198 THEISLAND ACADIANS 
     
    
   
   
    
     of obligation, people of all ages would visit their fathers to receive 
     
     the paternal blessing’®. 
     
    

    
     Among the religious ceremonies celebrated in the church during 
     
     the winter, there was Candelmas Day (February 2) when candles were 
     
     blessed. People would take home several candles that would be lit 
     
     on special occasions during the year: for storms, for novenas, and 
     
     during the final hours of the dying. The feast day of Saint Blaise was 
     
     celebrated the next day. People went to church to have the priest 
     
     bless their throats with prayers and consecrated candles. They had 
     
     great faith in this ceremony as a way of preventing sore throats. 
     
    

    
     Lent was undoubtedly the most demanding period of the litur- 
     
     gical calendar. For the forty-six days that preceded Easter, the Catholic 
     
     Church prescribed a very strict regime of penitence. It was above all 
     
     a period of fasting and abstinence which varied in stringency depend- 
     
     ing on the era. Here are the rules for Lent in the Charlottetown diocese 
     
     in 1894: 
     
    
   
   
    
     1. Meat is permitted for all three meals on Sundays. 
     
    

    
     2. Meat is permitted once a day, i.e. for the main meal on Mondays, Tuesdays, 
     
     Thursdays and Saturdays except for Ember Days and Good Saturday. 
     
    

    
     3. According to a decree granted to this ecclesiastical province on May 10, 
     
     1889, the use of lard and other fat is permitted for the preparation of food 
     
     for all meals on days of abstinence as well as for meat days. However, two 
     
     days are set aside: Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. (TR)’! 
     
    
   
   
    
     People gave up sweets or candies during Lent and many men would 
     
     abstain from smoking and drinking alcoholic beverages. Amusements 
     
     were few and far between, whereas events of a strictly religious nature 
     
     increased in both length and number. People who lived close to the 
     
     church attended Mass regularly during the week and everyone would 
     
     do the Stations of the Cross at home and in the church. 
     
    

    
     Lent came to an end with Holy Week and the lengthy ceremonies 
     
     called Tenebrae during which cantors interpreted the Lamentations, 
     
     long plaintive songs. Good Friday was a day of great mortification. 
     
     Some people fasted all day while others observed strict silence. 
     
     Everyone attended the afternoon service. Lent ended with another 
     
     series of religious ceremonies held in the church on Saturday; this 
     
     marked the end of fasting and the beginning of the celebration. 
     
    

    
     Easter was a day for feasting on all the things that one had gone