eanjay's comment two posts back reminds me of a small, but I think relevant, experience of my own, which I found at the time both amusing and thought-provoking.

I was teaching in the 1960s in a secondary school. At school lunch one Friday, one of the boys on my table went to the cooks to get his specially provided fish lunch. "You do know, John," I said to him, "that the Pope has said you don't have to eat fish on Friday any more?"

"Never mind the Pope, sir," he replied with a grin; "it's my mum!"

~Michael~