In the Orthodox Church, we are bidden to fast on almost every Wednesday and Friday, throughout the 40 day Nativity Fast, the 50 day Great Lent, the variable length Apostles’ Fast, and the 15 day Dormition Fast. Fasting consists not in not eating (though there are periods when the strictly observant do that for a day or a few days running) but in eating less than usual and abstaining from all products of vertebrates (meat, milk, eggs, though on certain days fish is permitted), from olive oil (some say all cooking oils) and from wine (and strong drink, some hold beer counts, some don’t).

I and my coreligionists jolly well aren’t going to go meatless on the Mondays when Holy Mother Church allows us to eat meat just because the USDA or some pack of officious we-know-what’s-good-for-you health nuts or “save the planet” do-gooders tells us we should eat less meat for the health and environmental benefits. I invite anyone who thinks people in general should eat less meat to join us on our schedule of not eating meat, from which they will gain more of the same benefits advertised for meatless Mondays (albeit without the alliteration — of course, “Lunes sin carnes”, “lundi sans vivande”,… don’t alliterate).