Not sure how many strict Catholics we have here, I just got curious as to what all those Irish-Catholics are gonna eat next Friday? Corned beef and cabbage being the standard fare for Saint Patrick’s Day and it being a Friday during Lent. Have the meal on Thursday or Saturday? Say what the heck and eatit anyway(like me, and I’m not even Irish), throw in a couple Hail Mary’s afterwards? Skip it altogether? Anyone?
I’ll buy that for a dollar.
Seeing as how I am not Catholic or Irish… I will prolly have meatloaf 
I really try to be good but it just isn’t in my nature!
St. Patrick’s Day is an automatic dispensation. So us Irish Catholics will be fine on that front. 
But I’ve always wondered, does the same go for St. Joseph’s Day?
WTF is corned beef anyway. I searched the archives to see if Cecil had something to say about it and all I came up with was this:
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We had a thread on corned beef in GQ back in January. Briefly, the term refers to preserving meat by rubbing it with coarse granules, called “corns” of salt. Later, it was extended to cover beef cured in brine.
As to the “automatic dispensation” regarding St. Patrick’s Day – Jeannie, what is your source for that statement. I’m unaware of any such automatic dispensation; in fact, the last time St. Paddy’s Day fell on a Friday, my Knights council got a dispensation from the bishop for our party. We certainly could have saved that step if there were a dispensation already available. I can’t find anything from the United States Episcopal Conference, or from the Holy See.
My answer to the OP would be that either the celebration is moved to another day, or the local Ordinary is asked for a dispensation.
Psy: On days like Saint Patricks day, you get special dispensation (as was already said). My Parish priest also assures us that if you have a birthday during lent (like I do, and my dad does today), you get special dispensation then too.
I myself am an incorrigible conlang slut. I love oral lex.
My aunt mentioned it years ago when I was a kid. I asked my priest at the time and he said that, yes, it was automatic dispensation. So we’ve gone with it for years. My “traditional Catholic” friend at work also recently confirmed another “dispensation” for me with her pastor: On Sundays during Lent, you don’t have to give up whatever you gave up. The pastor said it’s because of Sunday being a “day of rest.” I’m not sure that the logic makes sense, but I’ll go with it! Besides, who am I to apply logic to religion?
Maybe some Catholics are taught differently, but that’s what I’ve been taught.
Well, it’s not exactly an “automatic” dispensation, but the practical effect is generally the same. In Detroit, the bishop (archbishop? Tom, where are you??) just issued a dispensation, and they are pretty common in areas which have a high Irish Catholic population. It wouldn’t necessarily be “automatic” in some area that didn’t have that heritage, though. Thus, I’d expect to see it as a matter of course in Chicago and Boston, but not in Miami.
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Bastard.
Of course, you already knew that pastrami is a corned beef brisket that has been smoked, right?
TT
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–James Thurber
Hehe, whoops, I forgot to say, the dispensation is on a case by case basis. We’ve been told in our parish for birthdays and very special events we get dispensation. Also for St. Patricks day we got it too (we do have a number of Irish families in our parish). We’d probably get one if there was a special Portuguese festival during lent, since our pastor is Portuguese.
I myself am an incorrigible conlang slut. I love oral lex.
So, in other words, it’s ok to throw away the religious reasons behind fasting and avoiding meat during Lent for a tradition(completely unrelated to the religious side of the Holiday). Gotta love being Catholic.
I’ll buy that for a dollar.
MMMMMMM! CORNED BEEF AND CABBAGE!
And, I’m not Irish.
Corned beef: Salt rubbed brisket of beef, pickled in a solution of heavy brine and spices for preservation and flavor. (Best done the old fashioned way in an oaken barrel with a sealed lid.)
I love good corned beef and good cabbage - especially if it has not been cooked into mush and the chef left some of the origonal pickling solution in the mix. Spiced up with fresh ground pepper, served hot with spicey yellow mustard and excellent barrel dill pickles, great mucking slabs of hot rye bread and fresh, sweet butter along with boiled or baked whole potatoes and you HAVE a meal! Wash it all down with great, ice cold mugs of good beer!
TASTY!! (You fart your ass off a few hours later, but what the heck.)
A variation on it is what is known as a boiled supper. Corned beef, cabbage, sliced up potatoes and cut carrots with a little onion all boiled together in the same pot. Someone told me that if you substitute ham for the beef you have a New England boiled supper – and that’s just as excellent.
As a kid I used to like to fork out carrots and spuds and chunks of cabbage, stack 'em all together and mash them up with a huge pat of butter and pepper. MMMMMMMMMM! GOOD!
But then, I like pickled pigs feet, served ice cold with the jellied juice clinging to them. I used to like pickled eggs – so long as I would not be in polite company later (the farts are foul) but they started giving me heartburn as I grew older.
(You want to clear out a room? Scarf down about 4 pickled eggs and chase them with two beers. About 30 minutes later, the resulting ‘emissions’ will be so foul either people will leave your vicinity or they’ll throw YOU out of the room.) 
Damn, that sounds really good, I just can’t get over that, "they settled for corned beef, which also had a corpsy flavor. " thing…
Can you get it without the cabbage?
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As mentioned over in another Forum, in Detroit, (Polish) Archbishop/Cardinal Maida and in New York, (Irish) Archbishop/Cardinal Connor have both issued dispensations. Interestingly, I do not remember (Irish) Archbishop Dearden every offering a dispensation when he was the bishop of Detroit.
Since I am no fan of cooked cabbage, the “corned beef and cabbage” routine has never been high on my list of priorities. (I do like corned beef, but there are several fish or vegetarian dishes that go well with Guiness, so it has never been a problem.)
Tom~
Erm…not really. At least not according to our pastor, who advised that you choose another day to substitute for this Friday if you choose to set aside abstinence for the St. Patrick’s Day traditions (fasting is only Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, so that doesn’t apply).
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