Said Nicolas Harvey, 39, a high school history teacher, quoted in "Halfway Through Lent, a Small Quebec Island Celebrates With Masks and Jigs/Few islanders still observe Lent, but they cling to a tradition once seen as defying the all-powerful Roman Catholic Church" (NYT).
I'm out of gift links for the month or I would give you one. There are lots of nice photos of these islanders of the St. Lawrence River.
Is it odd to carry on the traditional rebellion when you're no longer subject to the authority that inspired the rebellion? Or is it actually typical of our annual festivities? (I'm thinking of Halloween, Christmas, and the 4th of July.)
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Just an excuse for a party for those pathetic Canadians. Maybe after the celebration is over and they are sad, they can go to the government euthanasia office and get offed.
My mother would give up popcorn for Lent. Doesn't sound like much, but she really, really loved her homemade popcorn.
I play for services constantly during Lent and Easter. It’s quite moving. I play for both Methodist and Catholic services, so very different emotional ranges. I play for at least two services a week, sometimes more. The Methodists throw a strange Holy Day into the mix: Maundy Thursday. (I’m Catholic. The Methodists look very confused to me.) I also play for Stations of the Cross on Friday nights during lent, the “Stabat Mater Dolorosa.” The church ladies put together a soup and salad dinner before Stations. I’m old (76). Lent and Easter give me a vivid spiritual platform for facing death and joining in communion with the other elders trying to cope with age and dying. When I was young, I was a God Botherer. So, I understand the affliction.
"Or is it actually typical of our annual festivities? "
Yes, I think there a lot of festivities that are vestiges of something that once had real meaning. Guy Fawkes Day in the UK comes to mind.
If there is a reason for a party then have it. Rebellion against the church in Quebec has a long history and should be celebrated. We celebrate resistance against the British during colonial times.
And before you all start complaining about Canadians. These people are Quebecois, a very different breed from your typical Hog Town resident.
Gift Link
Is there a technical reason why you couldn’t gift us the link tomorrow?
I always figured that the point of punk rock was that anybody with a small gift of musical talent could learn their instruments from scratch within a month, and be performing in three.
I gave up twitter for Lent; it’s been much harder than I expected.
I gave up Facebook years ago because I was sick of people who couldn’t shut up about their stupid politics and immediately almost forgot it existed. Giving up twitter has been hard because twitter posts show up everywhere. It didn’t help that we started bombing Iran shortly after lent started.
In practice, when I see twitter posts elsewhere, I read them. And I go to twitter periodically to look at one Persian poster I follow, but I don’t engage, I don’t follow the threads, it’s just about Iran news from this one poster.
So technically I have not kept my vow, but I’ve kept the spirit of it.
Thank you, Mary Beth.
Mardi Gras is, of course, the excess allowed before the austerity of Ash Wednesday and Lent. To have an additional mid-Lent break is, well, something like a recovering alcoholic saying one drink will be OK. Just forget about the whole thing.
Nothing about Trump in the comments. That has to be a first.
The Spanish are long gone, but Filipinos are big serious about Easter:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Week_in_the_Philippines
All of the cool theater kids love to cosplay rebellion. I hear several hundred were reenacting their favorite dystopian fantasies just last weekend.
“The Catholic Church long held a grip on Quebec society, controlling its schools, hospitals and other services.”
Funny way to attack the provider of social services to many that would not have otherwise been available. So much better now that it is government run with death services like MAiD.
You were two posts early, Dave.
Giving stuff up for Lent is... good for taking a break from something that we can't otherwise admit we might be overdoing. Like creating AI Slop.
Give up AI Slop for Lent.
Since I don't create AI Slop, I can easily and perhaps blithely say to others 'Give up AI Slop for Lent.
Maybe I should give up telling people what to do for Lent.
Never mind.
Strike that. Actually... There is a real need by some to give up AI for Lent.
"Nothing about Trump in the comments."
Trump should give up naming stuff after himself for Lent.
Rural Quebecois are descendants of pre-revolutionary French, preserved in amber. I worked with a professor of Dairy Science from Grenoble who toured Quebec one summer. "They are more French than the French", she reported.
Is this what Paul Simon meant about “boredom and chowder”?
One of my cousins was married during lent.Her fiancée was able to an exemption to serve meat at the Friday rehearsal dinner from Cardinal Egan.
Here in Atlanta it has always been traditional for an exemption to allow meat on Friday when March 17th falls on a Friday.
The Knights of Columbus at pretty much every parish in our area has a Friday fish fry to raise money. Our parish has started musical entertainment.
"Is this what Paul Simon meant about 'boredom and chowder'?"
I love that song, but the Maritimes are a whole different beast.
I think it is the best policy to ignore everything about Canada. Too weird.
They are a figment of our imagination
link works for me (strangly)
they look like they wandered out of a Progressive no kings rally.
"look at me!"
Throughout Europe there are traditions of dressing as grotesques for various festivals, whose origins may be pagan.
imTay said…
I love that song, but the Maritimes are a whole different beast.
Or, as they say, a whole different kettle of fish?
This is what we would have devolved if the british had won
Shorter Dave Begley: "Keep your weirdness hidden in the closet like me"
I grew up Baptist and am now Orthodox. Neither tradition participates in the Western version of Lent, so I've never understood the practices, especially not this one. If you're not even giving up meat for six days out of seven, there's barely anything to rebel against.
The notion of choosing what you fast from is equally bizarre. We fast from what the Church tells us to fast from. Surely the obedience is the point?
How is lent not Orthodox
If you dont like fish for instance youre not abstaining
Its just ritual
This is reminiscent of mumming (mummers).
Archived here: https://archive.ph/geg8i
I think I'd prefer Carnival, a few weeks earlier and a whole lot warmer, the better to wear skimpy outfits !
I wonder how the tradition got started - it doesn't really go into it, in the story. Maybe it took a few weeks for stories about Caribbean carnival celebrations to reach the Canadian islands, and they were so upset at what they had missed, they decided to have a shorter one, themselves.
The Western practices of Lent are not Orthodox. We are specifically told by Christ not to put ashes on ourselves when we fast, to start with. Fish is only permitted on the Annunciation and Palm Sunday in Orthodoxy. No meat eggs or dairy at all, only shellfish or crustaceans. It's very prescriptive. So I don't understand the point of the Catholic and some mainstream Protestant practices. It seems very half-assed.
Blair said at 3/31/26, 9:12 AM
“The Western practices of Lent are not Orthodox. We are specifically told by Christ not to put ashes on ourselves when we fast, to start with. Fish is only permitted on the Annunciation and Palm Sunday in Orthodoxy. No meat eggs or dairy at all, only shellfish or crustaceans. It's very prescriptive. So I don't understand the point of the Catholic and some mainstream Protestant practices. It seems very half-assed.”
You are correct; Lenten rules differ between the Latin and Orthodox churches. In the Catholic church those rules have changed over millennia. But, the core that remains is fasting (to turn from excess), prayer, and almsgiving (corporal acts of mercy). A total fast on both Ash Wednesday and Good Friday are required, along with abstaining from meat. One meal is permitted, traditionally taken after sunset.
Meat, eggs, and dairy were also forbidden for Catholics as well, but various relaxations of those rules began as far back as the fifth century A.D. It’s understandable, in a way, when you consider that Lent comes just as the last of the winter stores are available, so what you’re left with is root vegetables, barley or some other grain, fish, and shellfish. Not a lot to keep up one’s strength when doing daily physical work. In more recent history, abstaining from meat on Fridays and Wednesdays (ember days) and fasting were the norm until Vatican II. (Technically, abstaining from meat on Fridays is “still on the books” for Catholics every Friday of the year, although, sadly, most don’t observe.)
The idea of fasting is a good one. These days it’s harder to fast from noise, social media, and other distractions than it is to stop eating certain foods or drinking alcohol. But anything that might encourage silence and stepping away from a focus on worldly things is good.
Yah. The annual Ann Arbor Hash Bash has been a shadow of its former self since 2018 when cannabis use in Michigan was legalized, plus it just doesn't have that rogue element to it now. The risk of an arrest for pot is virtually non existant now. Drinkers don't celebrate the repeal of prohibition do they? The AAHB will probably die out altogether as the boomers who would celebrate it do. And so it goes.
Shouting Thomas:
What does Maundy Thursday mean? The word Maundy comes from the Latin word mandatum, which means command.
On this day we remember Jesus’ commands on the day before He died. The first command is to love one another: “A new commandment I give you: Love one another. Just as I have loved you, so also you are to love one another.” (John 13:34 EHV)
Jesus also commanded that we continue to celebrate the sacrament of Holy Communion: He took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way, he took the cup after the supper, saying, “This cup is the new testament in my blood, which is being poured out for you. (Luke 22:19-20 EHV)
Catholic fasting for Lent used to be much more strict, like the Orthodox. Fasting is supposed to be a means to an end, but apparently too many people were viewing it as a ritual unto itself, so they relaxed the rules. At least that was the impression I got from the nuns in grade school.
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