April 1st, 2026
Dear Diary,
I had a nasty little fright today. Finance thing. Worse, donor thing. Worst, Knights of Malta thing.
Turns out there were phone calls which Fr. Gilbert intercepted from a couple of the local Malta gents, the ones with the capes and the solemn faces and the checks with all those useful zeroes, are upset. Really upset. Something about Rome, tradition, disrespect, sovereignty, dignity, ancient privileges, yaddayadda. Usually when people in fancy uniforms start talking about “ancient rights” I tune out, but today I paid attention. Because money.
Apparently some knights in Rome are in a grand snit with the Pope over something or other. If this keeps up, we won’t be seeing the same support for the clinic, seminarians, cathedral roof, or anything else. They’ll take their checkbooks and go play crusades with someone else. I’m told the trads that broke away have a huge church over in Black Duck. I’ve gotta talk to Jude.
One thing after another. At a FMFH* in runs Chester who grabbed a donut off of Vice’s plate and trotted off. Fr. Gilbert ran after him, “Drop it, Chester!” It was the best part of the meeting.
Lunch helped. Since Good Friday is in a couple days and I’ll have to fast like one of the Desert Fathers, I fortified myself. Meatloaf with gravy, mashed potatoes, buttered carrots, two rolls, wedge salad, and a slice of coconut cream pie. Not huge. Moderate. Pentitential, even, given the circumstances. We’ll go to Razzo’s soon.
Fr. Tommy used to say at this time of year that fasting is easier if you prepare spiritually. I say it’s easier if you prepare caloricly.
Anyway, I need those Malta men to calm down. If they secede from Rome, fine, that’s above my pay grade. If they secede from Libville’s diocesan annual appeal, that’s personal.
(later)
Okay… I get it. Fr. T was on the phone about something er other with me tonight after I wrote … he told me that Knights thing was an April Fool joke. Fell for it. Dang. Could I call him back to the chancery? He’d come, of course. Fr. Gilbert walked right into it and then I did too.
*Finance Meeting From Hell
I feel his pain, in terms of fasting.
Ash Wednesday and Good Friday are a source of extreme suffering to me, and precisely because of the bizarre USCCB rules around fasting.
I have a practice of abstaining for meat on every Friday. It is perfectly normal and easy for me to abstain, because I do it routinely. Long ago, I realized that if I only abstained during Lent, it would be far more difficult and in fact I often forgot entirely that it was Friday/Lent. If it’s something that I do every 7 days, it’s as easy as falling off a log.
Now, when a very generous and permissive Church tells us that there are only two fast days out of the entire year, this pains me no end. I have no discipline of fasting. It is nearly impossible to develop such. Currently dealing with a new diagnosis of Diabetes Type 2 and basically unable to prepare my own food at home. Relying on restaurants, and especially delivery, during periods of fast is a fools’ errand!
It’s times like this when I long to be Byzantine. Just the fact of stricter rules and an entire culture built around routinely fasting and abstaining from good things, that I can get on board with. This thing about 2 days per year with 3 meals in a fasting day is bizarre, and it makes no sense, and it breaks my brain. What would Muslims say if their imam issued such fatwa? What if the rebbe told all the Hasidim they could have just 3 chametz per day, but 2 chametz should add up to less than the main chametz?
I’m just going to eat what I need, and go to Confession later.
Bishops always have a keen sense of what is above their “pay grade” and what isn’t.
Only just now do I realize that the Knights of Malta thing was a April Fool’s Prank. That’s how gullible I am! XD
Although in this day and age, so few things in the Church surprise me, almost anything seems plausible.
It certainly is true about the lack of any sense of humor in places like Libville and among like-minded folks elsewhere. I once told a story about a potential superior who said he would ban all priests from wearing argyle socks as well as going outside in mufti (non-clerical dress), unless they used a self-tied bow tie. It set off a fire storm, with angry reactions. I tried to calm folks down, telling them it was a joke.
As one other friend noted, such folks have their helmets screwed on too tight.
methinks +McButterpants is more likely to fast like one of the Dessert Fathers than one of the Desert Fathers.
The gourmand Bishop of Libville,
Found fasting a most bitter pill,
But even as he pined,
His ‘best friend’ could find,
Haec sua donut… at will!
I did not get it, either….
People with diabetes are not bound to fast, in my understanding. People with serious sicknesses and conditions are not even bound to abstain, at least by old school rules. If you can figure it out, that’s great; but even monks with normally meatless diets usually had to eat meat when they were sick in the monastery infirmary.
@Elizium23
One option is to abstain from meat on Fridays year-round, and then abstain from meat during all of lent. Problem solved, no more fussy modern rules to worry about.