Mackerel Snapper

"Mackerel Snapper," or "Mackeral Snapper," is a sectarian slur for Roman Catholics, originating in the U.S. in the 1850s and referring to the pre-Vatican II custom of Friday abstinence. [ [http://books.google.com/books?id=mAdUqLrKw4YC&pg=PA1250&lpg=PA1250&dq=mackerel+snapper&source=web&ots=t0K23OffuF&sig=6WZBMGGID2DB5IAOOwBwrXg2AJ4 The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English] p. 1250 (2005 Taylor & Francis)] The Friday abstinence from meat (red meat and poultry) distinguished Catholics from other Christians, especially in North America, where Protestant churches prevailed and Catholics tended to be poor immigrants from Italy and Ireland.

One example of the term's use comes from a letter to University of Notre Dame president Fr. Matthew Walsh from an anonymous Klansman who was upset with the recent actions of Notre Dame students in breaking up a Klan rally in South Bend:

. . . You can thank your lucky stars that you have your buildings intack (sic), for if the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan assembled in South Bend last Saturday (May 17th) had been as lawless as your bunch of Anarchist students, they would have wiped the Notre Dame Buildings off the earth.

. . . You will see that the Klan will grow by leaps and bounds in and around South Bend. Your "Mackerel Snapping" (emphasis added) hoodlums couldn't have done anything to help along the cause of the Klan any better.

. . . We showed you a few tricks at the recent Primary, now we are going to show you several more at the election in the Fall. I say down with Catholic dominition (sic) of every kind in AMARICA (sic). [cite web | title=Notre Dame -- 100 Years: Chapter XXVI | publisher=Notre Dame Archives | accessdate=2007-08-20 | url=http://www.archives.nd.edu/hope/hope26.htm]

The moniker "Mackerel Snapping Anarchist" has been adopted by some students on the Notre Dame campus in much the same way the originally insulting "Fighting Irish" was adopted by the University as a nickname and source of pride.

The Church still calls Catholics to a Friday abstinence. However, individual Catholics are allowed to choose their own form of abstinence. Catholics are still called to abstain from meat on Ash Wednesday, Good Friday, and every Friday of Lent.

ee also

*Anti-Catholicism
*Discrimination
*Papist
*Popery

References