c. 1997 Religion News Service
WASHINGTON _ Roman Catholic bishops Monday (Nov. 10) voted to study the possibility of bringing back”meatless Fridays”as a public expression of the church’s opposition to legal abortion and other”attacks against human life and human dignity.””Our people are waiting for a way in which they can publicly affirm their faith”and”show their opposition to the culture of death,”said Cardinal Adam Maida, archbishop of Detroit.
Opening their annual fall meeting here, the bishops approved the study as a show of concern for a society they see as overwhelmed by violence. In asking for the study, they specifically mentioned the widespread acceptance of abortion, growing support for euthanasia, the continuance of war and rising drug abuse.
The church leaders asked that committee reports on the proposal be readied as soon as their June 1998 meeting for final action.
Abstaining from eating meat was a standard church practice intended to remind the faithful of Jesus’ suffering and crucifixion until Pope Paul VI allowed the bishops to establish their own dietary guidelines following the liberalizing Second Vatican Council, which ended in 1965.
Prior to that, the church insisted on meatless Fridays as an act of penance in preparation for confession and receiving communion. Cardinal Bernard Law of Boston said whether the bishops would again insist on the practice or only institute it on a voluntary basis was yet to be determined.
While the bishops agreed on the need for some display of abstinence by Catholics to show their concern for society, some said avoiding red meat was hardly enough.”A day without meat is hardly a day of penitence when one can always substitute a good lobster meal,”said Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua, archbishop of Philadelphia.
Bevilacqua and others urged that the study be expanded to include the possibility of asking Catholics to fast every Friday. However, other bishops said that would be too difficult for most Catholics and would undercut the effort.
About 280 bishops are in Washington for the four-day meeting of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops and its social policy arm, the U.S. Catholic Conference.
Speaking to the gathering earlier Monday, Bishop Anthony M. Pilla of Cleveland, president of the NCCB, called for a greater”spirit of reconciliation”among Catholics.”The first imperative for reconciliation surrounds the way in which some public discussion of issues takes place within the church,”Pilla said.”Across the spectrum of church opinion there are some very angry voices who apparently feel justified in using a rhetoric of violence toward whoever disagrees with them.” An example of what Pilla was taking about could be found immediately outside the Capitol Hill hotel hosting the bishops’ meeting.
There, several dozen Catholics demonstrated both in support of and opposed to the bishops’ Oct. 1 pastoral letter urging parents of homosexuals not to personally reject their children even as activities stemming from their sexual preference are condemned by church doctrine.
At times, those on both sides of the argument angrily confronted each other, with each insisting on the wrongness of the other side.
In other action Monday, the bishops voted to continue indefinitely their annual collection to help rebuild the church in the former Soviet Union and other ex-communist European nations.
In doing so, the bishops noted the recently approved Russian law giving preference to the Russian Orthodox Church over all other faiths there and the added problems that may cause for Catholic communities still seeking to recover from more than seven decades of communism.
In its seven years, the collection has sent $37 million to Russia and other Eastern European nations to support about 1,400 projects designed to help the church rebuild.
The bishops also voted to hold their fourth”Encuentro,”a national gathering designed to enhance the church’s outreach to Hispanic Catholics, in the year 2000. Encuentro is Spanish for”encounter.” No location has as yet been decided for the Encuentro, which will bring together bishops, priests and lay leaders. Previous Encuentros were held in 1972, 1977 and 1985. The last meeting led to the development of the bishops’ 1997 National Pastoral Plan for Hispanic Ministry.
In 1994, according to the church, Hispanics accounted for about 30 percent of the nearly 60 million U.S. Catholics. The church estimates that over the next 25 years, Hispanics will become the majority of U.S. Catholics.
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