ToppyToppyKnits: Mardi Gras, Martes de Carnaval, Fat Tuesday

Tuesday, March 4, 2014

Mardi Gras, Martes de Carnaval, Fat Tuesday

Celebration that precedes Lent Christian meditation

One of the most important times of the Catholic calendar is: Lent. Beginning on Ash Wednesday, Catholics begin to prepare for the Easter celebration with prayers, small sacrifices of our favorite things , and personal reflection. This is also the time of year when Catholics refrain from eating meat on Fridays, dating back to ancient times when lack of cooling methods, Christians had to eat all products that could not be consumed during Lent. On this pretext, many localities organized the preceding Ash Wednesday, a popular holiday called "Carnival" in those who consumed all the products will be destroyed during Lent. ”Carne Vai”, the carnival.

Another name for Carnival is " Mardi Gras "
Mardi Gras literally means " Fat Tuesday " and takes its name from the habit of walking a goose ( goose ) Fat in the streets of the city prior to Ash Wednesday , the beginning of Lent Tuesdays.

Shrove Tuesday is the last day before the Catholic Lent in preparation for Easter. The "Lent" begins on Ash Wednesday and ends on Palm Sunday. The word " shrove " comes from " shrive " which means "confess" . Going to confession is an unofficial Catholics who practice before starting the 40-day spiritual journey of Lent.

Other international Mardi Gras names are: Mardi Gras in Mexico , Fastan in Sweden, in Italy Martedi Grasso , J'Ouvert in Trinidad and Carnival in Germany.

The carnival season runs from the Feast of the Epiphany, January 6 , through Tuesday, which in English is known as "Fat Tuesday" because since the 1800s all the butter in the house used to be used to prepare the banquet of Tuesday .

Like many holidays we celebrate today , the festivities include evidence of pagan tradition. Celebrations and masquerade balls , which are an important part of Carnival celebrations today , were also part of the ancient Roman holiday Saturnalia and Lupercalia

The idea of parades, where drinks , laughs, and gives license to other worldly pleasures , is to satiate the desires of the flesh before the abstinence of Lent.

The festival has over seven rules calling to scream, dance , go to the nine parades , dressing ( or undressing) to " freely " , bring cash to the festival, and play responsibly.

No Fat Tuesday would not purple, gold and green beads, but how those colors become a symbol of the party? The International Business Times reports that the first King of Carnival day in 1872 selected the colors based on their associated meaning and people thought it fit threw meaning .
Purple = Justice
Gold = Power
Green = Faith

There are four main styles to celebrate Mardi Gras around the world, originated in pagan fertility rites , whose roots go back to the custom of the feast offered to the Egyptian god Osiris, to mark the retirement of the river Nile

Carnivals peaked with Roman Bacchanalia and Saturnalia, which were controlled during the Middle Ages by the Catholic Church , a period in which the carnival reached its present form , closer to a festival