After Maslenitsa, the
great week of celebrations that include eating bliny (pancakes), Russian
Orthodox began Lent, the so-called Great Fast.
As is the case for
Catholics, they spend seven weeks in prayer, repentance and abstinence,
the most demanding period on the liturgical calendar: no meat, eggs,
fish, milk products and alcohol. According to tradition, monastic orders
are the most observant in upholding the fast. For this reason, they
have come up in time with the best vegetable-based recipes, with
mushrooms, greens and berries.
The Great Fast commemorates Jesus’ 40 days in desert,
right after his baptism. The period of abstinence reaches its peak in
Passion Week (Holy Week for Catholics).
However, the Way of the Cross is
not part of the Orthodox tradition, nor is the adoration of the cross.
In former Soviet states, the traditional Easter bread,
paska, which is made with aniseed but without fruit candy and raisins,
is blessed in church on Holy Friday.
The long period of preparation for
body and soul ahead of the resurrection reaches its apex on Easter
Sunday, the central festivity on the Orthodox calendar, which this year
will fall on the same day as in the Catholic calendar, on 24 April that
is.
During the great service that started the Great Fast,
last Monday, the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Kirill urged the
faithful to work and not fall into idleness, which leads to gloom.
“Let us not replace work with idleness, which does not
refresh the soul,” he said during the celebrations held in the Holiest
Trinity of Saint Daniel Monastery.
“Idleness is an empty pastime,” he noted, whilst “The
soul of an idle man is something dangerous for his physical and
spiritual life”.
Idleness often leads to hatred towards human kind, the
head of the Russian Orthodox Church explained. By contrast, “work is
one of the greatest Christian virtues. [. . .] It is a tool to use on
oneself as well. An idle person is instead someone without the means to
fight evil.”
Speaking the same day in Christ Saviour Cathedral, the
Patriarch emphasised the importance of “hope, the greatest fruit of
faith”.
“Hope in God does not release from our
responsibilities,” Kirill warned. “Faith gives strength to solve every
problem, whereas those who would deny faith and hope tend towards
discouragement, which is a negative force that destroys human life.”