Fish on Friday

From the Startlegram: "During Lent, the Christian season of penitence preceding Easter, Catholics are prohibited from eating meat on Fridays. But in an unusual move, Bishop Kevin William Vann of the Fort Worth Catholic Diocese has waived that ban for this week only -- because St. Patrick's Day is Friday."

This seems a bit arbitrary, no? But why stop there. St. Patrick's Day might be the most famous (and least holy) of Saint's days, but it is by no means the only one. A quick trip over to the Saint's Calendar shows that pretty much every day is a Saint's Day (if you have time, don't miss the Saint's Fun Facts!)

Therefore, I propose, in honor of the Saint's, to continue this trend of relaxing Catholic prohibitions on Saint's days. For example, I think it would be appropriate on St. Cletus' Day (April 26) to allow all manner of birth control, lest someone bestow the Saint's name on an innocent child. Maybe there's a "St. Dwayne Ray" on whose day the Catholic's could turn a blind eye to capital punishment. Suicide by shotgun to the mouth would be acceptable only on St. Kurt's day. Sins of taking the Lord's name in vain as well as all other spoken vulgarities could be overlooked on St. Al Swearengen's Day.

I welcome religion turning its collective back on rigid moral absolutism. Things really do depend on circumstances. It's St. Patty's Day? Let's party.