The Christmas Fast

George Arabatzoglou, 
Reader of the Archdiocese of Athens – Church of Saint Luke in Patision

Another blessed period of fasting begins, of spiritual struggle and effort to turn our minds to God, each with his own strength and spiritual “philotimo” and always in consultation with their spiritual father.

This fast begins on November 15 and lasts until December 24, while on December 25, when we celebrate the birth of our Christ, we break the fast from everything regardless of the day. During this period of forty days of Christmas, we abstain from meat and dairy products, while we can eat fish all days of the week except Wednesday and Friday.

The fish is consumed until December 17th and in some exceptional cases, mainly in the countryside, the consumption of fish is completed on December 12th, however this is an exception and is not included in the official "fasting calendar" of our Church, which is provided for by the sacred Rudder.

On November 21st, the day of the celebration of the Presentation of the Theotokos, we can consume fish, no matter what day the feast falls on.

And as a parenthesis, we would say that hymnologically, on the day of the celebration of the Presentation of the Theotokos, our Church directly and quickly prepares us for the great feast of Christmas.

During the katavasies we sing "Christ is born, glorify Him". This hymnological masterpiece that we hear in the first tone more than a month before the Despotic Feast of Christmas, it is as if it is calling us from that moment to pull back time and celebrate the birth of our Christ.

Everything is intertwined and becomes a celebration.

The past, the present, the future.

This is what our mother the Church teaches us, calling us to participate in the events that have marked humanity. To live each event as the present.

Besides, perhaps some know that a prayer in the Proskomide that the priest reads is related to the birth of Christ, a prayer that is read throughout the year and at every Divine Liturgy.

Now He is born, the redeemer of man from the corruption of death.

The new Adam is He who provides a solution to the drama of man. Our Christ, who, in love with His creature, takes on human nature while retaining the divine, receiving it from the Theotokos with her consent and raising it with his Resurrection and Ascension, to the right hand of the Father.

These come to remind us of Christ's condescension to man out of inexhaustible love, so that we may strive as a minimal sign of gratitude, with a small abstinence from pleasures of all kinds and a restraint in the passions of the flesh.

A bridle on the tongue and a guard of the senses. Fasting - Christ Himself showed us its necessity.

Let us return to the Christmas fast, which historically is a later addition to the established fasts of our Church, at least in terms of its number of days.

In the early years of Christianity, this fast lasted a few days, while the celebration of Christmas was not on December 25 but was celebrated together with Theophany on January 6, which changed in the fourth century, for reasons that the Church considered at the time.

We must add that our Church has established this period of forty days until Christmas as the time for the "sacred forty liturgies", which helps us greatly in our struggle, each of us individually to the extent of course to which we can participate in these Divine Liturgies, which are celebrated daily in several churches throughout Greece.

How important and spiritually beneficial is our frequent participation in these Divine Liturgies is difficult to develop, but let each of us only reflect on the fact of the daily table, on which Christ is offered as food and drink and calls us to His table to taste Him, for the forgiveness of our sins and eternal life.

The commemoration of the names that is made in the Proskomide by the priest, during these Forty Divine Liturgies, is also very important.

Let's not forget to give the paper with the living and departed names of our brethren.

Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.