If you’ve got a hankering for fish this Friday, you’ll have to make it yourself or find somewhere other than St. Michael’s Catholic Church in Canfield to buy a dinner.

The parish has posted signs outside the church and posted a notice on its website announcing that the weekly Friday fish fry has been canceled for March 17, 2023.

Youngstown Diocese David Bishop Bonnar has provided a dispensation from the requirement to abstain from eating meat on Saint Patrick’s Day.

As a result, St. Michael’s won’t be selling fish dinners on that day. The dinners will resume on Friday, March 24, and Friday, March 31.

The Church mandates that Catholics aged 14 and over are required to abstain from eating meat on Ash Wednesday and each Friday during the Season of Lent.

This year, however Friday of the third week of Lent corresponds with Saint Patrick’s Day which has traditionally been an important tradition, which for some includes eating corned beef and cabbage.

Bishop Bonnar suggests those taking advantage of the dispensation to make some other act of Lenten sacrifice of charity, such as the public celebration of the Stations of the Cross, the giving of time in a charitable way, the spending of time in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament, praying for vocations, or the Rosary.