Fast and abstinence outside of Lent
Those helpful folks at EWTN laid it all out for me. (Follow the link to "General Questions", then "Fast and Abstinence.") I should have consulted them before I thawed out those steaks on Valentine's Day (emphasis added):
Canon 1250 All Fridays through the year and the time of Lent are penitential days and times throughout the entire Church.Canon 1251 Abstinence from eating meat or another food according to the prescriptions of the conference of bishops is to be observed on Fridays throughout the year unless (nisi) they are solemnities; abstinence and fast are to be observed on Ash Wednesday and on the Friday of the Passion and Death of Our Lord Jesus Christ.
...On the Fridays outside of Lent the U.S. bishops conference obtained the permission of the Holy See for Catholics in the US to substitute a penitential, or even a charitable, practice of their own choosing. They must do some penitential/charitable practice on these Fridays. For most people the easiest practice to consistently fulfill will be the traditional one, to abstain from meat on all Fridays of the year. During Lent abstinence from meat on Fridays is obligatory in the United States as elsewhere.
Now I know.
