostle were fishermen.   How to increase profits?  Use your newly formed religion to make your product the only acceptable meat. 

BTW the rules are so ridiculous and convoluted now it isn't funny.  You can eat eggs but not chicken.  Drink milk and eat cheese but no beef.  There are exemptions for the elderly.  There are even exemptions if St. Patty's day falls on a Friday.  It's all just man made BS.   

[Mongoose]

Kind of a weird tangent we're on here, but I don't see why eggs, milk, and cheese shouldn't be okay, since none of those are "meat" in any sense, just products from animals; there are plenty of vegetarians fine with eating them too.  And the elderly are exempted for health concerns, in case they have certain dietary needs, but most of them would still normally abstain.

Plus, if you go by the gospels, the apostles who were fishermen quit when they first met Jesus, so they weren't exactly helping their bottom line here. (That's assuming that the tradition goes all the way back to apostolic times, which I'm unsure of.)

[Dragon]

Actually, birds also were exempted at some point, hence why bustards are rare in England. Back in the middle ages, this was a popular exploit. Oh, and beavers were considered fish for the purpose of fasting, and suffered a similar fate. Ever since rules were invented, people found a way around them. Doubly so if the rules are so horribly outdated they're nothing but a hindrance. In many cases, religious rules made sense back when they were invented (fasting, for example, made sense when food was scarce). Not so much nowadays, though.

[Flipside]

Oddly enough, Beaver was rated as a fish, hence the famous QI question of 'Can the Pope eat Beaver?'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRbkKrQeuj8

[Flak]

I just heard of something like that to be honest. I personally didn't know they don't eat meat on fridays and all, I think most, if not all Catholics in my area don't do such things. I am a Protestant myself so that is never an issue for me, I eat meat almost every day.

As much as I know, whether you eat eggs and milk products (and fish in that case) just depends on how vegetarian you wish to be, and to some extent also if it is religious related or not. Vegans on the other hand, that is a lot different story.

[Dragon]

The truth is, almost nobody does it these days. Fasting is one of less convenient customs and tends to be the first one people forget about. Aside from a few extremely devoted Catholics and clergy, nobody cares.

Regarding vegetarians, I think that the reason they're OK with eggs and cheese is that making them doesn't really harm animals. Milking a cow or taking eggs from a hen isn't a huge problem for either. As for the fish, I honestly don't know why they're generally omitted from "meat" category. Maybe it's the fact they look much less "relateable" than land animals (notice how, for example, they're treated in "funny animal" cartoons. Either it's all "funny fish/sea life" or fish are drawn realistically can't talk and are eaten normally). Usually, a hamster is a pet, a fish bowl is furniture, with children being the only ones to care about the latter. I noticed this is a general trend.

[karajorma]

Kind of a weird tangent we're on here

I kinda expected this topic to be about lions in suicide belts by the time I came back to it.

Kinda nice to see HLP can still surprise me.

[redsniper]

lions in suicide belts

Link plz.

[Phantom Hoover]

here you go

[The E]

I've split out the weird flower talk. Carry on.

[Al-Rik]

The truth is, almost nobody does it these days. Fasting is one of less convenient customs and tends to be the first one people forget about. Aside from a few extremely devoted Catholics and clergy, nobody cares.

Even the Catholics don't care, because they invented Ravioli and  Maultaschen.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maultasche

If the meat is minced small enough and camouflaged with pasta it doesn't count any more

[Beskargam]

Either it's all "funny fish/sea life" or fish are drawn realistically can't talk and are eaten normally). Usually, a hamster is a pet, a fish bowl is furniture, with children being the only ones to care about the latter. I noticed this is a general trend.

IIRC what I was taught in catholic high school, was that meat, particularly red meat, was  less common in the lower classes. Fish on the other hand, was pretty much a staple of a lot of diets for those who had less. The idea was that giving up "meat" was actually a sacrifice and you were giving up a luxury item if you were rich, or a a rare treat if you were  not. Fish was not considered part of this because a lot of people survived on it.

[Sandwich]

In modern Judaism, meat and dairy aren't eaten together. However, fish can be served in a dairy restaurant. The reasoning, AFAIK, is because nobody is going to mistake the (appearance? taste?) of fish for red meat. Why's that matter? It all ties back to the (decidedly odd) way the rabbis understand the verse that says "Don't boil a kid (as in baby goat, not as in child) is its mother's milk.". That's where the whole separation of meat and dairy comes from (don't ask).

[Black Wolf]

Yeah. Because that specific part of Judeo-Christian tradition is just totally ridiculous compared to the good common sense of the rest of it.

[karajorma]

I always find the lengths some people will go to in order to stick to the word of the law. The various workarounds for observing the Sabbath generally go from Heath Robinson to full blown Rube-Goldberg in their execution.

[Dragon]

In modern Judaism, meat and dairy aren't eaten together. However, fish can be served in a dairy restaurant. The reasoning, AFAIK, is because nobody is going to mistake the (appearance? taste?) of fish for red meat. Why's that matter? It all ties back to the (decidedly odd) way the rabbis understand the verse that says "Don't boil a kid (as in baby goat, not as in child) is its mother's milk.". That's where the whole separation of meat and dairy comes from (don't ask).

Well, that's not much of a restriction, actually. I also don't drink milk with meat unless there's nothing else to drink, simply because they don't go well together. There probably are dishes that combine the two, but I've yet to come across one. The idea of red meat+dairy strikes me as odd.