2) Fast on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. Fasting means having only one full meal to maintain one's strength. Two smaller, meatless and penitential meals (collations) are permitted according to one's needs, but they should not together equal the one full meal. Eating solid foods between meals is not permitted. Catholics from age 18 through age 59 are bound to fast. Again, invalids, pregnant and nursing mothers are exempt.
3) Friday Abstinence Outside of Lent. It should be noted that all Fridays throughout the year are designated days of penance. The Code of Canon Law states that Friday is a day of abstinence from meat throughout the year. The American Bishops have allowed us to choose a different form of penance rather than abstaining from meat, but there must be some form of penance, for this is the day we commemorate Christ's suffering and death. The bishops stress that "among the works of voluntary self-denial and personal penance...we give first place to abstinence from flesh meat". From time to time the Church has considered bringing back obligatory abstinence on all Fridays and perhaps this penitential practice will be restored.
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