What are the rules for fasting during Lent? What are Lent-observers supposed to refrain from?
WRS
From what I understand:
– Abstinence from meat on Fridays (including Good Friday) and Ash Wednesday.
– Fasting on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.
What I’ve always been told is that fasting consists of one “big” (i.e. full) meal and two smaller meals that, when combined, do not equal the big meal. And no snacking. This applies to healthy people from roughly age 15 to 60, I think.
The darkest hour is eleven p.m. on Ash Wednesday…
Why is eleven pm on Ash Wednesday the darkest hour?
And why do I recall meat, eggs, dairy, and cooked food as not permissable during Lent? Was this the rule prior to Vatican II?
WRS
You may recall one or more of those from people of different rites. There has never been a single church-wide “law” regarding abstinence and a number of regional churches have made separate determinations. The Latin Rite of the Catholic Church uses the phrase “flesh meat.” The lists of animals included and excluded (dating back to very early in the church history) have broken down between what we would now call cold-blooded and warm-blooded animals, with warm-blooded animals (mammals and birds) considered meat to be avoided and cold-blooded animals, (fish, reptiles, amphibians) not regarded as covered by the rule. (So, for example, frog legs and turtle soup were “officially” OK to eat on Fridays although in the States they were not generally on many menus outside Louisiana.) I also suspect that there may have been regional differences even within the Latin Rite, simply because the rules arose from traditions that predated Linnaeus by several hundred years and people tended to create their own categories.
I have encountered people who abstained from eating any animal on Fidays (someties including eggs) and I have encountered people who considered it OK to eat poultry on Fridays. Unfortunately for this discussion, I never made it a point to write down which group was following which practice.
Catholic Encyclopedia: Abstinence
Orthodox Church in America: Lenten Fasting
Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America:
I believe that was a clever remark to the effect that it’s when many holidays-only Catholics go *“Oh, Holy Mother! :smack: It’s a Fast Day, isn’t it!? Now I have to wait all the way to suppertime, and it’s gonna be fish sticks! And I have to take my lunch hour to go get smudged! <sfx: stomach growling>” * Extra points if you’re still suffering the aftereffects of Mardi Gras revelry…
…and that would have been a clever response if the original statement had said t 11 AM. Just ignore me, I’m still woozy from the combination of MG and Chinese New Year…
I meant that eleven PM is that last stretch of fast time - when you can hear the meager contents of your stomach sloshing about and you can’t get to sleep for the rumbling. Just one more hour and you can get some food…
Now that I think about it, though, I’m not sure that fast days actually end at midnight, exactly.
I understood what you meant. One of my coworkers was fasting at night last month for “religious reasons” (he didn’t explain further and I didn’t feel it was my place to ask), and on the 31st, getting some food after work was all the poor man could talk about. And, for him at least, the fasting did end at midnight.
as tomndebb gave you links for orthodox fasting, i’ll just say it can get complicated and you know what to do by following the church calendar pinned to the 'fridge.
great lent runs from sundown forgiveness sunday to palm sunday. holy week fast from sundown palm sunday to after liturgy pascal sunday.
how strictly you follow the rules depends on your health. most healthy people 7 years old and up will do no dairy or meat.
during non lenten times, wends. and fridays are no meat or dairy, there are appx. 5 wends and fridays throughout the year that are fast free.