<p>^ The accommodation to Catholics occurred to me. There are some conservative Catholics around here who, following the old rules, still refuse to eat meat on Fridays, even in “ordinary time” (i.e., not Lent/Easter, and not Advent/Christmas). In my childhood, most Catholics didn’t eat meat on Fridays, and that was a year-round practice; Friday was a day of “fasting and penance,” which as a practical matter in most families meant no meat, but fish was OK. </p>
<p>Saint Paul is historically a pretty Catholic town, unlike its neighbor Minneapolis which historically was pretty Nordic. But I find the continued willingness to accommodate the most conservative Catholic elements (if that’s what it is) quite ironic in light of the public schools’ apparently obliviousness to the sensitivities of vegetarians, Muslims, and kosher-keeping Jews, all of whom live here in quite substantial numbers.</p>