The Orthodox Spirit and the Nativity Fast

/in , /by

By Metropolitan Saba (Isper)

Saint Porphyrios of Kafsokalyvia (also known as Saint Porphyrios the Seer, +1991) recounts, in the context of narrating events from his life, his experience as a spiritual father with the sacrament of confession. He was a mere fourteen years old when he fled to Mount Athos. There, he lived in the company of two hermits who were brothers according to the flesh. His illness compelled these hermits to send him down from the sacred mountain in search of medical treatment and recovery. Upon returning to his village and regaining his health, the metropolitan of the archdiocese ordained him a priest and granted him the blessing to be a father confessor, all while he was a young man of just twenty-two years, and he only knew the spiritual direction of ascetic monastic life.

In reflecting on that experience, he mentioned that he kept the book of Saint Nicodemus of Athos by his side. This book, rooted in the realities of the 16th and 17th centuries, meticulously cataloged sins one by one and established rules for repentance and discipline for each sin. The canons contained within this book may seem excessively stringent to the modern person.

Saint Porphyrios’ unwavering commitment to his faith and his monastic education compelled him to consult this book after every confession. He would assign penitents a regimen that corresponded to their particular sin: three hundred prostrations daily, weeks or months of fasting, and so forth. However, he soon realized that these rules exceeded the capacities of the faithful and did not contribute to their spiritual growth. On the contrary, they led to a sense of despair regarding the possibility of overcoming their sins, and this despair often caused them to return to their sins.
He thus made the decision to close the book and place it on the shelf. Instead, he began to inquire of the penitents regarding the number of prostrations they could reasonably perform and the duration of fasting they could sustain, providing them with an obedience tailored to their abilities.

The example of Saint Porphyrios teaches us the distinction between the spiritual teachings of the Church and their practical application. Spiritual growth is a gradual process in which believers ascend toward their desired spiritual state. The Church’s role is to provide personal support and guidance to individuals on their spiritual journeys, helping them climb the ladder of salvation. Pastors or spiritual fathers draw from living spiritual experiences, not just static texts, to offer spiritual care that considers the individual’s capacity, readiness, and circumstances.

Father confessors accompany the faithful on their spiritual path and tailor their guidance to the unique needs of their spiritual children, focusing on what is most beneficial for their growth in Christ. The Gospel serves as a general spiritual guideline, but the specific application and embodiment of the Gospel’s teachings depend on the spiritual father’s experience and the individual believer’s abilities, circumstances, and state of being. This principle forms the foundation of Orthodox spiritual guidance.

A story from The Garden of Monks (The Paradise of the Desert Fathers) illustrates this concept. It tells of a young man from a wealthy family who sought monastic life in an Egyptian desert monastery. The monks of the monastery slept on the ground, following the customs of their time. However, the abbot granted the young man the privilege of using a pillow while sleeping. Some of the other monks saw this as special treatment and complained. The abbot responded by saying, “My sons, you used to sleep on the ground in your homes, and when you came to the monastery, your sleeping conditions did not change much. But he used to sleep on a bed with a pillow of ostrich feathers. Whose monastic sacrifice is greater?”

This incident, along with countless others in our spiritual heritage, emphasizes the importance of tailoring guidance to each person’s abilities, circumstances, and potential to help them progress to higher levels of spiritual growth. As the Apostle Paul says, “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things” (1 Cor. 13:11).

“The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life” (2 Cor. 3:6) yet going beyond the letter and reaching the Spirit requires deep spiritual experience and profound humility, which enables pastors to be receptive to the experiences of those more spiritually advanced and benefit from them. Often, stubbornness and excessive rigor are rooted in hidden passions such as self-righteousness or vainglory. History has witnessed the downfall of many who, in their strictness, stifled and overwhelmed those under their guidance.

Our Orthodox spiritual heritage teaches us to be rigorous in self-discipline while being compassionate and merciful towards others. This message is especially relevant since some priests considering abstinence from oil as a central aspect of the Nativity Fast. The Nativity Fast in the Orthodox Church is observed as follows:

– Abstention from food and drink until noon is not required.
– Fish and seafood are allowed until December 12, which coincides with the feast of Saint Spyridon the Wonderworker.
– The strictness of fasting increases as Christmas approaches.

Abstaining from oil is a monastic tradition blessed for those who desire it, with the blessing of their spiritual father, but it is not obligatory. Some individuals justify abstaining from oil based on references in the Great Horologion. The Church’s response is that the influence of monastic practices became more widespread with the growth of the monastic movement and the guidance provided by monastic fathers. Our liturgical books were formulated under this monastic influence. The Church does not prohibit these practices, but it does not impose them on everyone. Thus, such practices remain optional and contingent upon the willingness of the believer to live a more ascetic life, guided by a spiritual father who understands their potential and spiritual condition. It is crucial to be aware of the potential pitfalls associated with what our heritage refers to as the “devil of excessive zeal.”

The spiritual father’s role is to accompany his spiritual children, nurturing their spiritual growth and development, rather than burdening them with practices that exceed their capacity and lead to despair, ultimately causing them to abandon the Christian path leading to salvation. The arrangements within our Church order (the Typikon) are designed to help believers engage with and experience the salvific events they commemorate. These arrangements aim to facilitate spiritual growth, purity, and holiness rather than serve as additional burdens. In the words of Jesus, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27).

The Suffering Church

/in /by

By Metropolitan Saba (Isper)

The question arises first: Can the Church be described as suffering? The answer is yes and no. No, because the Church is a divine entity, its head is the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit is present in it without interruption. And yes, because it is a human entity as well, and its members, who are on earth, are sinful human beings, living in a fallen world, and consequently bearing the effects and signs of the Fall, which appear in the weakness of most of them and the sins of all of them.

The Church is a divine-human entity. Because it is divine, you find in it all the possibilities of transcendence, exaltation, and deification; all the energies of God that transform, change, or alter; and all the powers of God that make the impossible natural. Therefore, you find in it great saints who, through their lives, achieved what the average person cannot imagine. You see miracles as natural things, as you see men and women who have become great after being humiliated and have become messengers of peace, mercy, and love, leaving an indelible mark on the history of humanity. Whoever engages in the Church, passionately in love with their Master, will be inhabited by the Holy Spirit, who transforms them into a flame that illuminates those near and far. Whoever lives in the Church in continuous repentance advances from one level to another, until he reaches a peak of perfection that no human being can reach without divine Grace, which rejoices in working in the souls of those who repent, who do not stop at a certain limit but, rather, burn with divine love increasingly.

As for the human aspect of the Church, our theological teachings distinguish the face of the Church Triumphant from the face of the Church Militant, for learning purposes but not in a way that actually separates them. The first includes, in addition to the angels, all human beings who have departed to eternal life, who have completed the phase of struggle and repentance and are now waiting for the final resurrection. The second face includes the believers on earth. These people are still in a state of spiritual struggle, so (hopefully) they are in a sincere pursuit of a life of holiness and righteousness, loyal to their Lord, keeping His commandments, and loving His creation. These people are afflicted with faults, temptations that hinder them, and the worries of living make them forget their primary goal. But they must continue to cling to their Lord, return after an exile from Him, ceaselessly evaluating and examining themselves in the light of the Gospel, and rising whenever they fall. Their eyes, hearts and minds must remain directed, constantly, to their Christ, who rose from the dead, and to His outpouring of love for His creation, so that they may be filled with hope in Him and this hope may protect them from falling into further despair.

Saint Ephrem the Syrian gave the Church a practical definition, perhaps the most beautiful. He said, “The Church is a group of repentant people.” Yes, its believers are sinners, but they know that they were redeemed at an inestimable price, so we find them hastening to repent and start over, whenever they become aware of their distance from the One who redeemed them. Thus, repentance becomes their permanent path.

But repentance is not an automatic or formal act. Repentance is a radical change that affects the person inside and outside. It is, in the words of the Apostle Paul, “forgetting what is behind me and reaching out with all strength to what is before me” (Phil. 3:13). Man abandons not what is good but, rather, what is bad and evil. This requires him to be aware of his faults and evil-doings first, and second, to avoid and abhor them so that he lands on the threshold of true repentance. Realistically, we do not see this prevailing in the Church of Christ. We see it in some believers, but not in everyone. That is why the Church suffers. The Church’s suffering comes from the fact that not all Christians seek holiness. Some of them are comfortable with their sins and do not seek change. Among them are those who view the Church as merely a social institution, and act in it and with it as they would with any human institution, thus missing its divine dimension. Some of them subordinate the Church to their personal interests and use their influence there.

We find hot, lukewarm, and cold believers in it. The voice of influential people may speak louder than the voice of the Gospel. It may be used as a tool to serve everything except the salvation of souls. This is from the internal aspect. From the external perspective, it is subject to all kinds of persecution and restrictions. The Church of Christ is in constant war with the spiritual forces of evil, which take various and changing forms, ways and models, and sometimes wear a luminous guise in order to mislead the believers, but their goal is the same: to destroy the Church.

No religious institution has known external and internal persecution as the Church of Christ had. However, it continued to radiate Christ’s light everywhere, and its testimony has remained a shining beacon that no one could deny. The Holy Spirit remained its guardian, active in it and present in its many known and unknown witnesses. But the absence of love among its members remains the greatest danger to its children.

The more the war increases against it, the more God provides it with blessings and strength. The more its children sin and become aware of their sin, the more God bestows His grace upon them and raises them up again. As for whoever refuses to love, God refuses to work in them. Apathy is the ultimate betrayal. The absence of love blocks the Church from speaking the name of Christ, estranges it from Him, and makes it a “social gathering,” as Metropolitan Georges (Khodr) likes to say. The Church is anything but the Church of Christ if love is absent from its members. Through love, faithfulness to the Lord is embodied, and through it alone the children of the Church are known as disciples of Christ: “By this all will know that you are my disciples” (John 13:35). Hence, love’s absence becomes the severest pain for the Church.

Many people may not reject love, but Satan lures them to finding faults in others, and in this manner, they excuse themselves from the labor of love. In addition, reality shows that many do not know how to express their love and are therefore unable to embody it. That is why we see misunderstanding, misinterpretation, and mutual accusations, based on seeing only one aspect of the story as the talk of the hour among her children. This is why faith and integrity must rise above all else, prioritizing prayer and spiritual practices, and therefore putting emphasis on acts of love. A junior or senior official takes his time in work and implementation, while another sees rushing things as more important in a certain circumstance; one person sees a specific solution to an existing problem, another sees it in another way, etc.; and they fight. Instead of the spirit of cooperation, in order to reach integration, the demon of jealousy begins to attack hearts and ignite anger, pitting believers against each other, instead of covering up each other’s shortcomings and complementing them. Then the pain will be most intense in the Church of Christ. May God have mercy on us and protect us from everything that causes pain to His Church. My Lord, make us “accept injustice, and protect us from being among the oppressors,” as our great saint, Isaac the Syrian, commanded. Amen.

“In Behalf of All and for All”: On the Offering of Holy Bread

/in /by

One of the most overlooked contributions we can make to the Church is offering Holy Bread.

In fact, offering Holy Bread is one of the most important ways laypeople may participate in the Divine Liturgy. The process of offering Holy Bread underscores its importance. The offering begins by making the Holy Bread itself, a labor-intensive project.

Thankfully, for those in our parish who do not have the time or the ability to make Holy Bread, our Belles of St Mary allow individuals or families to purchase the bread for a reasonable price ($25). When the bread is made, it is stamped with a seal used specifically for this purpose. On the seal are the markings IC, XC, NI, and KA, one in each of the four squares in the center of the Holy Bread.

Based upon the Greek biblical language, IC stands for Jesus; XC for Christ; and NIKA for victorious. Before the Divine Liturgy, the Priest or Deacon chooses the loaf of bread with the highest quality and then cuts out the ICXC NIKA piece to be used as “the Lamb”, which is later consecrated as the Body of Christ for Communion. This piece is called “the Lamb” because Jesus Christ Himself was called “the Lamb of God.”

In addition to the centerpiece, the seal includes 10 other pieces, one for the Mother of God and nine others for various ranks of saints commemorated during the preparation service before Liturgy. All of these pieces are placed on the diskos next to the Body of Christ. The pieces represent the Church, Christ surrounded by His holy ones. The diskos is veiled and brought to the Holy Table by the Deacon during the Great Entrance.

When Holy Bread is offered, the person or family offering the bread submits the names of both the living and the departed. For this reason, families often choose to offer Holy Bread close to a birthday or anniversary of themselves or loved ones. During the preparation service, the Priest offers a prayer for each Orthodox person on that prayer list and places a piece of Holy Bread on the diskos for each as well, since they also are part of Christ’s Church. During the Great Entrance, the Priest prays publicly for each name submitted by those offering Holy Bread, regardless of whether or not they are Orthodox.

That is why each Sunday, the prayer list at the Great Entrance is different. In addition to the Holy Bread being used for the consecration of the Body of Christ, the remaining Holy Bread is used to distribute to the faithful, who have fasted in preparation for Communion. In Antiochian parishes, we also have a custom of sharing some of the Holy Bread with guests as a sign of our hospitality.

The offering of Holy Bread allows the person or family to participate intimately in the Divine Liturgy. They are literally offering, on behalf of the community, what becomes the Body of Christ. Furthermore, through the offering, they will receive special prayers for themselves and any of their living or departed family members and friends whom they wish to commemorate by name.

We encourage each individual or family in our parish to offer the Holy Bread at least once per calendar year. Individuals or families may join with other individuals or families to make the offering of Holy Bread together. For those who do not know how to make the bread, they may attend one of the Belles baking days for that purpose. In addition, they may simply purchase the Holy Bread from the Belles.

Want to Make Holy Bread (Prosphora) on Your Own?

Check out this video from the Antiochian Village:

A Holy Bread binder is available in our church hall on the south side of the gymnasium. Parishioners are encouraged to look through the book to find an open date to offer Holy Bread for themselves and/or their families.

One important final note: although many people combine offering Holy Bread with hosting the Coffee Hour, this practice is not required. Holy Bread may be offered even if a person is not able or does not wish to offer the Coffee Hour.