Tomorrow, Christmas Lent Begins

Silent Night

Viggo Johansen

1891

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We’ve said much about the Lenten periods, yet, once one begins, we hear the same question:

What are we not supposed to do?

The brief answer to that is:

Food is in last place. It isn’t an end-all and be-all; it’s only a means.

The Lenten effort requires five things.

LEARN TO PRAY

Try to add something extra to your routine. If you don’t normally pray, make a brief but regular prayer. If you have a morning and evening rule, read the Psalms, or the daily Gospel reading. If you go to services only on Sunday, try to make it for one of the weekday services.

LEARN TO FIGHT SIN

Look at your repetitive sins… choose the smallest and try to overcome it. For example, do you complain about everything you see or hear? Do you talk about others behind their back? Do you hold an old grudge against a relative (boss, teacher, neighbour, etc)? Overcome this through daily prayer.

LEARN TO REPENT

Choose your most secret sin… the one most hidden from the eyes of others and one for which you’re particularly ashamed. Go to confession and ask how to fight it. Choose an experienced priest to help you with what you need.

LEARN TO DO GOOD

For I was hungered, and you gave me meat: I was thirsty, and you gave me drink: I was a stranger, and you took me in: naked, and you clothed me: I was sick, and you visited me: I was in prison, and you came unto me.

Gospel according to St Matthew 25.35-36

At the end of each day, search your conscience and ask yourself, “What good deed did I do today? Who did I comfort, who did I help, and who did I devote time to?” If you didn’t do that, you wasted the day.

LEARN TO BE JOYFUL

Open up to the beauty of God’s world. Meditate on God’s gifts and on the talents that He endows us with. Show manifestations of love, compassion, and mercy, along with reflecting on logic, harmony, and truth. In short, focus on everything that brings us closer to God.

I wish you a salvific and joyful Christmas Lent, my friends!

24 November 2017

Archpriest Vladimir Vigilyansky

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28 November 2017. Heroes of the Russian Land

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The five brothers of the Nikolaev family not only all fought in the VOV, all returned home alive at its end. Americans don’t understand that the war in Europe against the fascists was already won when they entered it… the tide had already turned. That happened on 5 December 1941, the opening of the Soviet counteroffensive outside Moscow. This was the first real defeat handed the Wehrmacht… it was the “end of the beginning”. In the next year, Stalingrad was the “beginning of the end”… before any appreciable American forces had landed in Europe. There’s nothing dishonourable in what America did in Europe in the Great War Against Fascism… they made a contribution, not the most major contribution, but they were the largest of what we Russians call “the Little Allies”. The USA helped to defeat the fascists, but the fascists were already on the run before the USA entered the war. Note well that the childish Anglos claim credit that isn’t theirs to take. The credit belongs to millions of families such as the Nikolaevs… sadly, all too many had an empty space at table at the end of the war. The credit also belongs to I V Stalin, who refused to cave in, like the French did. The Nikolaevs and countless others (along with the families who raised them) were the real victors. The Anglos helped… but they weren’t the driving force behind the Great Victory.

Спасибо деду до победу!

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