Fish on Fridays

It's Lent. And back to meatless Fridays. Tonight it was fish sticks -- not fancy but it kept the kids happy.

When I was growing up we had meatless Fridays during Lent, but also if my mother was planning a meatless dish - pizza, tuna fish casserole or whatever - she would tend to plan it for a Friday. The rules were not as stringent as when she was growing up - we were allowed to eat meat on Fridays (except during Lent) and sometimes we did.

By the time I was married I didn't worry about meatless Fridays (except during Lent, of course), but over the last few years my husband and I realized that although the official rules were that you could eat meat on Friday it was with the provision that another sacrifice be given in its stead.

Hmmm. Another sacrifice. Well, we weren't exactly making any specific sacrifices, we were just eating whatever we darn felt like.

Maybe that wasn't the way this was supposed to work, maybe more thought was supposed to be given to what we were doing on a Friday. So, a couple of years ago we decided to go meatless on Fridays all year long. Fish on Fridays: It's not just for Lent anymore.

Since a lot of people only worry about fish on Fridays during Lent, it's not always easy to adhere to when we eat at someone else's house. And if we are at Grandma's house and she's serving pork chops or whatever on a Friday - we eat them. We just try to remember to say an extra prayer - do an extra sacrifice instead.

Have we gotten anything out of it? I don't know. I do know that sometimes when the kids want something with meat on Friday - we just have to remind them of what day it is - and they're okay with it. And we've discussed why we do a special sacrifice on Friday (in honor of Good Friday and the sacrifice Jesus made for us.) So at the very least we're recalling Good Friday more than once a year. And we know we're doing this in honor of God. And that is a good thing to know too.

Here are a few Lenten Links for the day:

Food for thought from Danielle Bean.

A hopeful Lenten post from Hope-full Signs.

Easter offers a meditation on Fasting.

Jenn muses on how Lent offers us an ending and a beginning.

Letitia at cause of our joy offers ways to simplify during Lent.

Holy Cards for Your Inspiration offers a lovely card for of a child Jesus with a tiny cross.

Karen Edmisten tells us what her daughter plans on giving up for Lent - and offers a great idea of a sacrifice jar - I think I'm going to have to incorporate that into our Lenten season.

Esther speaks of dying to self.

And Jean at Catholic Fire offers a Lenten meditation.

If you have something inspirational you'd like me to link to - let me know. Or just leave a comment.