To n. 316. - Appendix V. Historical Appendix on Fasting Before Mass

316. - On the fast to be observed, historical. Acts of the Apostles 20, 7 and the letter of Pliny to Trajan, X, 97, 98, are understood by most concerning a eucharistic celebration which was customarily done in the evening; at which hour fasting seems excluded. Yet Tertullian also mentions a celebration before dawn (De corona militum, c. 3. P.L. 2, 79.80). That the sacraments of the altar are to be celebrated only by fasting persons is testified to us by the Third Council of Carthage (397), c. 29 (Mansi, III, 885). At least somewhere an exception was made on Thursday in the Lord's Supper, when the Lenten fast itself was interrupted. Yet the Council of Laodicea (around 380), c. 50 (Harduin, I, 798), wants the fast to be observed on that day also; this is confirmed by the Trullan Council, in whose canon 29 the exception of the Lord's Supper is expressly removed, admitted in the Third Council of Carthage, in the canon mentioned above (Harduin, III, 1071). A special canon 808 urges an obligation distinct from the obligation of fasting to be observed before communion; and by canon 277, §5, dispensation is reserved to the Holy Office.