Great Lent

Contents I. About faith in God II. About Sin III. About the Son of God – our Savior IV. About the Church V. About the sacraments VI. About post VII. The meaning of confession VIII. How should you confess? IX. Oh St. Communion X. On preserving the good fruits of confession and St. communion Often, when starting confession, St. communion, we do not receive from these saints. the sacraments of the benefit that they give us with the right attitude towards them. This happens because we approach these sacraments too carelessly, not understanding their significance for our inner life and for our spiritual growth and not having the appropriate frame of mind. In the proposed conversations, we want to indicate and consider those spiritual dispositions, those necessary thoughts and feelings that you need to have when starting confession and St. communion. The first of these spiritual dispositions and feelings is a living, heartfelt faith in God. From early childhood we already know about God. As soon as consciousness begins to awaken in us, we already see our parents, brothers and sisters praying in front of the image. Imitating them, we too, with an inept, weak hand, sign ourselves with the sign of the cross, bow to the ground, and babble words of prayer that we alone understand. Father and mother come to our aid, teach us with their own hands to make the sign of the cross, and force us to repeat the words of the prayer after them. This is how our first prayer communication with God begins. As we grow, we become familiar with common prayers and recite them morning, evening and afternoon. Church prayer is added to home prayer, in which we begin to participate when visiting St. church. True, in these children's prayers of ours there is little understanding of what we read, but in them there is a lot of sincere and warm feeling of faith in God, hope in Him and love for Him. And church services, especially Lenten and Easter services, leave a deep, joyful and bright impression in our souls, often for the rest of our lives. These impressions resonate in adulthood and help a person, in difficult moments of temptation and despondency, to find a living faith in God. This is how Elder Zosima talks about his childhood religious experiences in Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov: “Mother took me alone (I don’t remember where my brother was then) to the Church of the Lord, on Monday of Holy Week for mass. The day was clear, and, remembering now, I clearly see again how incense rose from the censer and quietly ascended, and from above in the dome, through a narrow window, God’s rays poured down on us into the church, and, rising to them in waves, the incense seemed to melt in them. I looked with emotion and for the first time in my life I accepted into my soul the first seed of the word of God in a meaningful way. A youth came out into the middle of the church with a large book, so large that it seemed to me then that he was even carrying it with difficulty, and he laid it on the lectern, opened it and began to read, and suddenly I understood something for the first time, for the first time in my life I understood that they were reading in the church of God. There was a man in the land of Uz, truthful and pious, and he had so much wealth, so many camels, so many sheep and donkeys, and his children were having fun, and he loved them very much, and he prayed to God for them: maybe they sinned while having fun. And so the devil ascends to God along with the sons of God and tells the Lord that he has passed through all the earth and under the earth. “Have you seen my servant Job?” - God asks him. And God boasted to the devil, pointing to his great holy servant. And the devil grinned at the words of God: “Give him over to me and you will see that your servant will complain and curse your name.” And God handed over his righteous man, so beloved by him, to the devil, and the devil struck his children and his cattle, and scattered his wealth, all of a sudden, as if by God’s thunder, and Job tore his clothes, and threw himself to the ground, and cried out: “Naked came from his mother’s womb, naked will I return to the earth, God gave, and God has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord from now on and forever!” Fathers and teachers, spare my present tears - for all my infancy seems to rise again before me, and I breathe now, as I breathed then with my eight-year-old child’s chest, and I feel, as then, surprise, and confusion, and joy. And the camels then occupied my imagination, and Satan, who speaks to God like this, and God, who gave his servant to destruction, and his servant exclaiming: “Blessed be your name, despite the fact that you execute me,” and then quiet and sweet singing in the church: “May my prayer be corrected,” and again incense from the priest’s censer and kneeling prayer! Since then - I even picked it up yesterday - and I cannot read this holy story without tears." 1 Read other lines written to his father by the boy Lionel in his suicide letter (in Maria Corelli’s story “The Story of a Child’s Soul” - from English life), and you will see the result of a non-religious upbringing. Lionel was raised by his father in such a way that from childhood he did not know religious feelings. He developed the child’s mind, imparted to him a lot of knowledge, but at the same time he rejected the existence of God and raised his son in this conviction. The boy became sad. He became bored with life. His soul withered like a flower without sun and water. And dying, he writes to his teacher the following: “Dear professor! I can’t continue to live like this... After all, I would have to study for many, many years, not knowing why to study. It is clear that the most important thing for everyone is to learn at least something about God - but even you could not explain anything to me. If this were explained, there would be a goal to try to be both smart and kind, but really, it’s not worth working. If you teach little boys again, it seems to me that the best thing would be for you to teach them to believe in God, in God who created everything, and to love everything, then they would live more joyfully! For my sake, don’t forget this when you start teaching another boy - don’t let him be as unhappy as me!” 2 From these confessions it is clear how, on the one hand, living faith in God gives the soul human happiness and moral strength and how, on the other hand, unbelief kills the very desire to live in it. In the wonderful book of St. Petersburg Metropolitan Gregory, “The Day of Holy Life,” the author turns our thoughts to God with the following words: “Who gave us life? Lord! From Him we received a rational soul, capable of reasoning and knowing, from Him we received a heart capable of loving... We are surrounded by the air that we breathe and without which we cannot live. We are supplied with water everywhere, which is as necessary to us as air. We live on earth, which provides us with all the food necessary to support and preserve our life. We are illuminated by light, without which we could not obtain anything for ourselves. We have fire with which we can and do warm ourselves during cold weather and through which we prepare the food we need. And all this is a gift from God. We have father, mother, brothers, sisters, friends, how much joy, help and consolation they bring us! But we would not have any of them if the Lord did not want to give them to us. How can we not love the Lord God with all the fullness of our love?” 3 Look around you, look at the whole world around you! Is it really possible to assume that it arose by itself, by accident? Or that there is no intelligent force that would preserve it and control it? Look into the heavens in the dead of night. The entire dark blue vault of heaven is strewn with magnificent stars! All these beautiful celestial bodies are huge bodies, surpassing in size not only the Earth, but often the Sun itself; An immense multitude of them are scattered in the heavenly space and they all move harmoniously and in harmony along the paths assigned to them near each other. Where did they come from, all these countless, immense luminaries, how are they supported in space in their harmonious, consonant movement? By yourself? By chance? Of course not! Our minds cannot allow this! Throw a few hundred printed letters onto the table - will they randomly form a reasonable phrase? In the same way, without Intelligent Power, rational, harmonious, consistent movement of the heavenly bodies is impossible. Heaven itself tells us about God. All the nature around us on Earth tells us about God, the wonderful beauty of fields and forests, seas and mountains, the beauty of birds, animals and insects! Only we, the blind, do not see all this and do not notice God in His creations. Knowing and loving God, we must remember that God has shown us what we should be and how we should live. Our conscience tells us this, the Gospel tells us. But how often do we not care at all that our lives are in agreement with the will of God, and we do not live at all as the Lord requires of us. We realize that this is not good, but there is some force within us that pushes us away from God and draws us to break His commandments. This power is sin. It’s as if two beings are fighting in our soul: one is good, and the other is evil. A good being tells us: “Remember God, love God, fulfill His commandments, pray, go to church willingly, be kind, meek, pure, truthful, abhor foul language, and even more so, nasty deeds that are shameful to even mention.” And the evil creature tells us: “Forget about God, you want to go to church - it’s boring there, worry only about your whims and pleasures, what do you care about others, etc.” When we obey the first voice and fight the second, then although it is sometimes difficult, it makes our soul joyful and calm, and when we are carried away by the suggestions of the second voice, then although we temporarily experience some pleasure, then a bitter feeling, dissatisfaction with ourselves and sadness appear in our soul. Where do these sinful, bad attractions come from in us? Did God really create us so bad? No, God created people good and wanted people to remain good, but only God did not want to force people to be good. Therefore, He gave them free will so that they would freely, voluntarily choose good, because only good that is done voluntarily is real good. Man, created good and free, used his freedom for evil. From here sin arose, which took deep roots, first in the first people, and then in all their descendants. In order to teach people to obey God, God gave people the simplest and easiest commandment, but they did not want to obey Him even in this small matter. From small things you need to accustom yourself to obey God. The Savior said: “He who is faithful in a little will also be faithful in much, and he who is unfaithful in a little will be unfaithful in much” (Luke 16:10). A small violation of our duty, a small omission in something good cannot be considered unimportant! It's the small things that make a difference! In small matters, you need to dominate yourself in order to gradually get used to commanding yourself in important matters. It is not difficult, for example, to listen with attention to or read morning or evening prayer, it is not difficult to read with attention half a page from the Gospel every day, it is not difficult to correctly put on the sign of the cross, and all this cultivates in us decency, efficiency, the habit of doing every task conscientiously, and at the same time, strength of character is cultivated, not to mention those blessed fruits in our soul, the fruits of faith and morality that are created reverent prayer and constant reading of the word of God. So, the beginning of sin comes to us from our first parents, or, better said, from the tempter who seduced them - the devil. But constantly being passed on from generation to generation, sin took possession of all people and subjugated everyone to itself. And this sin lives in our souls, and it prevents us from living a real, good life, and it separates us and alienates us from God, with whom, as pure, nothing unclean can be in communication! How to overcome this sin in yourself? How to get rid of it? How to instill goodness and holiness in yourself instead of sin? God, in His mercy, helped people in this by sending His Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ, to earth. III. About the Son of God - our Savior For five and a half thousand years, humanity waited for the Savior promised by God to the first people, who was supposed to erase the head of the serpent - the devil, that is, destroy his power and the power of sin over people. During this long time, people managed to feel the full weight of sin and realized that they themselves could not save themselves from it, tear it out of their human nature, or reconcile with God, whom they had offended with their sin. And then the promised Savior came. He came to lay the beginning of a new, holy life on earth. All people were corrupted by sin, all were unclean, not one was pure, as the word of God says about this: “There is none righteous, not one; there is no one who understands; no one seeks God; they have all turned aside from the path, they are worthless to one; there is no one who does good, no, not one” (Ps. 13:1-3. Epistle to Rom. 3:10-12). People “have become futile in their speculations, and their foolish hearts have been darkened; calling themselves wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man, and birds, and four-footed creatures, and reptiles. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature instead of the Creator, Who is blessed forever, amen. And even though they did not care to have God in their minds, God gave them over to a depraved mind - to do lewd things, so that they are filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, greed, malice, filled with envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice, slanderers, slanderers, haters of God, offenders, self-praisers, proud, resourceful for evil, disobedient to their parents, foolish, treacherous, unloving, irreconcilable, unmerciful” (Rom. 1:21–31). People felt their sins, they yearned for holiness, and then perfect holiness appeared - Jesus Christ. This perfect holiness could only be brought to earth by the Son of God, only by God, because none of the created beings had it. The incarnate Son of God, along with holiness, brought to earth endless mercy. He took pity on people who languished in the power of sin. He grieved for them with the greatest sorrow. So that none of the people would feel abandoned by Him, far from Him, His Savior, He was born in the poorest lot of mankind, thereby giving the opportunity to the very last of the poor not to consider Him inaccessible to themselves; He endured all kinds of hardships and suffering so that all sufferers could find in him a model and consolation for themselves; He suffered a shameful death on the cross so that the most serious but repentant criminals would not feel rejected by Him. In a word, He took upon Himself, into His soul, all disasters and all human sins, without ceasing to remain sinless Himself. He was wounded for our sins, and by His stripes we were healed. He taught people who had forgotten God to know God the Father; He taught people given over to vice to know and love holiness in His face; He comforted the mourning and persecuted people with His mercy. With all this He broke the power of sin and destroyed its power over people. For people who came to know Christ, sin lost its attraction, or at least they had a desire to fight sin, relying on the strong help of their Savior. Grasping Him, clinging to Him with their souls, they climbed out of the mud of sin and stood, holding His saving hand, on the solid ground of holiness. In Him, people felt forgiven by God the Father. This is how Jesus Christ saves us! That is why He is called our Savior! Jesus Christ became the second Adam for us. Just as the first Adam plunged us into the abyss of sin, so Jesus Christ, the second Adam, introduces us into a new, holy life. We must remember this and love Him as our Savior, leading us onto the path of pure life, firmly believe in Him as the Son of God, and not forget that He is close, very close to each of us. And just as during His earthly life He suffered, seeing the sins of mankind, so now He suffers, seeing the sins of each of us! But, someone will ask, if Jesus Christ defeated sin and freed people from it, then why does sin still dominate people? Because people do not take the helping hand extended by the Savior. When they take this hand and strive to emerge from the swamp of sins, they are saved. In order to make it easier for people to free themselves from sin, the Lord Jesus Christ established His holy Church on earth, to which he gave grace-filled means to deliver people from sin. Believing in Jesus Christ and hoping for salvation by faith in Him, we must at the same time believe in the Church established by Him, belong to it and use for our salvation all the means that Jesus Christ provided it. Christ did not want those who believed in Him to live separately; He united them into one society, into one family, all members of which are united by the same faith and mutual love. This society is called the Church. Jesus Christ gave the church the correct structure and sent down the life-giving power of the Holy Spirit. He did this so that everyone who believes in Him, being part of the Church Union and strengthened by the grace of the Holy Spirit, could more easily and more surely be saved from sin. When there were few Christians and they all lived in the same city of Jerusalem, then they lived like one loving family. Everyone had one heart and one soul. The rich gave their property to the apostles, and the apostles used it to help the poor. Every day believers gathered for prayer and listened to the instructions of St. apostles, took communion of the Holy Mysteries of Christ. When the Christian Church from Jerusalem spread to other cities, then in each such city all the believers also formed one family - they also often gathered for prayer, to read the Word of God and receive Holy Communion. Tain and also lovingly and willingly helped each other and took care of the sick, old people and orphans. Each such society was called a church and all of them together constituted one Christian Church. Subsequently, those places where believers gathered for prayer, i.e. churches, also began to be called churches. To govern the Church and to perform divine services, the apostles established bishops, priests and deacons. Little by little, the same order of worship was established in the churches, the same church customs and rules - fasting, the sign of the cross, liturgical clothing, etc. Church hymns were composed, which were included in the general use of the Church, essays were written in defense and explanation of the faith, general councils were convened to discuss and resolve church affairs. Thus, church life gradually took shape in the form in which it exists today. Everyone lived the same church life. Having endured cruel persecution from Jews and pagans during the first three centuries of its existence, the Christian Church, in subsequent centuries, until the half of the 9th century, was forced to endure an equally cruel internal struggle with heretics who tried to darken the purity of its apostolic teaching with their inventions and, having defended its teaching at ecumenical councils, by the half of the 9th century it was adorned with the fullness of its doctrine, liturgical order and chants. This is neither the time nor the place to talk about how all the present diversity of Christendom came into being. I only want you to understand and feel the importance and necessity for us to belong to the Church of Christ, to that vast gathering of believers, the head of which is the Lord Jesus Christ, which includes a huge number of holy saints of God, apostles, martyrs, saints and saints, spiritually nourished by the gracious gifts of the Holy Spirit, i.e. receives its spiritual strength and life from the invisible heavenly world, from God and countless hosts holy angels and righteous people, and sacredly preserves Christian teaching and life in all purity. Why is it so important and saving for us to belong to this holy society? The same reason why no one would want to leave a strong and well-managed ship and rush into the sea to sail alone across the boundless expanse of the sea, exposed to the every minute danger of death. Another comparison can be used. – Who, having a strong and well-furnished house, would want to leave it, and would prefer, with their weak, lonely strength, to independently build a new home nearby? The Church, founded by the Lord Jesus Christ, strengthened and enlightened by the Holy Spirit, grown on the labors of the Holy Apostles, on the blood of the Holy Martyrs, on the exploits of the Church Fathers and saints, richly supplied with the grace-filled Gifts of the Holy Spirit, adorned with solemn and touching holidays, memories, rituals and chants, shining with high examples of holy ascetics and inspired writings of the fathers and teachers of the Church - is for us as that spiritual ship and that spiritual home where each of us finds spiritual shelter and spiritual food, where our soul receives correct and healthy spiritual development and learns the true Christian life. That is why the Apostle Paul calls the Church “the pillar and ground of the truth” (1 Tim. 3:15), and Jesus Christ promises the Church an indestructible fortress: “I will build my Church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18). From the very first days of our lives, we already enter into the grace-filled environment of the Church, but we do not always notice and appreciate it, and we do not always care about taking advantage of all the benefits that it offers us. Immediately after our birth, she blesses our entry into the world with a special prayer. On the eighth day of our life, she gives us a Christian name and prays that we will grow up worthy of the name Christian. On the 40th day, she blesses our entry into the church and baptizes us. And she sanctifies all subsequent important, decisive moments of our life with her prayer, strengthening our spirit with her grace-filled power. In the church she educates our soul with holy impressions. And after our death, she does not leave us with her prayers. And she only wants one thing from us, that we meet her halfway with an open heart, that we do not deprive ourselves of her gracious help, that we do not destroy the good work she has done in us with a bad life, and that for our part we live as our Christian dignity requires, without breaking away from her maternal cares and good influence. We said that Jesus Christ established his holy Church on earth to cleanse us from sin. Among the various means by which the Church helps us to be saved from sin, the most important is the holy sacraments. What is a sacrament? Leaving His disciples, Jesus Christ promised them that He would not leave them orphans, but would send them the Holy Spirit - the Comforter, who would teach them the truth. And indeed, 10 days after the ascension of Jesus Christ into heaven, the disciples received the promised Holy Spirit, who descended on the apostles as if in the form of tongues of fire and produced an extraordinary change in them. Simple fishermen who had never left their homeland, they suddenly spoke the languages ​​of all nations. Having not understood the simple words of their Teacher, they began to understand the prophecies. Timid and confused, they courageously and with dignity stood up before the leaders and kings and gave them wise answers. Thus, the grace-filled power of the Holy Spirit imparted to them enlightened, animated and made them wise. We also receive this grace-filled power of the Holy Spirit in the Church. This power enlightens our mind, purifies and inspires our heart; it is given to us in prayers, and in reading and listening to the Word of God, and in all sacred rites of the church, but especially in St. sacraments. The sacraments are those sacred church actions through which the grace-filled power of the Holy Spirit is especially communicated to us. There are seven of them - baptism, confirmation, communion, repentance, consecration of oil, marriage and priesthood. And each of these sacraments brings its own special gift to our soul. In the sacrament of Baptism, the seed of holy life is laid in us (see Bishop Theophan, “The Path to Salvation”), which we or our parents and successors must grow in us; in the sacrament of Confirmation, strength is given to our feelings and strengths for our spiritual growth; in the sacrament of Communion we receive Divine life into ourselves, partaking of the Body and Blood of Christ; in the sacrament of Repentance we receive forgiveness and cleansing of sins committed after baptism; in the sacrament of the Blessing of Unction we also receive forgiveness of sins, especially for the forgetfulness of those who did not confess in the sacrament of Repentance (Optina elders) and bodily health; in the sacrament of Marriage, family life is sanctified, God’s blessing is brought down on the birth and Christian upbringing of children; in the sacrament of the Priesthood, the power is given to be a prayer book for others, a performer of the sacraments and a leader in spiritual life. Anyone who approaches the sacraments with attention and proper preparation truly feels in his soul a clear change produced by the touch of the grace of the Holy Spirit. A fire flares up in the soul, peace descends on it, confusion and disorder of feelings subsides in it, sin leaves it for a while. Let us remember this and approach the sacraments with faith and reverence, as a means of our correction and renewal given to us by Christ! We sometimes hear from some people doubts about the sacrament of Baptism - whether it should be performed on unconscious babies who can have neither faith nor repentance. There is no barrier to the action of God's grace on the human soul, just as there is no barrier to the action of the sun's rays on the human body. Only one sin can interfere with the action of grace on the human soul, but a child has fewer difficulties in this regard than adults. We perceive most of our impressions without realizing them, because it is not possible to notice everything that affects our soul. And these impressions, unconscious to us, lie for the time being in our soul without moving, and then they float up and enter the area of ​​​​our consciousness and we then notice them, and then again they go into the depths of our soul and we then forget them. So is the soul of a baby - it collects impressions and preserves them in itself, although it is not conscious for the time being, but, undoubtedly, all these impressions do not pass without a trace and fruitlessly for it. Let us remember, then, the example of Jesus Christ himself. When the apostles did not allow infants to come to him, He was indignant at them and said: “Suffer the children to come to Me and do not hinder them, for of such is the kingdom of God” (Mark 10:14). At the same time, He hugged the children, laid His hands on them and blessed them. Did these children realize why Jesus Christ lays hands on them, why he blesses them? Hardly, but Jesus Christ did it anyway, obviously because this laying on of hands on children imparted grace-filled power to the children. In this example of the Savior lies the justification for our baptism of infants, our anointing and giving them communion. The Church does not want, just as the apostles, who were not yet enlightened by the grace of the Holy Spirit, mistakenly acted, not to allow children to Jesus Christ. And so, understanding what the sacraments are and what we receive through them, with faith, eagerness and reverence, we will approach the great sacraments of Repentance and Communion, through which our soul is cleansed from its sins and sanctified by the grace of the Holy Spirit! Everything stated above makes the meaning of the sacraments of Confession and Communion partly clear to us. Now we could talk in more detail about these sacraments, but since we usually approach them during Great Lent, and through fasting we prepare for them, I want to talk first about fasting. Fasting is the oldest church institution. The first commandment given to the first people in paradise was the commandment to fast. The Old Testament righteous fasted, and St. John the Baptist, and, finally, our Lord Jesus Christ fasted for forty days before going to preach, following the example of which our forty-day Great Lent was established. Despite all these examples, despite the fact that fasting has always existed in the Orthodox Church, many are burdened by fasting and consider it unnecessary, unnecessary, and therefore do not observe it. They say: “Why fast? It is not what enters into him that defiles a person, but what comes out of him, that is, the evil desires of the heart; you need to fight them, and not exhaust your body with fasting.” Those who reason like this are reminiscent of a patient who, when asked to take medicine, says: “Why should I take this medicine? After all, I don’t need to take medicine, but I need to get well?” This patient forgets that the medicine is given to him precisely so that he gets better... Likewise, fasting is not significant in itself, but only as a means to acquiring mental health. What is the significance of fasting for the health of the soul? As is known, fasting is primarily expressed by a transition from more nutritious meat foods to less nutritious fish, and sometimes to even less nutritious plant foods, and, finally, even to dry eating; This transition from one type of food to another is prescribed by the Church not because it considers one type of food pure and another not pure: all food is pure and blessed by God! And this is not even why so-called vegetarians refuse meat food, that is, out of a feeling of pity for animal creatures or out of awareness of the greater usefulness of plant foods. By changing food, the Church intends to weaken sensuality and give predominance to our spirit over our flesh. By switching from more nutritious to less nutritious food, we make ourselves lighter, more mobile, and more capable of spiritual life. How much influence food has on our spiritual life and work can be easily seen from our own experience. Try to engage in serious mental work after a hearty lunch, and you will see how difficult it is! And praying at this time is even more difficult! They say that you can also abuse lean foods. This is true, but we must keep in mind not abuses, but what the Church prescribes for us. The Church also prescribes abstinence and moderation in Lenten food. Some people say that fasting is unhealthy. This is not true. It is not harmful for healthy people. For those who, due to poor health, need increased nutrition, the Church allows relief from fasting. For she does not mean, as stated above, the exhaustion of our body, but only the weakening of our animal sensuality. That fasting is not at all harmful to health is evident, firstly, from the fact that those who fast get sick less than those who do not fast, and secondly, from the fact that they live no less. Many great fasters lived, as can be seen from the lives of the saints, to be 80, 90, 100 or more years old. The change of food prescribed by the Church during Lent also has the significance for us that it gives us the opportunity to exercise our will in the fight against our desires and habits and in victory over them. The transition from fast food to lean food is unpleasant for us. But by overcoming this unpleasant feeling and subordinating ourselves to the rules of the Church, we discipline ourselves, demonstrate our power over our habits and tastes, and this is very useful. This tempers us, makes us more courageous, resilient, stronger, helps us rise above our habits and not be slaves to them. Others voluntarily harden themselves with all kinds of hardships. But we do not need to find ways of these deprivations - it is enough to be only faithful followers of the rules of the Church. We will appreciate the importance of fasting even more if we remember that fasting consists not only in replacing fast food with lean food, but also in limiting oneself in excesses and whims, for example, sleeping less, refraining from delicacies, smoking tobacco, etc. Finally, the Church also requires spiritual fasting from us. During fasting, we must take special care to suppress and eradicate our bad inclinations, habits and desires. On this occasion St. John Chrysostom said this: “Can’t you fast? But why can't you forgive your enemy? Change your disposition: if you are angry, try to be meek; if you are vindictive, do not take revenge; If you like to slander and gossip, refrain, etc. Do more good during the days of fasting, be more sympathetic to people, be more willing to help those in need of your help, pray harder, warmer, etc. In all these directions, fasting opens up a wide field for you to work on yourself - just have the desire to work!” So, the Church did not accept and maintain holy fasting in vain. Let's learn to respect fasting, appreciate its benefits, let's not break it frivolously and treat it arrogantly! The days of Holy and Great Lent are usually days of fasting, confession and communion for us. Those days have come now. But how often do they pass us by without bringing us any tangible benefit! This happens not because, of course, they cannot bring us this benefit, but because we ourselves treat them too frivolously, too carelessly. Think more seriously about what confession and communion give us and why they exist in the Orthodox Church. Let's talk about confession first. To clearly imagine its meaning, let us turn to a consideration of our inner, mental life. We have already said that there are two beings constantly fighting inside us - good and evil. And so, true Christian life begins in us only when we consciously take the side of a good being and try to defeat the evil. As long as we treat our inner life carelessly, without even properly distinguishing between good and evil in it, and passively surrender to our desires and inclinations, whatever they may be, without making any assessment of them, until then we are not yet living a Christian life. And only when we painfully feel our shortcomings, when we condemn ourselves and want renewal, only then do we enter the path of Christian life. Let's take living examples. Here before us is a Pharisee and a tax collector. The Pharisee goes to the church of God, does many good deeds, but we still won’t say that he lives a true life. Why? Because he is quite pleased with himself. He does not painfully feel his uncleanness, he boasts of his righteousness, the abyss of sin sitting in him has not yet been revealed to him. The publican, on the contrary, does not have any good deeds behind him. But he clearly saw the depth of his sinfulness and grieved for himself. He asks God for one thing - mercy, salvation. This is the true Christian mood! Another example is in the sixth century, in the Egyptian city of Alexandria, there lived a young sinner, Mary. Sin was sweet and pleasant to her. She was carefree and cheerful. She never experienced anxiety of conscience. She didn't understand herself. To give herself some new fun, she joined the crowd of pilgrims heading to Jerusalem for the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. All the way she sang sinful songs, poisoning the peaceful rest of the pilgrims and their elevated mood with her shameless antics and laughter. Finally, she arrived with them in Jerusalem and carelessly, out of curiosity, followed the others to the Church of the Resurrection of Christ. But what? When she wanted to cross the threshold of the church, she felt that some invisible force was not letting her in. She felt both scared and ashamed in front of her companions. She does not want to show that she cannot enter the church, but all her efforts to enter it remain fruitless. Then only her whole past life illuminated before her with a bright light. She saw something she hadn't noticed before. She saw that she was unworthy to enter the church, because she was too unclean for this. And then she cried bitterly. From that moment on, an internal struggle began in her, to which she devoted her whole life. So, sometimes a person does not pay attention to his shortcomings and even to his sins and lives carelessly for a long time, and then the time will come and his eyes will open. For some, like Mary of Egypt, this happens immediately, for others it happens very slowly and with great difficulty. Let us now apply what we have said to ourselves. Trace a series of your actions, intentions, words. Yesterday you seriously offended your neighbor with a rude harsh word, offensive suspicion or poisonous ridicule; the day before, you were constantly haunted and tormented your soul by some dirty, base desire, and you not only did not drive it away from yourself, but seemed to even try to enjoy it; Now you had the opportunity to sacrifice your peace or comfort in order to provide a service to someone, but you didn’t do it, etc. If you are attentive and conscientious, then you will see that your life will present a whole network, a whole huge interweaving of such, sometimes small, sometimes large, nasty things that form a significant part of your existence. If we do not pay attention to all this, if we think that all this is how it should be, this means that we have not yet begun the Christian life. Our Christian life will begin only when we say: no, I don’t want such filth to live in my soul! I want to be clean and kind! I want to be a true Christian! But as soon as you try to take this path, you will immediately be convinced of the following: you will see that the fight against evil in yourself is extremely difficult, painful and exhausting. You will see how evil your feelings are, how your nasty thoughts and desires, against your will, against your consent, take possession of you, push you to do certain ugly actions. Sometimes, having already uttered a rude, offensive word, or done a bad deed, only then do you begin to understand that this should not have been said or done, and until then you did not see anything ugly either in the word that you wanted to say or in the deed that you wanted to do. You begin to feel the great truth of the words of the apostle. Paul: “I don’t do what I want, but what I hate, I do. I do not do the good that I want, but I do the evil that I do not want” (Rom. 7:15, 19). But not only do you become the plaything of your bad inclinations, you feel that your entire inner being is being desecrated, polluted by these bad inclinations, your thoughts are clouded, your desire is defiled, your will is weakened. How, one might ask, can a person get rid of all this dirt? How to throw her out of yourself? Should I really stay like this with her? It sometimes happens that, having shared his spiritual sorrows with someone, a person feels relieved. But in this way we only share our sadness with others, and do not free ourselves from it completely. Another, more certain means of salvation is needed. The famous spiritual writer, Bishop Theophan, in one of his works, says the following: “There was a young man who was deeply saddened that he had desecrated his soul with his many sins. He fell asleep out of sadness. And so he dreams that an angel flew down to him from heaven, cut his chest with a sharp knife, took out his heart, cut it into pieces, removed everything that was spoiled and rotten from it, carefully put it back in its original place and healed the wound itself. The young man woke up and felt clean from his sins.” Isn’t it true, how good it would be for us to sometimes experience such a healing effect of a luminous angel! And such an angel is given to us. This is the grace of the Holy Spirit in the sacrament of Confession. We know that Jesus Christ brought holy life to earth. This holy life through the Church and St. sacraments are communicated to people. Confession is the sacrament of Holy Repentance. It was established so that through it we could be cleansed from all our sinful filth. In establishing this sacrament, Jesus Christ said to his disciples: “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive, they will be forgiven; on whomever you leave it, it will remain on him” (John 20:22–23). And to this day, the shepherds of the Christian Church, according to the authority given to them by the Lord, forgive the sins of those who repent, and the grace of the Holy Spirit cleanses their hearts. Thus, confession is not some incomprehensible, unknown why existing custom that must for some reason be blindly followed, but this is an extremely important and extremely necessary means of moral healing and correction for us, meeting the most necessary requirements of our own moral nature. Avoiding confession is the same as if, suffering from some physical illness and knowing the right medicine for it, through negligence or laziness, you do not use this medicine and thus trigger the disease. Our sins are a mental illness for us. We have been given a cure for this disease. Not using this medicine means not wanting to part with your sinful impurity and accumulate it in yourself... VIII. How should you confess? You need to confess in the presence of a confessor. Those who do not want to confess sometimes say: “Why do you need to tell your sins to the priest? Doesn’t God already know our sins? And can’t He forgive us for them without confession?” It is necessary to confess your sins, that is, to recount them before the priests, not because otherwise they will remain unknown to God, but because it is useful and necessary for the repentant himself. Our sincere confession of sins to the priest shows, first of all, our sincere willingness to condemn ourselves for these sins. Whoever has the determination to express his sin to his confessor in order to be healed of sin, obviously this sin has already become unpleasant and alien to him. Confessed sin, as it were, becomes outside our soul, leaves it, just as a splinter removed from the body becomes outside the body and ceases to harm it. A person will never condemn his own sin with such sincerity and clarity as he condemns it when expressing it to his confessor. This is an undoubted fact of our mental life. It is explained by the fact that open confession of sin before a confessor humbles our pride, which often does not want to have witnesses to our shortcomings and sins, especially shameful ones. This pride of ours inspires us with the idea that one internal consciousness of sin before God is enough, for it is easier for her to admit her mistake before the Invisible God than in the presence of a visible person similar to us. In the primal Christian Church they looked at this matter even more strictly than the Orthodox Church looks at it now. There, a publicly committed sin had to be confessed in the presence of not only the confessor, but the entire community of believers, and, of course, for human pride this was even more unpleasant, but for sincerely repentant people this was not at all an obstacle to confession. Confession before a priest is also necessary because he is given the power to forgive or not forgive sin. How can a priest forgive or not forgive a sinner if he does not know the latter’s sins? And can the penitent himself have firm confidence that his sins have been forgiven and that he has been cleansed of them if there is no visible sign of this forgiveness and cleansing in the priest’s prayer of permission? The permission of the confessor completely calms the sinner, and he leaves him with joy and peace in his soul! Confession is usually followed by communion of the Holy Mysteries of Christ, but the priest can only admit a believer and a repentant to this communion, and therefore confession of sins before the priest is necessary. Finally, confession to a priest is also necessary because the priest, having become familiar with the state of the sinner’s conscience, can give him useful advice, show him the correct order of life and, thus, warn him against repeating previously committed sins in the future. How to prepare for confession? We usually live in such a bustle that it can be very difficult for us to concentrate on our inner state of mind and strongly feel our sinfulness. To help us with this, the Church established a fast before confession, which consists of leaving our usual way of life for several days, fasting, attending divine services in the morning and evening, reading spiritual books and spending time alone, or even better with a person who is in the same mood as us. Thanks to visiting the church, Lenten prayers and chants, reading and detachment from our usual secularism, we enter a new world, with a predominance of spiritual interests in it. We think more about God and feel Him closer to ourselves; our inner life and its bad, sinful sides appear more clearly in our consciousness. The corresponding reading further strengthens us in this mood. What to read during fasting? The best reading for this time are the works of Bishop Theophan, for example, “The Path to Salvation”, “Thoughts on Repentance”, “What is Spiritual Life”, etc., the works of Bishop Ignatius Brianchaninov, Tikhon of Zadonsk, John Chrysostom; for others, perhaps, “The Ladder” of St. John Climacus, book of Abba Dorotheus, etc. Our main attention at this time should be paid to ensuring that we vividly feel God’s great love for us and our guilt before God. Therefore, you should often pray in the words of King David: “Have mercy on me, O God, according to Your great mercy, and according to the multitude of Your compassions, cleanse my iniquity. Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a right spirit in my womb. Do not cast me away from Your presence, and do not take Your Holy Spirit from me” (Ps. 50:1, 12-13), etc. Self-condemnation is the first and most important thing with which we must come to confession. We must remember David, who wet his bed with tears at night, the sinner who washed the Savior’s feet with her tears, the prodigal son who returned to his father, St. Peter, who mourned his renunciation all his life, Rev. Mary of Egypt, etc. examples. They arouse a feeling of repentance in the soul, they remove carelessness and frivolity, the most terrible enemies of proper confession. It sometimes happens that our conscience immediately shows us our spiritual wounds. This happens if our conscience is sensitive enough or if we have committed some particularly serious sin. But sometimes our conscience is silent. People who are inattentive, who do not attach serious importance to confession, who “serve” it frivolously, still come to confession without knowing what to repent of? And when the confessor turns to them with a question about how they feel sinful, they usually answer: “Especially nothing. I am a sinner, like all people, in deed, word and thought.” This answer is completely insufficient. He shows that such confessors either did not have time, or were too lazy to delve deeper into themselves, and therefore did not notice anything special in themselves. They did not “test” their conscience, which anyone can easily do by testing themselves according to God’s commandments. The commandments clearly indicate man's duties. It cannot be that there is a person who has never violated one or another commandment. When you carefully examine your conscience, these violations are revealed. It is necessary to confess not only special sins, as some mistakenly think, but any general impurity of the soul, and someone who is sincerely aware of this impurity sometimes grieves more strongly over a small offense than another frivolous person over a serious crime. The severity of sin is largely determined by the sensitivity of our conscience. Confession must be completely sincere. Only people who have no idea about the purpose of confession can rejoice that the confessor did not ask about sins. After all, if a sin is hidden, not expressed in confession, then this means that it remains in us... A sincere confession is sometimes hindered by false shame - the tongue does not dare to admit to a shameful sin. To overcome this false shame, we must firmly remember that we are confessing not to a priest, but to God, who knows this sin anyway. You must have the fear of God! Let this fear force us to overcome our shame before our confessor! Well, we will burn a little in shame, but our conscience will be clear, and we will be pure before God! Sometimes a sincere confession is hindered by fear that the confessed sin may become known to one of the other people. This fear is completely unfounded. The confessor has no right to reveal to anyone what was said to him in confession. This is an eternal secret between the penitent, the confessor and God! Some, not relying on their memory and fearing from the excitement of confession to forget this or that sin, write down their sins on a piece of paper and read them to their confessor from the paper. Confessors usually do not interfere with this, and this method of confession is especially useful for those people who forget their sins out of excitement. In addition to self-condemnation and sincerity, we must bring to confession a sincere desire not to repeat the sins we have committed. The sins we have committed should seem disgusting to us, we shake them off and from now on we want to start a new, clean life! And we must firmly believe that the Lord, in the sacrament of Confession, removes from us the burden and filth of sin and will put us on the path of a new life. And so, having come to confession with such a disposition of heart and confessing to your confessor sincerely, seriously, contritely your big and small sins, with attention and with faith you need to listen to the prayer of permission read by him and when he says: “And I, unworthy priest, by the power given to me, forgive and absolve you from all your sins,” you will feel a surge of extraordinary joy and freshness, you will feel that the heavy stone of filth lying on it has fallen away from your heart and that you have become a new, pure person. The past has moved away from you, the dawn of a new life begins! This feeling always happens to those who worked on themselves during the days of fasting and brought their confession with faith and contrition of heart. Confession is over. All unclean things have been swept out of your soul. The soul is clean and tidy. This is a lot, a lot! This is a great gift from God! But this is not all that a Christian needs. Confession is only the first step in the process of our spiritual renewal. It is not enough just to have a soul pure from sin. We must absorb the Divine, holy life into ourselves, commune with God, without which our spiritual strength and vigor are impossible, doing good is impossible, good direction of thoughts, desires and feelings is impossible. Jesus Christ says to his disciples: “Just as a branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it is in the vine, so neither can you unless you are in Me. I am the vine, and you are the branches; He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing” (John 15:4–5). Without God we are nothing. God, who abides and acts in us, creates all good things through us. This is why the sacrament of Holy Communion is necessary. Sometimes we do not understand the great importance of this sacrament. To our sinful soul the sacrament of Repentance seems more understandable and more necessary, but this is because we still live too little spiritual life and have not yet been able to experience experimentally all the great saving power and vital necessity of St. communion. The Savior speaks about the meaning of this sacrament for us: “If you do not eat the Flesh of the Son of Man and drink His Blood, you will not have life in you. He who eats My Flesh and drinks My Blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. He who eats My Flesh and drinks My Blood abides in Me, and I in him” (John 6:53–56). Each of us understands how good it is to be under the protection of the Strong One, who can protect us from any offense; how pleasant it is to be with a Good being, who pours into our soul a softening and pleasing feeling of kindness; how pleasant it is to be with a Reasonable being, Enlightening our thought and imparting to it new reasonable concepts; how pleasant it is, finally, to be with a strong being, who affirms our will in good habits. St. experienced great joy. apostles, feeling protected and supported by the Almighty Love of Their Heavenly Teacher! We receive all this in the great sacrament of Holy Communion, in which the Lord Jesus Christ invisibly, under the guise of wine and bread, descends into our soul and unites closely with us until we ourselves again alienate Him from ourselves by betraying Him. To establish the sacrament of Holy Communion, the Lord chose the holiest, most touching moment of his earthly life, the Last Supper, when, turning to His disciples and, blessing the bread, giving it to them, he said: “Take, eat: this is My Body. And taking the cup and giving thanks, he gave it to them and said, “Drink from it, all of you, for this is My Blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins” (Matthew 26:26-28). The first Christians so strongly desired to be in constant inner union with their Lord that they took communion every Sunday. Let us also cherish this sacrament and approach it with great willingness and joy, but at the same time with fear, so as not to turn out to be unworthy participants. True, we cleansed ourselves through confession. But from confession to communion some more time will pass, which we must also spend carefully, and then proceed to communion itself with the proper frame of mind. How to spend time after confession, and how to begin communion of the Holy Mysteries of Christ, Bishop speaks very well about this. Feofan, and therefore we will speak in his words. “There is only half a day left until the minute when you receive the Lord into yourself: get ready to meet Him and receive Him in a worthy manner. The Lord will enter into you invisibly. Go inside yourself and put everything in order. Maintain the good mood that you brought from church after confession... Don’t fuss and don’t entertain yourself with anything external. In every possible way, preserve that warm inner presence that you acquired through fasting and prayers and which especially overshadowed you or will overshadow you after a full and sincere confession. Stop all movement of extraneous thoughts, and contemplating the Lord alone, pray to Him with a laconic prayer... But if your thought is still entertained, occupy it with thinking about communion, read the words of the Lord and St. apostles So, in prayers and in serious thoughts about God, take care to spend the rest of this day, and especially the evening, until you rest in sleep. The morning will come. As soon as you open your eyes, quickly take hold of your thoughts and hasten to revive in it the consciousness of the greatness of the day that has come for you. But do not make a fuss and do not have a lot of fun 4; hurry to gather your thoughts again and focus your attention on the only thing you need - on what has to happen with you and for you. And in this spirit, prepare to go to St. church for the Divine Liturgy. Be careful! The enemy of your salvation at these moments will try to spoil your good mood, instill in your soul some unkind state, or scattered thoughts, or worry about something, or dissatisfaction with something, or displeasure with someone, etc. Each of these movements brings confusion into the soul and upsets it. Keep your mind and heart attentive and turned to the Lord, and you will avoid this danger. So, maintaining a good mood, you will enter the church of the Lord. While staying here, feel as if you were in the Upper Room of Zion, among the Apostles, whom the Lord Himself communed. For here, as there, He is present. He is both the giver and the giver. Listen more attentively than ever before to what is read and sung on this day, and direct everything to the thought that it is the Lord who is preparing a saving supper for you; and accordingly strengthen your feelings and dispositions. Strengthen your faith in the real presence in the holy Mysteries of the Lord and Savior Himself, who, being in heaven with the Father, also invisibly abides here, and deigns to be secretly given to believers under the guise of bread and wine. Feeling unworthy of participating in this Divine life, say, following the example of the centurion: “Lord, I am not worthy for You to come under my roof.” So, moving from one feeling to another, wait for the moment of communion. In this gracious mood and heavenly overshadowing, finally approach the cup of the Lord, at the sight of which offer earthly worship to the Lord approaching you. And having opened your mouth and heart, accept the Lord humbly and reverently. So get ready to meet the Lord, and He will undoubtedly enter into you and take up residence in your heart!” 5 Let us cite another word from St. John Chrysostom about the attention and reverence with which one must approach St. communion: “It’s time to start the terrible meal. Let us all approach with proper wisdom and attention, and let no one be Judas, let no one be evil, let no one hide poison in himself, carrying one thing on his lips and another in his heart. Christ is coming. Whoever approved that meal (i.e., with the holy apostles), the same one will now arrange this one. For it is not man who transforms what is offered into the Body and Blood of Christ, but Christ Himself, crucified for us. The priest stands wearing His image and pronounces the words; but the power and grace of God acts: “This is My Body,” He said. And so, let no one be treacherous, let no one harbor malice, let no one harbor poison in the soul, so as not to partake of condemnation” 6. X. On preserving the good fruits of confession and St. communion The fast ends with the communion of the Holy Mysteries and a prayer of gratitude for it. The question now is, what happened to us and what should we do next? A lot has happened to us. If we took fasting seriously, we could be convinced by our own living experience that fasting, confession and St. Communion is not one simple, meaningless custom that supposedly has nothing to do with our inner life and our spiritual development. We have experienced and experienced a whole series of serious and deep feelings and moods that have produced a noticeable change in our soul, in our well-being and in our self-awareness and have introduced into them a lot of new and good things. It was as if we had visited some other, special world and received many new and strong impressions there. In a word, after the fast we became a different person than we were before the fast. Both ourselves and the people around us - everything now appears to us in a different light. That bad thing, in the power of which we were previously, with which our thoughts were occupied, has now largely faded for us, has lost its charm; and on the other hand, we experienced new holy feelings, appreciated the sweetness of prayer, fell in love with good more deeply, our will became stronger in the pursuit of this good, we became purer in heart and closer to God. These are the fruits of fasting, confession and communion. These fruits are not so unimportant that there is no need to take care to preserve them. Usually those who have received the Holy Mysteries feel for some time, several days, and sometimes several weeks, as if their previous sins were inaccessible to the penetration into their souls. The soul is, as it were, closed to sins. It is clean and cozy. And this purity, peace and comfort are inexpressibly gratifying. But then, little by little, the dust of sin begins to settle on the soul again. You are already losing your initial sensitivity to sinful touches, you no longer stand so carefully on guard over your soul. Sin not only hovers around your soul, but also penetrates it, little by little dirtying it and, if you fail, finally settles in it as a rightful owner. From this you see what needs to be done after confession and communion. We must not give in to sin. Let him be a stranger to you, do not make him your own. Remember the following order of our spiritual life: sin first flashes in our mind as a completely alien thought to us; then it already appears as our thought, when we focus our attention on it and ourselves begin to keep it in our heads; finally it begins to touch us and attracts our sympathy; after that it becomes our desire and eventually takes possession of us and becomes our habit or our passion. The more firmly sin takes root in our soul, the more difficult it is to fight it and tear it out of the soul. From this you see that we must begin the fight against sin not when it has already become our habit or strong desire, but when it still only flashes in our mind, like a thought foreign to us. Then we should not focus our attention on it, but quickly turn away from it. If you do this, the Lord will help you protect your soul from defilement by sin and keep it pure. And since any lasting success in this inner work is possible only if we rely not on our own strengths, but on God’s help, then always try to be internally with God and always ask for His all-powerful help. By doing this, you will protect the fruits of confession and communion in your soul! Look, you have been entrusted with a precious treasure - take care of it! And just as a person who has received some gift that is very dear to him, keeps it in a safe place, takes care that it does not deteriorate, that dust does not settle on it and that it is not stolen - so you carefully protect the shrine of that bright and good Christian feeling that penetrated your soul after confession and communion and do not allow the gross impressions of sin to touch it! Let us end with the words of the ever-memorable Bishop. Feofana: “If a big guest comes to you, you behave modestly, speak decorously; now the Lord himself has visited you, and who is greater than the Lord? Look - behave reverently and with fear... And not only think about this, but also about delivering something pleasant to the Lord. If a guest comes to you, you try to calm him down and offer him only what you know he likes. So now offer the Lord what He loves. What does He love? He loves everything good and blesses it, but he turns away everything bad and condemns it. Bring to Him whatever good thing each of you comes up with. Come alone and say: “Here, Lord, I will stop being angry and scolding, but I will be quiet and meek.” Another say: “I, Lord, will stop being lazy and lying on my side, and will begin to work hard and labor.” The third say: “I, Lord, will not be proud and despise others, but will humble myself and consider myself worse than everyone else.” So, each one bring his own good to the Lord and offer it to Him as a gift: and the Lord will rejoice in this and be comforted by it. He will be pleased with you, and He will abide in you, and bless you, and give you great good, both spiritual and physical.” 7 Op. Dostoevsky. T. XII. Page 336. "The story of a child's soul." Page 231. Metropolitan Grigory. "Day of Holy Life" Page 35. Meanwhile, how often does it happen that this morning we are more busy taking care of our outer attire than with the inner concentration of thought and feeling! Ep. Feofan. "About repentance." Page 106 ff. Prot. Dyachenko. "On the eve of St. communion." Page 67. Prot. Dyachenko. "On the eve of St. communion." Page 89.