The Shepherd, November 2004
THE COMING MONTH
NOVEMBER enjoys one Great Feast, that of the Entry of the Mother of God into the Temple (21st November / 4th December), and sees the beginning of the Nativity Fast. On account of the Entry, this month we have included a translation of St Ignatius of the Caucasus’ explanation of the Gospel read on feasts of the Mother of God.
The Nativity Fast lasts for forty days and so always begins on 15th / 28th November, the day after the feast of the Holy Apostle Philip. For this reason, it is sometimes popularly referred to as St Philip’s Fast. This year it begins on a Sunday, and so a Liturgy will be celebrated on that day, although, should this fast begin on a weekday, it is usual not to celebrate the Liturgy so that we are reminded that we are entering a fast period. In some ways this is a pity as the first day of the fast is also the festival of the Holy Martyrs Shmuna, Gurias and Habib, who are the saints to whom the faithful turn in prayer when they experience difficulties in their married life.
The fast, although long, is not so severe as the Great Lent before Easter. We begin by keeping a day of preparation and on St Philip’s day itself, a Saturday this year, we abstain from meat products. During the fast itself we are permitted fish, wine (alcohol), and oil (f1) on Sundays and Saturdays, on the feast of the Entry and on some of the greater festivals; on Tuesdays and Thursdays we have wine and oil (f2), and on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays we keep the stricter fast which we indicate in our calendar insert as f3. Sometimes on these days the fast is mitigated because of coinciding celebrations. Five days before the Nativity itself, we enter the forefeast and then the fast is kept one degree more strictly. In some churches, they begin this period of stricter fasting immediately after the celebration of St Spiridon’s day on 12th / 25th December.
As in all the fasting periods, we should not confine our fasting to purely dietary measures. We should also limit our pleasures and entertainments, and married couples should try to abstain from marital relations devoting the time to their prayer and fasting. Nor is fasting simply a negative thing: refraining from certain things. It should also be a time when we apply ourselves to the things of God more assiduously, first and foremost those “bodily activities,” which St Ignatius speaks about in his article reproduced above - these, not as a end in themselves, but as a training ground for spiritual asceticism. Prayer, spiritual reading and almsgiving are recommended by the Fathers as essential for our purpose. As in so many areas of church-life, if we have difficulty in trying to keep the fast, we should ask the guidance and help of our spiritual father, rather than simply devising our own “rule.”
A fast before the Saviour’s Nativity has been kept by the Christians from the earliest days. By the fourth century is was clearly established and in the following century, St Leo the Great, the Pope of Rome, preaches specifically about it. However, it was not until the mid-twelfth century that the exact ordering of the fast as we have it today was established by a Synodical decision in Constantinople.
Each Orthodox Christian has a name saint or a Slava saint, who is their particular intercessor and patron, but each has a Guardian Angel as well, and in November we all of us have an “Angel Day” (the name used popularly by the Russians for a Nameday) because in this month we have the festival of St Michael and All Angels (8th / 21st). Our Guardian Angel ever stands near us to protect us and guide us, and he intercedes for us before the Throne of the Almighty. We turn to him each day in our morning and evening prayers, and should do so in times of temptation, necessity and danger, not forgetting also to turn to him again to give thanks for his aid. All of us then should be assiduous in keeping this pre-eminent festival of the Angels. Because the ministry of the Bodiless Powers is so vitally important in our Christian life, even in parish churches, it is often the case that a Vigil is celebrated for this festival, so that the faithful might worthily honour their own Angel and all the hosts of heaven. This year the feast falls on a Sunday. Sadly in our day, keeping the Saturday evening vigil (either at home or better in church) as a preparation for Sunday and attending church then is all but forgotten. Church attendance is often confined to a Sunday morning observance, perhaps the Liturgy only - for many this is all they are able to do because of the circumstances of life, for others it is simply a lack of application and the result of carelessness about their inner life. On this particular Sunday, though, when we are also celebrating our Angels, we should make a special effort to honour them and thank them by attending the Vigil on the Saturday evening.
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