How Are You Keeping Friday as a Traditional Day of Sacrifice?

It's Friday -- having fish for dinner?

When I was a child, every Friday of the year was a required day of abstinence unless it was a solemn feast day. It made sense to remind Catholics that Jesus died for us on "Good Friday" and to remember it once a week by giving up meat. I don't remember the year things changed in the U.S. but it was due to the bishops asking for an exception to allow Catholics to choose some other form of penance or a charitable practice on the Fridays outside of Lent in lieu of abstinence. But the Canon Laws pertaining to fast and abstinence are still in place and you can read them here.


Sadly, I think most Catholics have simply abandoned the Friday abstinence without substituting anything else. I confess myself that I often don't think of it. But I did today and decided to keep the traditional abstinence and also to say some extra prayers for a person in my life whom I find difficult to deal with.

Read about the origin of pizza.

And I also think I will start putting a big "S" for sacrifice on all the Fridays of my calendar. I want to remember Christ's great sacrifice for us and to respond in Thanksgiving every day, but especially on Friday, the anniversary of the day Christ died for us.

And for the rest of the week, there's pepperoni pizza.

So....How are you making Friday "good" today?