Mardi Gras 2012: Fat Tuesday And Carnival's Religious Meaning And Origins

Mardi Gras 2012, or Fat Tuesday, falls on Feb. 21, and is the final day of the festivities known as Carnival. Mardi Gras is celebrated in predominately Catholic locations around the world, most famously in cities such as New Orleans and Rio de Jainaro. While best known for parties, costumes and beads, Mardi Gras has religious origins in the Catholic calendar as well as in pre-Christian pagan celebrations.

The Latin root of the word Carnival is carne vale, which means "farewell to meat" -- a reference to the upcoming 40 day fast of Lent that commences at midnight on Mardi Gras. Fat Tuesday was named because it was a time of extravagant feasting of rich foods such as meat or pancakes before the upcoming fast. According the Catholic calendar, the season of Carnival actually starts on the 12th day of Christmas, known as Epiphany. And in Germany, where Carnival is known as Fasching, festivities start on Epiphany and build toward Mardi Gras.

Fat Tuesday is also know as Shrove Tuesday, a reference to "shriving" or confession, which was meant to prepare Christians for the fast ahead. Some communities use Shrove Tuesday to burn palm fronds from the previous year's Palm Sunday to create the ashes that are used on Ash Wednesday. Ash Wednesday is the fist day of the season of penitance and fasting that leads to Good Friday and Easter. Ash Wednesday is a solemn observance when many Christians receive ashes on the foreheads and are reminded that "they are dust and to dust they shall return."

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Comments

[learntmylesson]

01:35 PM on 02/25/2012

Ash Wednesday, Lent, Palm Sunday, Holy Week, Good Friday, Easter, and Christmas are all man-made pagan rituals. They came from Catholicism. They do not have anything to do with Christianity.
Neither Jesus, nor his disciples knew about these things. Remember they came long after Jesus and his disciples were gone from the face of the earth. Why are the "so called followers of Christ" following man-made traditions? Did Jesus die on the cross so that people could take ashes and make a cross on their foreheads? If you truly believe that Jesus shed his blood, which was better than the blood of goats and bulls, for you, then you should not have any problems turning your back on this man-made nonsense. Jesus told the Pharisees that they preferred man-made traditions to the word of God. If you join those who follow these things, then you are a Pharisee.

[MEVirginia]

08:11 PM on 02/26/2012

Actually most of them predate Catholicism. The Roman bishop was only one of the four bishops. And at one point it was the minor one. The Orthodox Christians still celebrate all of these, sometimes on different dates. The Mardi Gras and Carnival excesses are not Christian observants. Displays of drunkeness and sex are not part of any Christian procedure.

True about Jesus or his disciples, but if you followed them you would be Jewish and not Christian. Jesus was not planning a new religion, unlike some, but it happened because the Jews did not want their Religion to be changed.

[learntmylesson]

06:42 PM on 02/27/2012

You are right. Man got in the middle, and gave us sawdust. As far as I can see, if Jesus wanted the gentiles to be a part of what he was offering, he had enough time to reach them. I have some strong opinions, and alot of questions about the entire pie.

[Herndon Davis]

09:34 PM on 02/24/2012

The American Birthplace of Mardi Gras is in Mobile, AL and is actually celebrated across the entire Gulf Coast in cities in Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Lousisana and Texas. I explain more in my video on it here on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5U8wVFS3GTI

[crydespite]

03:29 AM on 02/22/2012

"...as well as in pre-Christian pagan celebrations."

which we won't mention again in the article.

[Allen Jenkins]

08:22 PM on 02/21/2012

Mardi Gras(pronounced "moddy gra") is a yearly pagan sex rite, complete with ritualistic religious "repentance," period of atonement in Lent, ending with the Mass, the death burial and resurrection of Christ...celebrated each year.

Al manner of works of the flesh are made manifest, adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance emulations, wrath, strife sedition's, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness's, revellings, and such the like: of the which I tell you before you do it as you also have been told in times past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God("Thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven...).Galations 5:19-21.

A festival for the unseen world, the tools of sin are displayed: lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, the pride of life, the power of suggestion, half truths, separation from the safety of God's people...

Stay out of the alleys!

[lynnemelcombe]

04:42 PM on 02/21/2012

Could HuffPo reporters possibly learn that the word is not "predominately" but "predominantly"? Predominate is a verb. One doesn't generally convert verbs into adverbs (ie, words that end in "ly," among others). Predominant is an adjective. One can convert adjectives into adverbs. For example, one can take, "He is a quick runner" and turn the adjective into an adverb by saying, "He runs quickly." One cannot say, "He quick runly." And in the first paragraph, saying "predominately Catholic" does not an adjective an adverb make. The verb is implied. Properly, it would read, "Mardi Gras is celebrated in locations that are predominantly Catholic," with predominantly modifying the verb "are," not the noun "locations." For conciseness, it can be phrased, "predominantly Catholic regions," but then the verb "to be" is implied (ie, it is still an adverb, not an adjective). Come on, people, you are champions of the English language. Your pen is your sword. Sharpen up.

[crydespite]

03:31 AM on 02/22/2012

sound advice. oh and don't forget that it's penitence, not penitance.

[lynnemelcombe]

11:03 AM on 02/22/2012

Good catch. I got so frustrated with predominately that I didn't read as far as penitance.

[LeftyHeinz]

02:51 PM on 02/21/2012

Many seem to think it’s their calling to assure impenitent sinners and carnal professors that their sins are absolved, but it’s arrogant to try to convince others that they are saved. This is intruding on God's territory. They would better serve the Lord if they would challenge people to question their salvation rather than giving assurance of salvation. Believing is total commitment and the righteous have forsaken ALL sin and selfishness in order to qualify.

[edgraham]

01:22 PM on 02/21/2012

I was wondering just the other day, "Why pancakes?"

[Syllogizer]

01:47 PM on 02/21/2012

And this article did not answer that question. The reason for pancakes is that if you go back far enough, the fasting rule for Lent excluded not just meat, but egg and milk products too. So you used them up in making the pancakes.

[syntax facit saltum]

03:47 AM on 02/22/2012

Eastern Orthodox Christians still fast that way, and not just during Lent, but also every Wednesday and Friday plus a Lent before Christmas. All animal products (except for some reason that is completely unclear to me, exoskeletal animals are allowed) are avoided such as dairy, eggs, butter, and meat including fish. Also, oil and alcohol is also avoided during the fast (except for Saturdays and Sundays of Lent).

[Susan Landis-Steward]

01:14 AM on 02/28/2012

And the reason for this was because the meat, milk products, and eggs had been stored over the winter and were starting to go rancid. This was a way to use them up and not use them again until the cows freshened and the new lambs and calves were born.

[Katharine Owens]

06:52 PM on 02/21/2012

Using up the butter & eggs that one was not supposed to eat during Lent

[stjoshy]

12:47 AM on 02/21/2012

gotta go to NO some day.. see my saints. see some nips... paradise

[libwingoflibwing]

12:00 AM on 02/21/2012

Epiphany is NOT the 12th Day of Christmas. It is the next day. The 12th Day of Christmas is January 5th. Epiphany is January 6th. The night before Epiphany is the end of the Christmas season and is called Twelfth Night. It traditionally was when the Christmas greens were burned in a bon fire, hot wassail was drank and carols were sung.

[WhoIsNoOne]

10:28 PM on 02/20/2012

Obviously the fish lobby didn't work
hard enough when all of the rules were laid down.

[Pennsylvanianne]

02:53 PM on 02/20/2012

Gee, no one is bad-mouthing Catholics so far on this thread. I guess maybe the Catholic bashers are thinking Catholics did something right when they created Mardi Gras (or Carnevale)!

[springsm]

11:04 PM on 02/20/2012

They don't bash catholics...they do bash fundamental traditional out of touch with reality catholics. Dont be so defensive. You are not the only faith denomination on the face of the earth. And shrove Tuesday happens elsewhere as does Ash Wednesday. Mardi gras from the looks of the person in the picture is just one big drunken party. I was in NO a week before some years ago....and it was a lot of fun. Couldn't come for mardi gras...had to go back to school. I don't think people even knwo there is a religious meaning to this.

[Pennsylvanianne]

11:33 PM on 02/20/2012

"I don't think people even know there is a religious meaning to this" -- just goes to show you how ignorant many are.

[Kenneth Knapp III]

03:26 AM on 02/21/2012

I don't know about Catholic congregations in the rest of the country, but here in Louisiana, I can assure you that most Catholics understand at least the basic religious significance of the season.

[ManuOB1]

07:57 PM on 02/18/2012

Religion and science agree on this point: we are dust and unto dust we shall return.

The reception of ashes on the forehead is open to all humans of any or no religious affiliation.

Ash Wednesday belongs to everyone.

[syntax facit saltum]

03:31 AM on 02/17/2012

That is interesting about the word "carnival". For Greek Orthodox, the name of the Sunday that begins the week before Lent (for us it begins on Monday) is Apokreas-- which means: "away from meat." Moreover, our fast still includes abstention from all animal products, so this must be from a shared time before the Great Schism. Our Lent begins on Monday, not Wednesday. And we begin by asking forgiveness of everyone we have wronged and granting forgiveness to everyone who has wronged us instead of applying ashes to our foreheads.

I had always thought that the ashes that Catholics use were a sign of repentance. I didn't know they had this other meaning.

[SimonBao]

10:33 AM on 02/17/2012

Syntax, you are correct and the ashes on the forehead are meant to be a sign of deep repentance... as in Biblical examples wherein people cover themselves with ashes and sack-cloth.

While the blessing does remind the congregant of her/his own mortality and humility, the ashes end up on the forehead as a very specific sign of sorrowfulness and repentance. Think of Mordecai, the residents of Ninevah, Matthew 11:20-21...

[dpkjj]

08:39 PM on 02/20/2012

Thank you for the information. It is interesting. I was baptized Greek Orthodox, but have spent most of my life in Protestant churches. I love the tradition of forgiving and asking forgiveness. If practiced, that must give a person a wonderful sense of renewal.

Okay, I give up. What does your "handle" mean?

[syntax facit saltum]

03:51 AM on 02/22/2012

I agree with you. Sometimes, during the service of forgiveness, one can sense people who have hardly or perhaps never been asked for forgiveness. Perhaps they have had to spend most of their lives (at least trying) to forgive other people.

"syntax makes a leap." It refers to a linguistics paper that I really like. :)

[MuslimThinking]

03:31 PM on 02/16/2012

It can't be all bad if it involves pancakes.

[MirrorMonkey]

05:11 PM on 02/16/2012

The medieval Lenten fast did not just include abstinence from fat and meat, but also abstinence from eggs and dairy products. Pancakes are a traditional food for Shrovetide because they used up eggs, butter, milk, and fat that could not be eaten during Lent. Eggs are associated with Easter for the same reason: on Easter, for the first time in six weeks, eggs could once again be eaten.

[MuslimThinking]

07:17 PM on 02/16/2012

Now I understand. Thanks

[maxfax]

10:54 PM on 02/16/2012

You know some stuff. Laissez les bon temp roulez!

[H P]

02:56 PM on 02/16/2012

Well I think we need our Mardi Gras rights protected, why aren't the republicans out there on this one???