Ash Wednesday Fasting and Church Teaching

Every year a bunch of questions come up concerning Lent and the details of the laws governing it. Sometimes these rules are misstated or not clearly stated in various places on the web, so let’s look at what the Church’s official documents say regarding the practice of fast and abstinence on Ash Wednesday.

Before we do that, though, let me offer a few notes of caution:

1) The Church’s laws regarding fast and abstinence today are very mild. As such, they are minimums. One can go beyond what they require and observe a stricter form of penitence, though one is not legally required to do so.

2) There are ways of technically staying within the letter of the law while violating its spirit—e.g., avoiding meat but having a lavish seafood feast. These should be avoided. We want to keep both the letter and the spirit of the law.

3) The Church does not mean us to hurt ourselves by observing penitential practices, and there are a number of exceptions to the law of fast in particular. Anyone who has a medical condition that would conflict with fasting is not obliged to observe it. For example, someone with diabetes, someone who has been put on a special diet by a doctor, someone with acid reflux disease who needs to keep food in the stomach to avoid acid buildup.

Now let’s look at the law.

Ash Wednesday is a day of abstinence and fast. According to Pope Paul VI’s constitution Paenitemini:

III. 1. The law of abstinence forbids the use of meat, but not of eggs, the products of milk or condiments made of animal fat.

2. The law of fasting allows only one full meal a day, but does not prohibit taking some food in the morning and evening, observing—as far as quantity and quality are concerned—approved local custom.

Something to note about the law of fast is that while it acknowledges one full meal, it does not further specify the quantity of “some food” that can be consumed in the morning and evening. You sometimes hear or read about “two smaller meals as long as they don’t add up to another full meal” but this is not what the law says. It just says “some food.” That is certainly something less than a full meal, but the Church does not intend people to scruple about precisely amounts. (Also, the “doesn’t add up to another full meal” rule is very difficult to apply since people eat meals of different sizes during the day and the “size” of a meal can be measured in more than one way; e.g., calories vs. volume.)

The law does provide that approved local custom can regulate the quantity and quality of this food, but the U.S. bishops have not established a complementary norm regulating this. Nor has any U.S. bishop bound his subjects in this respect, to my knowledge. (Your mileage may vary.)

Now: Who is bound to abstain and fast? Here the governing document is the 1983 Code of Canon Law:

Can. 1252 The law of abstinence binds those who have completed their fourteenth year. The law of fasting binds those who have attained their majority, until the beginning of their sixtieth year. Pastors of souls and parents are to ensure that even those who by reason of their age are not bound by the law of fasting and abstinence, are taught the true meaning of penance.

“Those who have completed their fourteenth year” mean those who have had their fourteenth birthday (your first year starts at birth and is completed with your first birthday). The obligation to abstain begins then and continues for the rest of one’s life.

Not so with the law of fasting. “Those who have attained their majority” refers to those who have had their eighteenth birthday, and “the beginning of their sixtieth year” occurs when one turns fifty-nine (the sixtieth year is the one preceding one’s sixtieth birthday, the same way the first year precedes the first birthday). The law of fast thus binds from one’s eighteenth birthday to one’s fifty-ninth—unless a medical condition intervenes.

What about those who are too young to be subject to these requirements? Here Paenitemini states:

As regards those of a lesser age, pastors of souls and parents should see to it with particular care that they are educated to a true sense of penitence.

As noted, these are legal minimums, and one certainly can do more.

By Jimmy Akin – To read more posts by Jimmy Akin, go to the National Catholic Register

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What does St. Teresa mean by “pesky reptiles”?

Q: Dear Sister Carmen, In the Interior Castles St. Teresa talks about “pesky reptiles” and other creatures. What exactly does she mean when she is saying these things?”

A: Those “pesky reptiles!” When you come across a snake unexpectedly, what is your immediate reaction? Well, unless you are a herpetologist it is probably fear, dread or surprise. Let me share with you the reaction of a group of Sisters with one such encounter several years ago.

We had attended Mass at an abbey and were looking for a place to have our lunch on the grounds. We began walking down the path of the Stations of the Cross looking for some benches. At that particular time of the year the grasses and wild flowers had grown to waist level on both sides of the path. Thus, the path had become very narrow, so much so that we had to walk single file. I was in the lead and looking up at some birds flying overhead and not paying attention to the path I was on. The Sister behind me in a sweet gentle voice said, “Oh, look at that snake.” Thinking it was well ahead on the path, I replied, “Where?” She answered, “Right there.” I looked down and about a foot in front of me was the largest diamondback rattler I had ever seen. Its head was well out on the path but most of its body was concealed in the grasses. I froze! Everyone stopped and I said, “That’s a rattlesnake; back up slowly!” Everyone began taking steps backwards.

When we were out of danger, I turned and the Sister who was last in line was nowhere to be seen. She is normally a very slow mover but we found her later by the van, a good distance away. We were very happy that she did not have the van keys or she might have left us behind. We doubled over laughing not only because of her but because of the gentle sweet message we had received about the danger in our path.

Knowing our human nature, Teresa uses an image that is repulsive for most of us: snakes and poisonous creatures – not because they are bad in themselves – but because they can become a danger to us if we do not understand what we are dealing with and do not take the necessary precautions.  Teresa tells us that these creatures live outside the castle in their normal habitats, but they can manage to squeeze into the castle when we enter, just as creatures which live in our yards manage to find their way into our homes.

The creatures to which St. Teresa refers here are “worldly things” – whatever can be an occasion of sin or a danger for us. In the first mansion, we are less aware of the danger before us since we are just beginning a serious life of prayer and not as spiritually attuned to the voice of the Holy Spirit. This room is also cold and dim and our spiritual eyes do not recognize the perils around us. Progress is slow but if we stay with it, allowing God to do His work in us, we gradually enter the second Mansion.  But a number of these “pesky reptiles” manage to come in with us.

Both the first and the second mansions are “rooms of humility.” If Adam and Eve could so easily be convinced by the reasoning of Satan then our wounded nature can undoubtedly be misled. Although the second mansion is not as dark and cold as the first, the hard work required here, the discouragement and impatience with ourselves, and our self-condemnation can cause us to look back and try to return to the previous room. We are still too close to the “world” and its allurements and comfort levels can entice us back. If Satan can induce us to return to the First Mansion, then it will not be too long before he convinces us to leave the castle altogether.

These two rooms of humility are also the rooms of self-knowledge. Unless we know ourselves well we are not in a position to recognize the menaces that can endanger us and draw us off the right path. The difficulty in recognizing what becomes for us an occasion of sin is the proficiency with which we rationalize our choices and behavior.

The second mansion requires great determination and determination is the resolve to move. But to move, we must take a step in some direction. A holy card I have shows a newly hatched fluffy chick standing and looking forward. The verse beneath it states, “Trust is at the beginning of everything: it precedes every step and at every step lights up the way.”

Will we trust God sufficiently to keep our gaze looking ahead, to step forward courageously, and to tune out all voices which are not in conformity with His?

PS: To learn more about the Carmelite Sisters visit our web site: www.carmelitesistersocd.com and for more information please contact the sisters at contact@carmelitesistersocd.com, or 626-289-1353 Ext. 246, 920 East Alhambra Road, Alhambra, California 91801.