I am not Irish, but I like celebrating St. Patrick’s day with corned beef, cabbage, and potatoes. The corn beef briskets or rounds are only available around the second or third week of March each year. A corn beef round is incredibly rare. If you see one, buy it, I promise you will not be disappointed! As I was thinking ahead of when to cook the corn beef, thinking we usually cook it on St. Patrick’s day or shortly after, I pulled out my calendar. Well, to my surprise, St. Patrick’s day falls on a Friday this year, which begs the question, can I eat my corned beef this year on his actual feast day?
According to Canon Law,
“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.”
Canon Law Pargraph 1251
A solemnity is “the highest liturgical rank of a feast in the ecclesiastical calendar” (John A. Hardon, S.J., Modern Catholic Dictionary, 511). There are fourteen solemnities that are celebrated in the universal Church:
- Mother of God (January 1st)
- Epiphany (January 6th)
- St. Joseph (March 19th)
- Annunciation (March 25th)
- Trinity Sunday (first Sunday after Pentecost)
- Corpus Christi, or the Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ (Thursday after Trinity Sunday)
- Sacred Heart of Jesus (Friday after the second Sunday after Pentecost)
- St. John the Baptist (June 24th)
- Saints Peter and Paul (June 29th)
- Assumption of the Blessed Virgin (August 15th)
- All Saints (November 1st)
- Christ the King (Last Sunday of the ecclesiastical year)
- Immaculate Conception (December 8th)
- Christmas (December 25th)
Since St. Patrick is a feast day and not a solemnity, therefore we cannot eat meat on his feast day since it falls on a Friday. The exception is if the local bishop of your dioceses gives you a dispensation. A dispensation is “a relaxation of the Church’s law in a particular case. It is neither an abrogation of the law nor an excuse from observing the law but a release from its observance, temporarily or permanently, by competent authority, for good reasons” (Father John Hardon, S.J., Modern Catholic Dictionary, 161).
According to Canon Law,
“A diocesan bishop, whenever he judges that it contributes to their spiritual good, is able to dispense the faithful from universal and particular disciplinary laws issued for his territory or his subjects by the supreme authority of the Church. He is not able to dispense, however, from procedural or penal laws nor from those whose dispensation is specially reserved to the Apostolic See or some other authority.”
Canon Law Paragraph 87
So you can may eat meat on St. Patrick’s Day this year if your Bishop has given the faithful a dispensation. So far this is the case in the Diocese of Milwaukee. In the case of the Archdiocese of San Francisco, the bishop has also given a dispensation but has required the faithful to abstain from meat on either the Wednesday before or the Wednesday after St. Patrick’s feast day, which is also permissible. Please check your local diocese’s website for additional details, as some Bishops may or may not give a dispensation.
As a reminder, Canon Law states,
“The law of abstinence binds those who have completed their fourteenth year. The law of fasting binds those who have attained their majority, until the beginning of their sixtieth year. Pastors of souls and parents are to ensure that even those who by reason of their age are not bound by the law of fasting and abstinence, are taught the true meaning of penance.”
Canon Law 1252
In summary, you can eat meat on Fridays during Lent if one of these applies:
- You are 13 or less
- A solemnity falls on a Friday
- Your local bishop gives a dispensation to the faithful
Outside of Lent, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USSCB) has eliminated the moral obligation on penalty of sin to abstain from meat on Fridays. The USCCB said directly: “we emphasize that our people are henceforth free from the obligation traditionally binding under pain of sin in what pertains to Friday abstinence, except as noted above for Lent” (USCCB, Pastoral Statement on Penance and Abstinence).
