
It's time for Lent. Bring me my sackcloth and meat-free ashes.
I've done the reading on the topic, both from the Canon and the USCCB. In short, the Canon calls us to do some kind of Friday fast (generally prescribed from meat) but leaves the specifics up to the bishops:
Canon 1251—Abstinence from eating meat or another food according to the prescriptions of the conference of bishops is to be observed on Fridays throughout the year unless they are solemnities; abstinence and fast are to be observed on Ash Wednesday and on the Friday of the Passion and Death of Our Lord Jesus Christ.
Canon 1253—It is for the conference of bishops to determine more precisely the observance of fast and abstinence and to substitute in whole or in part for fast and abstinence other forms of penance, especially works of charity and exercises of piety.
19. Changing circumstances, including economic, dietary, and social elements, have made some of our people feel that the renunciation of the eating of meat is not always and for everyone the most effective means of practicing penance. Meat was once an exceptional form of food; now it is commonplace.
20. Accordingly, since the spirit of penance primarily suggests that we discipline ourselves in that which we enjoy most, to many in our day abstinence from meat no longer implies penance, while renunciation of other things would be more penitential.
Blame it on a possible iron deficiency in pregnancy (at least, that's what I'm blaming it on), but what do I want in the morning? Bacon. What do I want for lunch? Big, honking turkey sandwich, preferably with bacon. Afternoon snack? Chicken taquito! Dinner? Steak. Please. If you love me, make it a steak.
Switching out meat for pastas, fruits, cheeses, legumes and shrimp may not mean that I'm sacrificing my taste buds, but I am sacrificing the convenience that meat affords, at nearly every hour of the day.
And that, to me, for the Fridays before Lent, is my sacrifice.
Now. Off to find a rotisserie chicken.