Meating the Church's Requirements
Meating the Church's Requirements
Saint Faustina wrote:
"Our meals shall be such that not even the poor will have any reason to envy us" (546). So, it's no surprise that St. Faustina didn't eat meat on Fridays even outside of Lent. That was Canon Law. But since St. Faustina's time, Canon Law has allowed us, depending on our bishops conferences, to choose another penance on Fridays in place of abstaining from meat. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops allow a substitute penance. Nevertheless, the USCCB gives "first place to abstinence from flesh meat" (24, Pastoral Statement on Penance and Abstinence)
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Turn to any page of St. Faustina’s Diary, and you’ll find spiritual gems, like this one:I became absorbed in prayer and said my penance. Then I suddenly saw the Lord, who said to me, My daughter, know that you give Me greater glory by a single act of obedience than by long prayers and mortifications. Oh, how good it is to live under obedience, to live conscious of the fact that everything I do is pleasing to God! (Diary, 894).
Jesus said: Do not be absorbed in your misery — you are still too weak to speak of it — but, rather, gaze on My Heart filled with goodness, and be imbued with My sentiments. … when you feel your strength failing, if you come to the fountain of mercy to fortify your soul, you will not grow weary on your journey (Diary, 1486).
The readings for this homily: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/021826.cfm
The world has its “small-g gods”: sex, money, and power. In this powerful Lenten homily, Fr. Chris Alar, MIC explains how the consecrated religious counter them through poverty, chastity, and obedience—but what about the laity?
The answer is the Church’s timeless Lenten call: prayer, fasting, and almsgiving.
