Alligator Meat

[Poche]

The Archdiocese of New Orleans has declared that it is permissable to eat alligator meat on Fridays.
:) :) :)

http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/a...clarifies/

[jovan66102]

The Archdiocese of New Orleans has declared that it is permissable to eat alligator meat on Fridays.
:) :) :)

http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/a...clarifies/

Not quite true. His Grace has simply pointed out the immemorial law of the Church regarding such things.

[Tim]

I've long said they should introduce those here in Lake Michigan, so those pesky Wisconsinites stay up by Milwaukee.

tim

[jovan66102]

I've long said they should introduce those here in Lake Michigan, so those pesky Wisconsinites stay up by Milwaukee.

tim

:LOL: :LOL: :LOL:

[SMKMI]

I've long said they should introduce those here in Lake Michigan, so those pesky Wisconsinites stay up by Milwaukee.

tim

If God wanted alligators in Lake Michigan, He would have made the North habitable in winter.

[LoneWolfRadTrad]

I've long said they should introduce those here in Lake Michigan, so those pesky Wisconsinites stay up by Milwaukee.

tim

If God wanted alligators in Lake Michigan, He would have made the North habitable in winter.

Didn't a bishop up around there permit the eating of muskrat or some other sort of swimming rodent?

[Pheo]

Not quite true. His Grace has simply pointed out the immemorial law of the Church regarding such things.

The immemorial law is concerning fish - and this was in part due to their connection with the Scriptures.  Alligators don't have that same connection.  His Grace's exemption may stand for now, but he's not much of an ichthyologist.  Alligators simply aren't a member of any fish family.

"A fish is any member of a paraphyletic group of organisms that consist of all gill-bearing aquatic craniate animals that lack limbs with digits."

This is almost as stupid as the muskrat dispensation in parts of Michigan.

[WhollyRoaminCatholic]

The general rule of thumb is warm blooded versus cold blooded animals. There are a couple of exceptions. Muskrat comes to mind, and even that exception is mostly by history and for novelty's sake. Also whales, but that dispensation in the East/Southeast Asian countries who eat whales is already loaded with other Westernly-unfathomable dispensations.  But warm/cold blooded is a good working distinction.

I think that His Excellency misspoke saying it was because alligator is "sea food". Alligators are allowed because they are cold blooded.

[Pheo]

But that was never really a general rule of thumb - although it was used as one of the justifications for allowing fish during Lent.  Even shellfish were a later addition for those who lived near the sea.

Dom Guéranger describes the exception in The Liturgical Year:

"For several centuries, abstinence from flesh-meat included likewise the prohibition of every article of food that belonged to what is called the animal kingdom, with the single exception of Fish, which, on account of its cold nature, as also for several mystical reasons, founded on the Sacred Scriptures, was always permitted to be taken by those who fasted."

[WhollyRoaminCatholic]

Dom Guéranger describes the exception in The Liturgical Year:
with the single exception of Fish, which, on account of its cold nature

The defense rests, your honor.