Friends Eating Just Before Mass

[Lil Red]

I don't know, but it would be cool if someone could answer that too and save us the trouble of using Google.

 

 

right?!! how would you even put that?! :|

[Anastasia13]

L&T took this to a whole 'nother level

 

Aww, thank you. I love people, especially with chocolate sauce and sprinkles.
 

[maximillion]

I am 62......

When I was old enough to receive, we fasted from midnight (which meant we ate nothing from about 8pm the previous night) until after Mass was over and we were back home.

 

I am an early riser by inclination but this was another reason for going to early Mass (weekday 6am and weekend 8am).

When we did the Nine First Fridays I took a packed breakfast with me and we  (the kids) who were at Mass were permitted to eat together in the priests house ( it was alongside the Church).

 

I wonder if this is where the habit of not having breakfast till I have been up for a few hours came from. In my case this custom was even more set in by my 14 years in the convent, when we fasted roughly for about 12 hours overnight too.

 

Later Mass times came in with the fall in those attending Mass in general as well as the one hour fast. Now I hate that I have to wait until gone 10am for a morning Mass. It just feels right to me to start the day with the Lord in the closest union.

 

But hey, I didn't make the rules and I am one individual.

[cmaD2006]

umm yeah. It was deleted from this thread so the evidence was deleted. It was almost exactly what Winchester posted.And if you delete a post there is evidence it was deleted (for mods). (Or there used to be)

 

Ok ... we're looking into it.  It may have been a phorum glitch (nothing is noted in this thread that something was deleted, at least where we can see it).

[blazeingstar]

That's not at all "cafeteria". That is saying, "The Church requires we at LEAST do this, but I'm thinking doing a little more would be better."

 

The Church requires bare minimums not best practices.

 

If YOU choose to do it, GREAT.  But it would be cafeteria to tell your friends that they are required to do more.  It is also cafeteria to suggest the Church is misguided and should have people do more which is what the previous poster was implying

[Slappo]

I think the previous three hours would be preferable. What kind of fast is it if you can complete it by accident?

 

 

If YOU choose to do it, GREAT.  But it would be cafeteria to tell your friends that they are required to do more.  It is also cafeteria to suggest the Church is misguided and should have people do more which is what the previous poster was implying

 

I'm sorry but where exactly did he say the Church is misguided, and even if he did how is that being "cafeteria" in regards to a discipline of the Church? If anything he said the Church is more lenient than what he thinks is most appropriate. Is it "cafeteria" for a bishop of a diocese to suggest to his diocese that they should strictly abstain from meat every Friday outside of lent even though it is not required as it can be substituted?

 

Cafeteria catholic means picking and choosing what you want to believe rather than believing the entire deposit of faith (doctrine, dogma, or tradition immemorial for Eastern Catholics). Thinking that a Church discipline (fasting) should be more strict is not choosing to believe something contrary to the deposit of faith.

 

 

Also... nowhere did anyone talk about telling friends that more than 1 hour before communion is required.

Edited February 16, 2014 by Slappo

[blazeingstar]

I'm sorry but where exactly did he say the Church is misguided, and even if he did how is that being "cafeteria" in regards to a discipline of the Church? If anything he said the Church is more lenient than what he thinks is most appropriate. Is it "cafeteria" for a bishop of a diocese to suggest to his diocese that they should strictly abstain from meat every Friday outside of lent even though it is not required as it can be substituted?

 

Cafeteria catholic means picking and choosing what you want to believe rather than believing the entire deposit of faith (doctrine, dogma, or tradition immemorial for Eastern Catholics). Thinking that a Church discipline (fasting) should be more strict is not choosing to believe something contrary to the deposit of faith.

 

 

Also... nowhere did anyone talk about telling friends that more than 1 hour before communion is required.

 

I think the previous three hours would be preferable. What kind of fast is it if you can complete it by accident?

 

 

Yes, he as disagreed that the church is being appropriate.   Bishops can decided how to best deal with their flocks, however, a person on a web forum has no authority to do so.  By indicating that a fast can be accidental it implies that the Church isn't doing enough to protect the sanctity of the Eucharist and is being hypercritical.

 

I also think that many TML'ers do far more damage to the faith than many ordinary weekly attending cafeteria Catholics and they both run on the extremes.  But that's my opinion.

[Slappo]

Yes, he as disagreed that the church is being appropriate.   Bishops can decided how to best deal with their flocks, however, a person on a web forum has no authority to do so.  By indicating that a fast can be accidental it implies that the Church isn't doing enough to protect the sanctity of the Eucharist and is being hypercritical.

 

I also think that many TML'ers do far more damage to the faith than many ordinary weekly attending cafeteria Catholics and they both run on the extremes.  But that's my opinion.

 

This post does not at all make sense as a reply to mine... Yes what? You didn't explain how disagreeing with the Church on a matter of discipline is being cafeteria, or in other words picking and choosing what doctrine's and dogma's one wants to believe.

 

 

 

You inferred an awful lot from the post. I didn't get anything about "the Church isn't doing enough to protect the sanctity of the Eucharist." I got more of a "why require anything at all if it's only an hour?" For many people that just means don't eat in the car... for some it may even mean just make sure you eat quickly after stopping by the first McDonald's drive through. For a few it may even mean leave your food in the car when you walk into mass.

 

And honestly... if priest's are going to respond in confession to "Father I only fasted for 45 minutes before communion" with "oh don't be so hard on yourself by counting the minutes"... really what is the point?

[Basilisa Marie]

 

 

And honestly... if priest's are going to respond in confession to "Father I only fasted for 45 minutes before communion" with "oh don't be so hard on yourself by counting the minutes"... really what is the point?

 

I'm inclined to agree that increasing the fast would make people more conscious of the pre-communion fast, even if to two hours. Because of course that's the bigger point, that you are consciously fasting before communion. I think that's why the priest told him not to be so nitpicky, because the spirit of the law isn't about being exact about the number of minutes, but that people are doing it at all. I think an hour is the probably bare minimum most people could fast and be conscious about it. 

 

I mean, I usually end up making the post-midnight fast, if only because my family and I make breakfast after we get home from mass, and I usually don't eat anything before I leave the house. But I'm not doing that out of reverence for the fast, I'm doing it because of routine (and my love for sleep).  So I'd say that for me, the times when I am conscious of not eating an hour before communion are more spiritually beneficial than the times when I make a longer fast by happy accident. 

 

But anyway, yeah. I think there's definitely a problem with people not consciously fasting, and increasing the fast a bit (to two or three hours) would certainly make a difference, at least as things stand here in the US.

[Slappo]

But anyway, yeah. I think there's definitely a problem with people not consciously fasting, and increasing the fast a bit (to two or three hours) would certainly make a difference, at least as things stand here in the US.

Careful! Talk like that might get you called "cafeteria"!

 

 

I know exactly what you mean. We go to 8am sunday mass and then to a friend's house for breakfast around 9:30-10am. I don't eat before mass in the morning's. I don't have any conscious "fasting" mindset as of midnight since I'm asleep by then, but from about 6:45-7:45 when I might like a snack to get through to a late breakfast then I become more aware of actively fasting.

 

To meet the minimums, I could eat up until 7:30 and be 100% safe every Sunday (maybe even 7:40, but that cuts it close). Why bother though? I can't die to my hunger for physical food for 2 hours longer while I wait for mass to end?

 

My wife on the other hand does pay close attention to the 1 hour marker because she has much more of a problem with not eating like light headedness, dizzyness, etc. She's also a nursing mother so it's more important for her to get in the calories. She pretty much always makes the 1 hour marker, but she does so consciously even though as a nursing mother she has no fasting requirements.

 

Maybe it's just easier for the Church to say "1 hour before communion" instead of "3 hours before mass except if your a nursing mother, pregnant, diabetic, elderly, iron deficiency, etc.". Almost everyone with every medical condition can plan to not eat for a single hour even if they aren't canonically required to.