Our Lord said of His disciples, “the days will come, when the bridegroom shall be taken away
from them, and then they shall fast” (Matthew 9:15). Fasting and abstinence are forms of penance
by which we make satisfaction for sin, master our appetites, and lift the mind to God. Abstinence
forbids eating flesh meat; fasting limits the quantity of food to one full meal a day, with a small
collation permitted. Under the Code of 1917, abstinence bound all Catholics from their seventh
year on every Friday of the year, in honor of Our Lord’s Passion. Fasting bound those from
twenty-one to fifty-nine years of age on all the weekdays of Lent, on the Ember Days, and on certain
vigils such as those of Pentecost, the Assumption, All Saints, and Christmas. The sick, the laboring
poor, and others with good reason were excused. The aim was never mere hardship, but
the freedom of a soul that rules its body.