Editor’s Note: This article was originally published on Feb. 26, 2024. It was updated on March 10, 2025 to include another version of the bogus quote, this time mentioning the Holy Week.
Several Facebook (FB) users are claiming that Pope Francis says Catholics can eat whatever they want during Holy Week or Easter, as the Lenten season kicked off. This is fake.
First published on Feb. 12, 2024, the viral posts attributed the following quote to the pope:
“Eat whatever you want for Easter, the sacrifice is not in the stomach, but in the heart. They refrain from eating meat, but don’t talk to their siblings or relatives, don’t visit their parents or bother them to attend to them. Don’t share food with the needy, forbid children to see their father, forbid grandparents to see their grandchildren, criticize other people’s lives, beat their wife, etc., A good barbeque or beef stew won’t make you a bad person, just like a fish fillet won’t turn you a saint. Better seek to have a deeper relationship with God through better treatment of others let’s be less arrogant and more humble at heart.”
The quote reappeared on social media on March 6, a day after Ash Wednesday. This time, it claimed that the pope supposedly said: “Eat whatever you want during Holy Week” and proceeded with a similar script.
The pope never made such statements on the practice of fasting.
The Vatican City’s official website, which keeps a record of all the pope’s letters, messages and homilies, has no record of such a message being delivered by Pope Francis since he became pope in 2013.
In fact, in his message for last year’s Lenten season, Pope Francis reminded Catholics on the importance of fasting as part of penance:
“Prayer, almsgiving and fasting are not three unrelated acts, but a single movement of openness and self-emptying… I invite every Christian community to do just this: to offer its members moments set aside to rethink their lifestyles, times to examine their presence in society and the contribution they make to its betterment.”
Source: Holy See Press Office, Message of the Holy Father Francis for Lent 2024, 01.02.2024, February 1, 2024
An article from Radio Veritas Asia, a media outlet owned by the Catholic Church, quoted Filipino priest Joseph Salando as saying that the post is “not authentic and misattributed.”
Salando added that the message also contradicts the church’s teachings on Lent and Easter:
“Catholics are obliged, depending on age and health condition, to fast and abstain on certain days, but not during Easter, as the quote seems to emphasize.”
Lent is a 40-day period of fasting and abstinence observed in several Christian denominations, including Roman Catholicism, in preparation for Easter Sunday. The practices of fasting and abstinence are codified in Canon Law.
Last year, 16 posts carrying the claim received around 28,000 interactions. A new version of the fake quote that emerged this year received over 95,000 interactions.