From a reader…
QUAERITUR:
What is required / recommended regarding fasting and abstinence when a solemnity falls on a Friday in Lent?
And another…
I can’t make out if the Lenten Friday rule of abstinence applies to the Solemnity tomorrow?
I presume you are Latin Church Catholics.
Those who are bound by the law are to do penance on Fridays of Lent.
However, tomorrow, Friday is 25 March, the Solemnity (in the Novus Ordo calendar, which the 1983 Code presumes) of the Annunciation.
Please attend to can. 1251.
Can. 1251 Abstinence from meat, or from some other food as determined by the Episcopal Conference, is to be observed on all Fridays, unless a solemnity should fall on a Friday. Abstinence and fasting are to be observed on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.
For those who don’t like the Usus Recentior or the Novus Ordo… your likes or dislikes make not the slightest difference. If you are a subject of the Latin Church, the 1983 Code pertains to you.
Because in the Novus calendar the Feast of the Annunciation has the rank of a Solemnity, and because can. 1251 applies to you, you are not bound to your Friday penance.
Of course you can do as you please. Do penance if you choose. You are not bound to it. There are conflicting goods: celebrating a great feast of Incarnation of the Second Person of the Trinity, for even those feasts concerning Mary always look to the Lord, as she herself did, or, due to the penitential season, the proper desire to practice some denial for the sake of Lenten disciplina.
In these cases of great feasts during Lent, I generally suggest that people keep their festivities somewhat muted. The Solemnity is a true feast day. That doesn’t mean necessarily extravagance. It also includes refraining from unnecessary things.
Be penitentially festive. Or, if that doesn’t do it for you, be festively penitent.
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