Lenten Regulations (1906)
by Nicholas Chrysostom Matz
2236802Lenten Regulations1906Nicholas Chrysostom Matz

Lenten Regulations

DIOCESE OF DENVER—1906.

1. All the faithful, who have completed their twenty-first year, are, unless legitimately dispensed, bound to observe the fast of Lent.

2. All days of Lent, Sundays excepted, are fast days of obligation, on which only one full meal is permitted.

3. By dispensation flesh meat is allowed at the principal meal on all days of Lent, except Wednesdays, Fridays, the Ember Saturday and Holy Saturday.

4. The use of fish with flesh meat is forbidden at the same meal, even on Sundays in Lent.

5. Custom sanctions the taking of a cup of coffee, tea, or chocolate in the morning; and in the evening a collation which should not exceed the fourth part of an ordinary meal. At this collation meat only is forbidden, the use of butter, cheese, milk and eggs being allowed in virtue of a special Indult of the Holy See.

6. The use of lard and drippings is permitted in the preparation of abstinence food.

7. When the principal meal cannot be taken at mid-day, it may be taken in the evening, and the collation in the morning.

8. All persons under twenty-one years, or over sixty years of age, those who are engaged in hard labor, the sick and convalescent, and those who cannot fast without injury to their health, are exempt from the obligation of fasting. Those who have any reasonable doubt, as to their obligation to fast or abstain, should consult their confessor.

9. Those who are not bound to fast may use flesh meat more than once each day on which its use is permitted.

10. The time for fulfilling the precept of Easter Communion extends, in this diocese, from the first Sunday in Lent to Trinity Sunday (From March the 4th to June the 10th.)

11. The Rev. Rectors are requested to have special Lenten devotions in their churches.

12. In virtue of powers granted us by the Holy See, on March 15, 1893, and renewed for ten years, we permit workingmen and their families the use of flesh meat once a day, on all the fast and abstinence days throughout the year, with the exception of all Fridays, Ash-Wednesday, the Wednesday and Saturday of Holy Week and the Eve of Christmas. Those who avail themselves of this dispensation are not allowed to eat fish and flesh at the same meal, and they are exhorted to perform some other act of mortification, such as abstaining from all intoxicating beverages.

The Rev. Rectors will read and explain the above regulations and dispensations to their respective congregations.

✠N. C. MATZ, Bishop of Denver.
Denver, Colorado, Feb. 25, 1906.


This work was published before January 1, 1929, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.

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