Muskrat love: Detroit-area Catholics permitted to eat rodent
Apr 16, 2019 | 10:57 AM
DETROIT — Roman Catholics in the Detroit area get a reprieve from their obligation to abstain from eating meat on Fridays during Lent. But only to dine on a certain rodent.
The Archdiocese of Detroit says a long-standing permission dating to the region’s missionary history in the 1700s allows local Catholics to eat muskrat “on days of abstinence, including Fridays of Lent.”
The Rev. Tim Laboe (luh-BOH’) says settlers probably had little in the way of a protein source, other than the muskrat, during the harsh Michigan winters.
