Is it possible to take communion at the evening service. Why are kakons written in Church Slavonic? Because they are so hard to read. My husband doesn't understand anything he reads and gets angry. Maybe I should read aloud? Communion of the elderly and sick people, pregnant women,
Where did morning or evening prayers come from? Can something else be used instead? Is it necessary to pray twice a day? Is it possible to pray according to the rule of St. Seraphim of Sarov? Should children pray according to the "adult" prayer book? How to prepare for Communion? How to understand that prayer is a dialogue, not a monologue? What to pray for in your own words? We talk about the prayer rule with Archpriest Maxim Kozlov , rector of the Church of the Holy Martyr Tatiana at Moscow State University.
- Father Maxim, where did the existing prayer rule come from - morning and evening prayers?
In the form in which the prayer rule is now printed in our prayer books, other Local Churches do not know it, except for those Slavic Churches that at one time began to focus on church printing. Russian Empire and de facto borrowed our liturgical books and corresponding printed texts. In the Greek-speaking Orthodox Churches we will not see this. There, as morning and evening prayers for the laity, the following scheme is recommended: in the evening - an abbreviation of Compline and some elements of Vespers, and as morning prayers - unchanged parts borrowed from the Midnight Office and Matins.
If we look at a tradition that was recorded relatively recently by historical standards - for example, we open Domostroy by Archpriest Sylvester - then we will see an almost fantastically ideal Russian family. The task was to give a certain role model. Such a family, being literate according to Sylvester's idea, reads the sequence of Vespers and Matins at home, standing in front of the icons along with household members and servants.
If we pay attention to the monastic, priestly rule, known to the laity in preparation for the reception of the Holy Mysteries of Christ, then we will see the same three canons that are recited at Small Compline.
The collection of prayers under the numbers arose quite late. The first text known to us is Francysk Skaryna's Book of Travelers, and today liturgists do not have an unambiguous opinion when and why such a meeting was held. My assumption (which cannot be considered a final statement) is this: these texts first appeared on our website. southwestern Russia, in the volosts, where there was a very strong Uniate influence and contacts with the Uniates. Most likely, there is, if not a direct borrowing from the Uniates, then a certain kind of borrowing of the liturgical and ascetic logic inherent at that time catholic church, which clearly divided its composition into two categories: the church of the students and the church of the students. For the laity, texts were offered that had to be different from the texts read by the clergy, taking into account the different educational level and the intra-church status of the layman.
By the way, in some prayer books of the 18th-19th centuries we still see a relapse of that consciousness (now it is not reprinted, but it can be found in pre-revolutionary books): say, prayers that a Christian can read at the liturgy during the first antiphon; prayers and feelings that a Christian must read and experience during the Little Entrance... What is this if not a kind of analogue for the layman of those secret prayers that the priest reads during the corresponding parts of the liturgy, but only referred not to the clergyman, but to the layman? I think that the fruit of that period in the history of our Church was the emergence of today's prayer rule.
Well, the widespread distribution in the form in which it is now, the prayer rule received already in the synodal era in the XVIII- XIX century and gradually established itself as the generally accepted norm for the laity. It is difficult to say in what year, in what decade it happened. If we read the teaching on prayer by our authoritative teachers and fathers of the 19th century, then we will not find any analysis, reasoning about the morning-evening rule either in St. Theophan, or in St. Philaret, or in St. Ignatius.
So, on the one hand, recognizing the existing prayer rule that has been used within the Russian Church for several centuries now and, in this sense, has become partly unwritten, partly written norm of our spiritual-ascetic and spiritual-prayer life, we should not overestimate the status of today's prayer books and given they contain prayer texts as the only possible norm for arranging the prayer life.
Is it possible to change the prayer rule? Now such an approach has been established among the laity: you can supplement, but you can not replace and reduce. What do you think about this?
In the form in which they are, morning and evening prayers are in some inconsistency with the principle of construction Orthodox worship, in which, as we all well know, the mutable and unchanging parts are combined. At the same time, among the variable parts there are repeatable - daily, weekly, once a year - circles of worship: daily, weekly and annual. This principle of connecting a solid, unchanging backbone, a skeleton on which everything builds up, and variable, changeable parts is very wisely arranged and corresponds to the very principle of human psychology: on the one hand, it needs a norm, a charter, and on the other, variability so that the charter does not turn into into formal proofreading, repetition of texts that no longer evoke any internal response. And just here there are problems with the prayer rule, where the same texts are in the morning and in the evening.
In preparing for Communion, the laity have three of the same canons. Even in the priestly preparation, the canons differ in weeks. If you open the missal, it says that on each day of the week their own canons are read. And among the laity, the rule is unchanged. And what, read only him all his life? It is clear that certain kinds of problems will arise.
Saint Theophan gives advice, which at one time made me very happy. I myself and others I know have found much spiritual benefit from this advice. He advises when reading a prayer rule to combat coldness and dryness several times a week, noticing the standard chronological interval that goes to reading the usual rule, try in the same fifteen to twenty minutes, half an hour not to set yourself the task of reading everything without fail, but repeatedly returning to the place from which we have been distracted or gone aside by thought, to achieve the utmost concentration on the words and meaning of prayer. If only in the same twenty minutes we read only the initial prayers, but then we would learn to do it for real. At the same time, the saint does not say that in general it is necessary to switch to such an approach. And he says that you need to connect: on some days you should read the whole rule, and on some days you should pray in this way.
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For many of us, on the day of receiving the Holy Mysteries of Christ, especially for the laity, regardless of the frequency of communion, the soul, and not laziness, prompts a person to seek thanksgiving to God on that day rather than repeat again in the evening the words that “I have sinned, lawless,” and so on. . When everything in us is still full of gratitude to God for accepting the Holy Mysteries of Christ, why not, for example, take this or that akathist singing or, say, an akathist to Jesus the Sweetest, or some other prayer and not make it the center of your prayer rule for this day?
Actually, prayer, I will say such a terrible phrase, needs to be treated creatively. You can’t dry it up to the level of a formally executed scheme: on the one hand, have the burden of having to fulfill this scheme day after day, year after year, and on the other hand, some kind of periodic inner satisfaction from the fact that I am doing what I should. , and what else do you want from me in heaven, I already did, not without difficulty, what is supposed to be. Prayer cannot be turned into reading and fulfilling only duties, and counting - I don’t have the gift of prayer, I’m a small person, holy fathers, ascetics, mystics prayed, but we’ll wander through the prayer book like that - and there’s no demand.
Who should decide what prayer rule should be - is it up to the person to decide, or is it still necessary to go to the confessor, to the priest?
If a Christian has a confessor with whom he determines the constants of his inner spiritual structure, then it would be absurd to this case without him, and on his own, only with his head to decide what to do. We initially assume that a confessor is a person at least as experienced in spiritual life as the one who addresses him, and in most cases somewhat more experienced. And in general - one head is good, but two is better. From the side it is more visible that a person, even reasonable in many respects, may not notice. Therefore, it is prudent, when determining something that we are striving to make permanent, to consult with the confessor.
But you can't advise on any movement of the soul. And if today you want to open the Psalter - not in terms of regular reading, but simply open and add to your usual prayer work the psalms of King David - why not call the priest? Another thing is if you want to start reading kathismas along with the prayer rule. Then you need to consult and take a blessing for this, and the priest, based on whether you are ready, will help you with advice. Well, as for the simply natural movements of the soul - here you somehow need to decide for yourself.
I think that just the initial prayers are better not to be omitted unnecessarily, because they may contain the most concentrated experience of the Church - “To the King of Heaven”, “Most Holy Trinity”, who taught us the prayer “Our Father”, we already know, “ It is worthy to eat” or “Hail to the Theotokos Virgin” - there are so few of them, and they are so obviously chosen by the prayerful experience of the Church. The Charter sometimes suggests us to abstain from them. "King of Heaven" - we wait 50 days until the feast of Pentecost, on Bright Week we generally have a special prayer rule. I don't understand the logic behind this.
Why is it necessary to pray exactly twice a day - in the morning and in the evening? One of our readers writes: when I am working with children, cooking or cleaning, it is so easy for me to pray, but as soon as I stand in front of the icons, everything is like chopping off.
There are several themes here. No one calls us to limit ourselves to the morning or evening rule. The Apostle Paul directly says - pray without ceasing. The task of a good dispensation of the prayer life implies that a Christian strives not to forget about God during the day, including not to forget prayerfully. There are many situations in our life when prayer can be developed in oneself in a distinct way. But the unwillingness to stand up and pray just when it is supposed to be duty must be fought, because, as we know, the enemy of the human race especially resists there when our self-will is absent. It is easy to do what is done when I want. But then it becomes a feat that I have to do, regardless of whether I want to or not. Therefore, I would advise you not to give up the effort to put yourself in the morning and evening prayers. Its size is another matter, especially for a mother with children. But it should be, as a kind of constant value of prayer dispensation.
As for prayers during the day: if you stir the porridge, young mother, - well, sing a prayer to yourself, or if you can somehow concentrate more - read the Jesus Prayer to yourself.
Now for most of us there is an excellent school of prayer - this is the road. Each of us goes to school, to work in public transport, in a car in all of us known Moscow traffic jams. Pray! Don't waste your time, don't turn on the unnecessary radio. If you don't get the news, you'll survive a few days without it. Do not think that you are so tired in the subway that you want to forget yourself and fall asleep. Well, you can’t read the prayer book in the subway - read “Lord, have mercy” to yourself. And this will be a school of prayer.
- And if you drive and put the disc with prayers?
I once treated this very harshly, I thought - well, what are these disks, some kind of hack, and then, from the experience of various clergymen and laity, I saw that this could be a help in the prayer rule.
The only thing I would say is that you don't need to reduce your entire prayer life to disk listening. It would be absurd, coming home in the evening and standing on evening rule, turn on the disk instead of yourself, and some reverent Lavra choir and an experienced hierodeacon will begin to lull you to sleep with a familiar voice. Everything should be in moderation.
- How do you feel about the rule of Seraphim of Sarov?
How can one relate to the rule given by the great saint? As to the rule given by the great saint. I just want to remind you under what circumstances he gave it: he gave it to those nuns and novices who were on difficult obediences for 14-16 hours a day. He gave them to start and finish the day without being able to fulfill the regular monastic rules, and reminded them that this rule should be combined with inner prayerful doing during the labors that they carry out during the day.
Of course, if a person in a hot workshop or in no less tedious office work comes home so that he can eat dinner made by his beloved wife in haste and read prayers - this is all that he has strength left for, let him read the rule of the Monk Seraphim. But if you still have the strength to slowly sit at the table, make a few unnecessary phone calls, watch a movie or news on TV, read a friend's tape on the Internet, and then - oh, get up for work tomorrow and there is only a few minutes left - then here, perhaps, it would not be the most correct way to limit oneself to the Seraphim rule.
Father Maxim, if during prayer in your own words some good words come up that you want to write down and then pray for them, is it possible to do this?
Write down and pray, of course! The prayers that we read in the prayer book, created by the great saints, were born that way. They prayed with these words as if they were their own. And someone, they or their disciples, once wrote down these words, and then from personal experience they became the experience of the Church.
For the most part, we cannot claim that our successes will receive wide church distribution, but, say, the prayer of the Optina Elders, the prayer of St. Philaret, some of the prayers of St. appeared. You don't need to be afraid of it.
Many parents say that some of the evening prayers are completely incomprehensible and not close to children and teenagers. Do you think that a mother herself could make some kind of prayer rule for her children?
It would be very reasonable. First, because in other cases we are talking about sins that children do not know, and the later they learn them, the better. Secondly, these prayers are largely correlated with the experience of a person who has already passed a fair way of life, who has some ideas about spiritual life, about his own weakness and about the failures that we have in spiritual life.
The main thing that we should strive to educate in children is the desire to pray and a joyful attitude towards prayer, and not as something that must be done under duress, like a burdensome duty from which it is impossible to get away. The main word in this phrase will be the word "painful." To child rule must be treated very, very delicately. And it is better that children pray less, but willingly. From a small sprout can eventually grow a big tree. But if we dry it to the state of a skeleton, then even if it is something big, there will be no life in it. And then it will be difficult to create everything anew.
Batiushka, what if you read for the first ten minutes during the reading of the aftermath to Communion and really feel that you are praying, and then the pure reading goes on?
First, we need to notice whether this happens to us regularly. And if there is some tendency towards this, then it would be prudent to try to distribute the rule for Communion over several days. Indeed, it is difficult for many to read with concentration first the three canons, then the canon for Communion, then the rule for Communion, somewhere else to place the vespers or morning prayers- this is usually more than the regular norm of a person. Well, why not distribute the same three canons over two or three days that follow before Communion? This will help us to walk the path of fasting, preparation, more consciously.
- And if a person takes communion every week, how, in your opinion, should one prepare?
I hope that the question of how to prepare for Communion will become one of the topics of the relevant commission of the inter-conciliar presence. Many of the clergy and laity realize that it is impossible to mechanically transfer those norms that developed in the 18th-19th centuries with a very rare communion of the laity - once a year or in four multi-day fasts, or a little more often - rarely anyone from the laity, including very pious , then communed more often. I do not want to say that it was necessarily bad, but such was the practice of the spiritual and mysterious life of the laity at that time.
Already in Soviet time a practice has developed in which a significant part of our laity began to take communion often or very often, up to and including weekly communion. It is clear that if a person takes communion weekly, it is impossible for him to fast for a week, his life will be entirely fasting. In no way suggesting this as the norm for everyone, based on the advice of experienced priests whom I knew in my life, and from some assessment of the benefits for people in the parishes in which I had to serve, it seems to me that if a person takes communion on Sunday , then Friday and Saturday will be sufficient days of fasting for those who partake of the Holy Mysteries of Christ. There are canonical problems with Saturday, but it would still be strange to cancel fasting on the eve of Sunday communion. It would be good not to miss the evening service on the eve of Saturday evening, if life circumstances somehow allow it.
For example, for a mother with children, this is probably not always realistic. Perhaps there is no need to take communion so often, but there is a desire, but it is not possible to attend the evening service. Or for a person who works hard, the father of a large family. It often happens that such a person cannot cancel work on Saturday, but his soul asks for Communion. I think he has the right to come to communion even without the evening service. But still, if he preferred to go to the cinema on Saturday evening or somewhere else, then he preferred leisure. Still, attending a cinema, a theater or even a concert - I do not think that they can be a way of preparing for the reception of the Holy Mysteries of Christ.
Certainly, no one should in any way cancel the canon and prayers before Holy Communion. But others - what we said about the three canons and so on - probably, on the advice of the confessor, they can somehow be distributed over the days, replaced by a different aggravation of prayers.
the main task prayer rule for Communion - so that a person has at least a small, but there is a segment life path, in which his main guideline would be the preparation for the reception of the Eucharist. What this segment will be in his specific life circumstances - today it is rather determined individually by the person himself, together with the confessor. Some more distinct guidelines, I hope, the conciliar mind of the Church will give as a result of the work of the Inter-Council Presence.
Question from our reader: "Christ said not to be like the pagans in the verbosity of prayer, but we still have quite long prayers."
The Lord said this, first of all, so that we would not pray verbosely for show. The Lord rebuked the Pharisees in this to a large extent.
With a lot of words that we see in our prayers, these prayers have three main goals - repentance, gratitude and praise to God. And if we focus ourselves on this, then this will be a good goal of prayer.
A lot of words are often needed for one simple reason: so that out of ninety - ninety-five percent that will turn out to be ore for us, we still find five percent of diamonds for the soul. Few of us know how to approach prayer in such a way that, knowing that it will last three minutes, these three minutes, having cut off all worldly cares, concentrate and enter into our inner hearts. Need some overclocking if you like. And then during this somewhat lengthy prayer there will be several heights of concentration, some kind of movement of the soul and heart. But if this path does not exist, then there will be no peaks.
When discussing creativity prayer rule, most people treat it painfully. This applies to fasting, and many other things in church life. Why do you think this is happening?
There is a certain trend, our Russian, which is the reverse side of another positive trend - this is the trend towards ritual belief. It is known that, according to the words of St. Gregory the Theologian, among the Greeks, with the general theological and contemplative direction of the mentality of the people, the reverse side of this was idle talk about the lofty. The phrase of the saint is known that it is impossible to come to the market to buy fish, so as not to hear arguments about two natures and about the ratio of hypostases. We Russians never had such a penchant for theology before the advent of the Internet era. But there was a tendency rather towards a sacred, sacred, sublime, church-going being, and, well, life at the same time, in which everything would be united in the Church, everything would be churchly. The same Domostroy in this sense is a very revealing book.
But the reverse side is the sacralization to the extreme of the rite and everything connected with the letter. The late Moscow University professor Andrei Cheslavovich Kozarzhevsky liked to say at his lectures back in Soviet times that if a priest in the Church suddenly says not “Our Father” but “Our Father”, then he will be considered a heretic. This is true, for many it can be some kind of challenge. It’s another matter why a priest would say that, but even at the level of some kind of reservation, they will consider that this is a very, very strange and dangerous trend. So I would connect this with the general structure of our Russian mentality.
On the other hand, there is a certain understanding that there is no need to shake what stands firmly (I quote St. Philaret), so that rebuilding does not turn into destruction. A person who seeks a good dispensation of his prayer life should always strive for the utmost honesty before God and understand that he cares about prayer, and not about shortening it. About filling it, and not about feeling sorry for yourself, not about creatively looking for something, but simply praying less. In this case, one must honestly say to oneself: yes, my measure is not the one that I imagined, but this one is quite small. Not that "I found this through a creative prayer search."
How can one feel that prayer is not a monologue, but a dialogue? Is it possible to rely on some of your feelings here?
The Holy Fathers teach us not to trust emotions in prayer. Emotions are not the most reliable criterion. Let us recall, for example, the gospel parable of the publican and the Pharisee: satisfied with his prayer, with a correct sense of his inner dispensation, not the one who was more justified by God, as Christ the Savior tells us, left.
Prayer is known by its fruits. How repentance is recognized by the results - by what happens to a person. Not by what I experienced emotionally today. Although tears in prayer and the warmth of the soul are dear to each of us, one cannot pray in such a way as to cause tears in oneself or artificially warm up the warmth of the soul. It must be gratefully accepted when the Lord gives it as a gift, but not feelings, but our relationship with God should be the goal of prayer.
- And if you feel tired during prayers?
Ambrose of Optina says that it is better to think about prayer while sitting than standing about your feet. But again, be honest. If fatigue sets in after the thirtieth second of prayer, if we are much better at praying while sitting in an armchair or lying on a pillow, then this is no longer fatigue, but inner cunning. If a person's calcaneal nerve is pinched - well, let him sit, poor thing. Mom is pregnant - well, why should she keep her with a child, at 6-7 months? Let him lie down as best he can.
But we must remember: a person is a soul-bodily, psychophysical being, and the position itself, the disposition of the body during prayer, matters. I will not talk about high things that none of us have any idea about - how to focus attention at the top of the heart, for example. I don't even know where the top of the heart is and how to focus my attention there. But that scratching one's ear or picking one's nose affects the way we pray - this, I think, is understood even by not so exalted mystics.
What about prayers for beginners? There are special prayer books for them, but there are no more understandable prayers than in ordinary ones.
It seems to me that the beginners need, first of all, to be taught this - so that prayers become clear to them. And here prayer books a) sensible and b) with parallel translation into Russian can play a good role. Ideally, it should be combined: it should be both a translation into Russian and some kind of interpretation.
Let's say, before the revolution, a series was published on the twelfth holidays N.A. Skabalanovich, where the whole slavic text holiday services, parallel translation into Russian and explanation of the meaning of what is sometimes not enough to translate. I think that if people make the text of the prayer understandable, then this will remove many difficulties. And the size of the prayer rule is a matter that should rather be determined individually.
Can a person who has just become interested in church life advise the prayer of the Optina Elders, for example, as a prayer rule?
Yes, most often beginners need to be limited from overdose as soon as possible. My experience tells rather something else: newcomers in neophyte zeal strive to take more than they can. Rather, they need to say: “Read this and that’s all, dear, then someday you will pray more. There is no need to read three kathismas.”
Question from our reader: he has complicated relationship with his father, they never communicated particularly closely. After churching, he felt that he could not talk to God as a Father with a capital letter.
This is some kind of specific spiritual complex, I would say. It is difficult to talk about a person whom I do not know, all the more so to make any judgments that can critically speak about his internal structure, but let him ask himself the question: is there some kind of absolutization of personal experience on the scale of the Universe? That is, doesn’t it turn out that if I had some negative experience within my hillock and bump, then I can’t teach myself to look in a different perspective, except from this bump and from this bump?
By this logic, children who have been abandoned by their mother cannot or should not learn to love. Holy Mother of God... It seems to me that there is a lack of readiness to accept that difficult, but for some reason, God-allowed experience for this person, and not just an unsuccessful relationship with his own father. But I repeat: this is how I reason on the three lines of this question, the problem can be much deeper, you need to know more than a person in order to say.
Father, what do you pray for in your own words? Sometimes they say: do not ask for humility, because God will send you such sorrows that you yourself will not be happy.
You need to pray for the one thing you need. Why, in fact, not to ask for humility? It’s as if they are listening in on us in the heavenly office, and if we say something like that, then we immediately: oh, you asked, here’s a stick to your head, hold it. But if we believe in the Providence of God, and not in some heavenly KGB, tracking wrong words then we should not be afraid to ask for the right thing.
Another thing is that in other cases one must be aware of the price of prayer. For example, a mother asking for deliverance from the passion of her son's drug addiction should understand that this is the least likely to happen so that tomorrow he will wake up like a lamb, having forgotten about his addictions, hardworking, abstemious and loving his neighbors. Most likely, asking for the deliverance of her son, she asks him for sorrows, illnesses, certain very difficult life circumstances that the son may face - maybe the army, prison.
You need to be aware of the price of prayer, but, nevertheless, you need to pray for the right thing and not be afraid of God. We believe in our Heavenly Father, Who sent His Only Begotten Son so that those who believe in Him would not perish, and not in order to rein them all in some right way.
- And what is the point of asking prayer, if the Lord already knows what we need?
God knows, but he expects a good will from us. “God does not save us without us,” these marvelous words of St. Peter of Athos fully apply to prayer. And we are saved not as cubes that are rearranged from place to place, but as living individuals, as hypostases entering into a relationship of love with the One Who saves us. And these relationships imply the presence of free will and moral choice from a person.
Interviewed by Maria Abushkina
Archpriest Alexander Ageikin, Rector of the Epiphany Cathedral in YelokhovoArchpriest Alexander Ageikin, Rector of the Epiphany Cathedral in Yelokhovo:
– Holy images, hymns and readings – the whole structure of worship in the temple cannot be reproduced simply by turning on the audio or video recording of the liturgy at home. Especially if we do this not because we are seriously ill and unable to reach the temple, but only because of our own negligence.
If a person does not participate in temple prayer, avoids the company of his fellows in Christ, he avoids fellowship with Christ. It is not given to us to comprehend how God's grace works. We should not compare, which is more important, to oppose unity in the Sacrament of the Eucharist and the grace that visits the soul during church prayer. Otherwise, we will begin to serve the letter, and not the spirit.
If we talk about preparing for communion, then in practice it usually turns out like this: if a person lives in the Church, prays, fulfills the prayer rule, then this is already enough to prepare for communion, and the confessor, who observes the spiritual life of the flock, blesses him. In this case, the acceptance of the Holy Mysteries of Christ becomes absolutely natural and logical: it is already an integral part of life. The priest himself should be a model of such a life in the Church for his parishioners.
But often we pray very irregularly, and we still don’t want to learn this. Then, of course, the rules of a three-day fast and intense prayer are necessary before receiving the Holy Mysteries of Christ.
The main thing is that there should not be an ordinary attitude to the Eucharist, “addiction”, when reverence, that is, the memory of God, is lost. This is a dangerous spiritual state. Therefore, the most difficult thing is to constantly maintain attention to yourself, to your spiritual world, to every step of your life. After all, we all walk everywhere and everywhere before God.
Priest Alexander Starodubtsev, Cleric of the Church on Krasnopresnenskaya Embankment at the EXPO CenterPriest Alexander Starodubtsev, Cleric of the Church of Seraphim of Sarov on Krasnopresnenskaya Embankment:
– To be at the Liturgy, if for some reason you do not receive communion on that day, is not only not reprehensible, but important and spiritually beneficial. The fourth commandment tells us to dedicate the seventh day to God. Not thinking about God, lying on the sofa waiting or preparing dinner, we should spend this day. And already in the morning they should be in the temple of God. Even if we don't partake. Prayer in the church is important because temple prayer is a conciliar prayer: “Where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am in the midst of them” (Matthew 18:20). It turns out that every real meeting of Christians is accompanied by the personal presence of Jesus Christ. The Lord promises to give us or those to whom we ask something, if it is for good.
The temple is a place of special residence of the grace of God. Prayer at the service, where the Bloodless Sacrifice is offered, is an extremely important event for a person. Of course, it is commendable if a person takes communion regularly, once every two or three weeks. But we will say again and again that even if a person does not take communion, prayer at the liturgy is a special prayer, and its presence in life is very important. It is no coincidence that we know from the ancient rules that those who did not attend more than three Sunday liturgies received excommunication. In fact, he testified of himself that he was a Christian only occasionally.
The holy righteous John of Kronstadt says: "After listening to the Divine Liturgy, fall on your face and give thanks to the Lord, who has granted you such great happiness."
Here is how Metropolitan Veniamin (Fedchenkov) writes about our issue: “My friends, remember the rule of the holy fathers: a person who has not been to the liturgy for three Sundays in a row; deprived of a Christian burial. Do not miss these meals of the Lord, consider lost that feast day on which you did not hear the Divine Liturgy. I will tell a parable: one peasant had a hundred pounds of bread and exchanged it for rags. Tell me, did he act wisely? No, it's not reasonable. How even more foolish is the one who exchanges the Bread of Heavenly life for the rags of earthly life! The Lord calls for the Last Supper, and he answers: "You need to go to the auction, the garden has not been cleaned, the strip has not been sown." He does not know, unhappy, that the grain that he throws into the ground during the liturgy will come out sick, stunted, will not bear fruit for him. My friends, let us pray with me: “Lord, we thank You for Your gift, we thank You for making us worthy to listen to the Divine Liturgy and partake of Your Most Pure Body and Your Life-giving Blood. We also pray to You for those who have departed from Your Holy Chalice They do not want to find consolation in the Mysteries of Your salvation. Thou enlighten and bring them to Thee, so that they too may be with us in Thy Church."
You can listen to hymns at home, but how can you hear a priest and a deacon, crying out and speaking, a priest explaining the Holy Scripture of the day? How to stand before the praying images, how to especially feel like a part of the earthly Church, the way we feel it in the temple? Returning to the Old Testament and the events of the emergence of the first temple - the Tabernacle - let's remember that God said to create it. And God also said to visit her. And we have to either listen to God or ourselves.
In order to receive communion often, you should take the blessing of a priest who knows you, preferably a confessor. As a rule, he knows how seriously the preparation usually goes, how a person's life is subordinated to spiritual striving. If the blessing is given, then it is clear that the preparation should be as serious as possible. The time between the sacraments should be spent in sobriety and focus on how I live. It is strange to take communion often, and to spend the time between receiving the sacraments in idle and non-spiritual pursuits.
Those who often take communion can talk about such a sinful phenomenon as getting used to the shrine. This is one of the most dangerous sins. This is partly why, on average, people take communion once every two or three weeks, some even once a month. Of course, the amount of fasting and the prayer rule must be agreed with the confessor. We know from the service book that for a priest, regardless of the frequency of his service, the rule is not proposed to be reduced, therefore, in terms of prayer, the canons and the Follow-up are seen as mandatory reading in any case for someone who decides to often approach the Chalice. The question of frequent communion is very, very individual, often the time when the Sacrament of Communion becomes more frequent is great post. This happens for special grace-filled help to a person in fasting. For example, a person begins to receive communion weekly, and in the last week of Lent, also on Maundy Thursday and Easter.
Archpriest Alexander Abramov, rector of the church in Krapivniki
—Our ecclesiastical consciousness has already gone very far in its regression. It is clear that the tradition of church life was interrupted, that today we have to create it anew, people have been deprived of full-fledged spiritual discipline for decades, and our knowledge of this discipline is mainly from books, and not from our own living experience. But sometimes it is worth remembering that such discipline exists. The canons of the Church punished those who did not attend the liturgy three Sundays in a row.
This is evidenced by the 80th canon of Trullo Cathedral. It prescribes attending divine services on Sundays, leaving the question of participation in the Sacrament of the Eucharist to the discretion of everyone: who would be removed from his church for a long time, but staying in the city, on three Sundays in the course of three weeks, he will not come to the church meeting: then the clergyman will be expelled from the clergy, and the layman will be removed from communion.
In our parish, in practice, it so happened that members of the community, that is, those who regularly go to church, pray and fast, try to go to confession often. At least it happens once a week or once every two weeks. Many of them try to take communion more often. These people are already living the church life, they have the experience of prayer, so preparing to receive Communion is also a natural part of their life for them. Sometimes, for one important reason or another, a confessor can bless them to take communion, even if for some reason they have not subtracted the full prayer rule or weakened their fast in some way. The absolute minimum in this case is attendance at Holy Communion. But this, nevertheless, is an exception - it is advisable never to shorten the prayer rule.
There is a common misconception: some people who are preparing for Communion, while strictly observing the food side of the fast, for some reason consider it possible to skip the evening service and come only to the liturgy. This is just unacceptable. The main theological content of the events commemorated during the divine service is precisely set forth in the variable hymns of the All-Night Vigil. It is bad if a person strives for the Chalice, wants to take communion, but at the same time does not want to participate in divine services more meaningfully and understand their meaning.
From experience I can say that in recent times the number of those who approach the Sacrament of Communion is growing. In our parish, usually at least half of those who were at the Liturgy receive communion, if we are talking about Sunday.
In any case, just as if you made a commitment to pray in the morning and in the evening, you, even if the prayer “does not work”, do not give up everything, but still read the rule and, despite forcing yourself, receive spiritual benefit. So is prayer at the liturgy: even if for some reason you do not receive communion on this day, this is not a reason to excommunicate yourself from communion with God. By your coming to the liturgy, you testify to your fidelity to Christ, that you belong to his flock, that you confess Him. The Savior said: “Therefore, anyone who confesses Me before people, I will confess him also before My Father in Heaven; but whoever denies me before men, I will also deny him before my Father in heaven” (Matthew 10:32-33).
Archpriest Gleb Grozovsky, Confessor of FC ZenitPriest Gleb Grozovsky, Deputy Head of the Youth Affairs Department of the St. football club"Zenith":
– The answer is very simple and unequivocal, voiced quite a long time ago by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself: "Take, eat..." (Mark 14:22). He didn't say once a year or once a week, but "Drink all of you from her..." (Mk. 14:24). And so it was every time the disciples of our Savior gathered together to break bread (Acts 2:42). Everytime. And they met at least once a week, and sometimes every day. In the monasteries of the 4th-5th centuries, the monks, even when fleeing in the desert, gathered once a week for a common liturgy, during which everyone was sure to unite with God in the Sacrament of Communion.
Periods of Eucharistic decline and rise have been observed at various times throughout history. In the 19th century, it sometimes reached the point of absurdity when officers sent lists of soldiers who received communion once a year to the Diocesan Administration.
How often should you take communion? This question is discussed both in Optina Pustyn and in the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, but an unequivocal answer can only be found in the New Testament or Sacred Tradition.
So that there are no disputes and disagreements, it will be useful for all Orthodox to read the works of the Monk Nikodim the Holy Mountaineer and the Monk Macarius of Corinth "The Most Helpful Book of the Soul on the Unceasing Communion of the Holy Mysteries of Christ." Whoever cannot find time for this, let him be familiar with the saying of the holy Apostle Paul: "... Every time you eat this bread and drink from this cup, you testify to the death of the Lord. Do this until He comes" ( 1 Corinthians 11:26). Well, so that there is no doubt left at all, I recall the words from the 9th Apostolic Canon: "All the faithful who enter the church and listen to the writings, but do not remain in prayer and Holy Communion to the end, as if they produce disorderly conduct in the church, should be excommunicated from the fellowship of the Church" . That is, all those believers who come to church and listen to the Scriptures, but do not remain in prayer and do not partake of Holy Communion, must be excommunicated from the Church, because they are causing outrage in the church.
Of course, "a man must examine himself before eating the bread and drinking from the cup," (1 Cor. 11:28), but look for the reason in "godly" excuses such as "I am not worthy" or "I am not ready" , not very soul-saving!
This is the practice in our parish. I call and exhort in different ways: if you come to the liturgy, then don’t be like a person who was invited to a birthday party, they cooked, tried, set the table, and he refuses to eat ... Is there really no desire to share the Meal of Love? Christ did everything for us, we only have to accept His Gift with gratitude, and instead of looking for opportunities, we are looking for the reason for our non-participation in the Savior. For whom did Christ die and for whom did He rise again? Who is the service for? For the sake of the righteous or sinners? The priest before Communion says: "Holy to the holy." To whom? Saints? Who are they? And the choir answers: "One is Holy, One is Lord Jesus Christ...". Then to whom are the words "Holy to the holies" addressed? To us, to everyone who came to the liturgy! "Holy" in Hebrew means "chosen", and not at all sinless. Yes, these words are addressed to us sinners, but to the elect! And then the necessary condition for uniting with the Lord is called: "Come with the fear of God, faith and love"! And at the liturgy Presanctified Gifts the words sound: “Let us approach by faith and love, so that we will be partakers of eternal life.” The Liturgy is served for the faithful (the baptized), so that at the end of it all partake of the Body and Blood of our Lord.
Archpriest Andrei Sommer, Department of Youth Affairs of the Russian Church Abroad Mother of God"Sign" of the Kursk Root in New York:
—Unfortunately, the practice of parish life in the Church Abroad took shape after the first wave of emigration. And it was such that parishioners rarely took communion. Now this is changing, and it is considered normal for us to take communion on all the twelfth holidays or when conscience prompts - maybe even almost every Sunday.
At the same time, everyone: both the parishioners of the old school, who, as a rule, take communion only during Great Lent, and young people, on the days Holy Week He makes every effort to partake of the Sacraments of Confession and Communion.
But even among our Orthodox Christians abroad, who are not very churched, the thought does not arise that you do not need to be at the liturgy if you do not take communion. The temple is a vessel of grace, each time if the liturgy is performed, then grace is added to this vessel. The temple itself is anointed with chrism during consecration. This is already the beginning of the accumulation of grace "in the vessel." By attending the liturgy, we touch this grace. But then the pastor needs to explain to the parishioners that not only do you need to touch Divine grace, but you need to accept it, and completely change your mind and your life. And this is impossible without the Sacraments of Confession and Communion.
We try in our sermons to emphasize the importance of more frequent Communion. And the preparation for receiving the Holy Mysteries is confession. To do this, I have compiled a small pamphlet about confession: we give it to everyone who comes to our church, including those who are waiting for their turn to confess. At the very least, while they are standing in line, they will have the opportunity to consider how serious the Sacraments they are about to begin.
Morozov.jpgHegumen Nektariy (Morozov), rector of the Satisfy My Sorrows church in Saratov, editor-in-chief of the journal Orthodoxy and Modernity:
Unfortunately, for quite objective reasons, the vast majority of contemporary Christians cannot take communion as often as Christians in the first centuries of the existence of the Church. Not because "it is impossible" or "forbidden". No, it’s just frequent communion, several times in one week (and I remember St. Basil the Great wrote that in his times in Cappadocia it was common for the laity to partake of the Holy Mysteries of Christ four times a week) requires both a certain structure of all life, and more strictness to oneself, and more attentiveness, seriousness. And not everyone is ready for this...
As for attending the Divine Liturgy on those days when a person was not going to take communion, then, of course, there is nothing reprehensible in this - it is enough to refer to the example of monastic cloisters, in which the Liturgy is served daily and the brethren attend all services daily. Although they do not join every day. Experience itself testifies that the more often a person is in the church, when the Eucharist is celebrated, the better: the action of the grace of God is like the action of the sun, under whose rays a person warms up, comes to life. And during the liturgy, the soul warms up and comes to life.
You need to decide: what does it mean to "commune often"? There are very different points of view on this. Personally, the opinion of Archimandrite John (Krestyankin) is closest to me, who advised taking communion on average once every two weeks. Therefore, "to take communion often," it seems to me, means to take communion more often than with such frequency. Man is a creature that quickly gets used to both good and bad - to everything, and even to the great and terrible. And getting used to the shrine, as you know, is not a safe thing. Therefore, if a person wants to take communion more often, then he needs the blessing of a confessor who will confirm that it will be useful for him personally, and not harmful. Such a person needs more intense prayer work, more sobriety of life.
The well-known Athos ascetic Hieroschemamonk Ephraim of Katunaksky advised, for example, to read the akathist to the Mother of God on the eve of communion and turn to Her throughout the day, asking that She vouchsafe us to receive communion without condemnation. I think this is a wonderful piece of advice. But the time of fasting before communion can probably be reduced if a person takes communion, say, weekly and fasts on Wednesday and Friday. But this, too, is at the discretion of the confessor.
Eremeev.jpgHegumen Peter (Eremeev), abbot of the stauropegial male Vysoko-Petrovsky monastery in Moscow, rector of the Russian Orthodox University:
The question of communion at each liturgy cannot be considered in the plane of church discipline. It's more of a question internal readiness man to the communion of the Body and Blood of the Lord. And it is decided in the heart of a person and in confession.
When I was a layman, a student of theological schools, I did not think about it. After all, in the seminary and academy we took communion, although not at every liturgy, but quite often. The very rhythm of the life of the theological school and the prayerful atmosphere in the Lavra favored this.
Then, when I already became a priest, it often happened that in a series of daily activities, especially when traveling and traveling, you come to worship not at the very beginning, you pray at the altar, and at the end you eat antidoron with holy water - and this is yours. participation in the liturgy. And, already having the experience of communion at every liturgy served, I began to feel that the spiritual thirst in my prayerful liturgical presence remains not completely satisfied. After all prayer appeals to God at the liturgy they prepare us precisely for the reception of the Holy Mysteries of Christ. Therefore, taking communion at the Liturgy is as natural as starting a meal, for the sake of which you sat down at the dinner table.
But, of course, it cannot be said that without the obligatory communion, the participation of a Christian in the liturgy is an unnecessary or undesirable prayer experience. Each of us knows that there are such moments of contrition of heart for sins when we do not fully feel ready to receive the Body and Blood. This, for example, includes cases of penance, when the soul needs more repentance. After all, according to the Apostle Paul, “Let a man examine himself, and thus let him eat from this bread and drink from this cup. For whoever eats and drinks unworthily, he eats and drinks self-judgment, not considering the Body of the Lord” (1 Cor. 11:28-29).
prepared by Antonina Maga,
Correspondent of the Journal of the Moscow Patriarchy
- Can the Lord really forgive any crime, even the most terrible?
We have talked about this many times. Although we use the term "forgive," we need to feel deeply that God's forgiveness is not at all what happens when one person forgives another. It's just that with respect to man and God, you need to use a completely different terminology - unfortunately, there is no such terminology. The first thing that came to mind was the music. Here we sometimes say: music is cheerful or music is sad. But in fact, music is not divided into cheerful and sad. It's just that one music in most people gives rise to the impression of sadness, and the other - of joy, but this is very conditional, because the musical language is not the language of human speech. There are some similarities. For example, a musician creates a piece and calls it “Drips”, and each person can hear spring drops in this music, but if you cross out the name and write “Bell”, then a person will hear the chime of bells at the same play. It is the same here, we say: God has forgiven, but completely different concepts are invested in this. For example, we quarreled, and then decided to make peace - what does this mean? This means that the sin that each of us committed against each other becomes non-existent, that is, we move on to relationships that were before the quarrel, that is, everyone forgot and forgave each other. And also in relationship with God. This man has sinned a grave sin. What does "God forgave" mean? Sin has not become former, this does not mean that historically it has disappeared, but the consequences have disappeared, and the person has become different. What does "become different" mean? That is, in a similar situation, he will never do this again - this is what means that the sin is forgiven. The most common sin in our country is drunkenness. Drunkards will not inherit the kingdom of God. Here a person stopped drinking - and he doesn’t even want to, and he doesn’t strive for this and doesn’t buy wine, and even at a party they offer him - he refuses, not because he’s sewn up, but simply doesn’t want to - this means God has forgiven him this sin.
But it's been a long way to get there...
Maybe for a long time, but sometimes it happens right away. Here we have one peasant in the village, Ilya, he immediately stopped drinking, he is already 90 years old, and 5 years ago he quit smoking, and has been smoking since he was 12 years old.
I say: "Have you quit smoking?"
- "Yes"
- "And why?"
- "Yes, something began to cough."
He took it and cut it off - that's the will of a man. So he decided to quit and that's it. What does it mean? This means that God forgave him his sin. Of course, God helped because without God's help this is not possible. I don't know if he prayed or not, but it's a fact. This is God's forgiveness. It doesn't mean "please forgive me", but tomorrow they do the same thing.
- Here are many women repenting of the sin of an abortion committed many years ago. Of course, she does not commit it and dissuades others, but sin torments and crushes. And what? God has not forgiven, just presses?
No, why? So I asked an old man when I was young, what to do if sins are remembered and crushed? He said - this is like a penance, this is so that you do not become proud, you would not undertake to teach someone. You always remember that you killed your child. Hitler - and even better, he did not kill his children - he was childless.
- Hello. How to determine what is cross-bearing for a particular person, and how to learn not to shy away from it?
Well, the cross is our whole life. The cross is: our climate, our clay soil, our history, our judiciary, our government, our bureaucracy, our chronic or newly acquired diseases. All cross. It started to rain - this is a cross, if we didn’t take an umbrella, and the sun bakes, it’s hot - this is a cross, the crush in the metro is a cross, the character of the wife is a cross, the disobedience of children is a cross, people smoking around are a cross. For me, our pavements spit on are like a cross. It seems that we live in the capital of our state, but you look - in a barn and even cleaner. This is also a cross, but how to carry it is only with patience.
- Father Demetrius, please explain the meaning of the saying "whoever humiliates himself - he will rise, whoever exalts himself - he will humble himself." How to understand this correctly, and if possible, then on a specific example.
It is about earthly and heavenly life. On ancient icons, all kinds of objects are depicted in reverse perspective, because our earthly life is heavenly, only upside down. What people consider high is an abomination before God. When a person exalts himself, thereby he moves away from God. Therefore, we see that the most ardent atheists - Lenin, for example, during their lifetime named cities and streets after themselves, thereby exalting themselves and moving away from God. And the person who humbles himself is a humble person - he is very high before God. The more modest a person is, the more humble, the higher he is in the eyes of God.
- Alexander from St. Petersburg asks who the scribes are and why they are spoken of as opponents of Jesus Christ along with the Pharisees.
Well, the scribes, for the most part they belonged to the party of the Pharisees, these are such intersecting sets, if we speak in mathematical language, so when we talk about the scribes, we can safely say that they are Pharisees. What is the damage to the religion that arose on the legacy of the holy prophet of God, the Pharisee? The fact that, not seeing the spiritual component of the Old Testament, God given to a person they put the fulfillment of moral precepts at the forefront. And our Lord Jesus Christ wanted to ensure that a person cleanses the inner glass of his soul, that is, he spends the energy of the soul, mind and body not on fulfillment external rule, but I saw the inner spiritual content behind the rules - this is a big problem. The scribe studied the word of God in order to extract from it some kind of rule, some kind of instruction. Here, for example: three in the morning, an absolutely deserted street and there is a red traffic light, we drive up to the traffic light and get up - why? The rule says "red light-no move". From point of view common sense this is complete absurdity: there is no one, and the wheels do not rustle, it is night - if the car is moving, then the headlights are visible. A man in uniform jumps out and says: you broke the rules. Not traffic safety, there is no threat to anyone, but the rule as such, that is, it turns into absurdity. Something similar happened then. The scribes extracted certain rules because they were specialists in the text of the law of God from the Holy Scriptures. In general, every scribe memorized some part of the Holy Scripture by heart. This was done for such a purpose that if the text is lost, then the scribes immediately gather and restore it from memory, because it was written on such media that are endangered by fire or dampness. They were great experts in the text, but, while reading the text formally, they did not see the depth in it.
- Many people, starting to become churchgoers, are horrified by the abundance of rules in our church life and often ask the question: is all this really necessary and important, or can something be neglected?
It's not about that. It is necessary to understand the main algorithm - what is Christianity? And in the light of this, to see the rules, but with us, on the contrary, a person begins: rule-rule-rule, and Christianity eludes him. He turns into a modern scribe and Pharisee.
A man came to confession. A father comes up to him and asks: have you read the canons?
He says: I didn’t have time, I worked late yesterday.
And he answered: you can’t take communion. And the person leaves in bewilderment: is canon really all?
Well no. The fact is that until the 18th century in our country, no one, except maybe monks, had ever read any canons. These rules arose only in the 18th century, and so who read the Jesus prayer, who “Our Father”. And what, priests are not Pharisees? Yes, as much as you want! Of such, the Scripture says: they themselves do not enter, and for others they hinder. They do not even look at age, or maybe a person does not see? Such a formal trip.
And what, a person humbly leave or can you ignore the rules?
Everyone will find their own way.
- Good evening. My name is Vladimir. Please tell me, I read from St. Ignatius that in order to acquire sincere repentance, one must have the determination to leave all one's sins. How to find this determination if nothing works out, especially since, due to his negligence, pride and extreme sinfulness, he has been placed in such conditions that if you do not pray, then it is not far to reach despair?
You have described everything correctly. You just need to start small and then move on to something more serious. Well, some very minimal effort can always be done. And if a person is not able to say: “Lord, have mercy,” then let him say: “Lord!”, So be of good cheer, child, your faith will save you.
- How does a written confession correspond to an oral confession, and can it replace one another?
After all, confession is only a tool, and not at all repentance itself, so it doesn’t matter if our crutch is made of aluminum or oak, it is important that there is repentance.
- Many say: I can’t say, I’m ashamed, father, read it.
Well, well, okay. It happens.
If the priest does not accept a written confession. Go to someone else?
Well, I don't know, it's different. Man must seek. Seek and find. That's when I was young, at Christmas, on Easter, they didn't take communion anywhere in Moscow churches, and we found a priest who agreed to give us communion.
- Tell me, do you know anything about the fact that the State Duma adopted amendments to the Law on Secondary Education, that now it will be paid? I would like you to comment.
My dear, I, unfortunately, do not know. How can I comment on something I don't know? Here and so everything is clear.
- Often the priests refuse to give communion to people who were not at the evening service the day before. How legitimate is this?
This is absolutely illegal! Here, I'll give you an example. When I served in the Altufiev Church, we had a parishioner Olimpiada, she had one leg, and the prosthesis was wooden. She came to the temple every Sunday, and only in winter, when there was already ice, she did not go. I then gave communion to her at home. And how to demand from her that she defended two services?! It just has to be a sadist. A priest should be a person who opens the entrance to the temple for people, and does not close the Royal Doors in front of their noses. But there are still few such priests in Moscow. I don't know what's next. It is very good when a person attended the full circle of Divine Liturgy, and it is also good if a layman has a full circle of Menaia, and when he cannot, he will take and honor. Well, it is clear that for most it is impossible. The Apostle Paul never took communion in his life, having defended the vigil, because then it was not in nature, and Basil the Great also, therefore, to demand from a person what even Basil the Great did not do is simply absurd.
- Is it possible to communicate with Baptists?
We even communicate often with crooks. What about the Baptists? These are our smaller brothers Why can't you communicate with them? Unless, of course, you are approved in Orthodox faith, then they will hammer you with a cascade of certain quotations from the Holy Scriptures, with a certain Baptist interpretation. And if you are guided by the Holy Scriptures, then on the contrary, they can be very easily confused. And if communication is just friendly, then we have a lot in common - we love the same God. True, they do not like saints, they consider themselves saints. And we believe that we are saved in hope. As the Apostle Paul says: they have a number of errors that are contrary to the church. Well, if a Baptist is sober and able to listen, which happens infrequently, then he can easily be shown his absurdities.
- Father, maybe it's better to bypass religious topics with such people?
Well, if there is a dispute, then, of course, it is not necessary. Weak in faith, but a Baptist can only be perceived as something to be accepted without disputes about the truth, with paternal love and warmth. I personally have a very good attitude towards the Baptists, they have many virtues. I would advise most Orthodox Christians to learn something from the Baptists.
- Can the mechanical exercise of yoga, without meditation to strengthen the muscles, damage the spiritual state?
I think no. On the other hand, it all depends on the person. I think if I did what was difficult with my stomach, it wouldn't hurt me. Everything depends on the person - one glass will drink, and nothing, and the other will drink a glass - and rowdy. We are all different.
- How to properly use the land consecrated from the grave of the reverend? Some say - take it, it helps.
And there is no consecrated land. They bring to memory. And so I don't know. In our church life it is not written what to do with it. I do not know. Here I have, for example, I keep a piece of plaster, crumbled from the chapel of Xenia of St. Petersburg. Then she was not yet glorified, as I went to St. Petersburg and took it as a keepsake, and now I keep it. Or I still have a piece of ceramics, which paved the floor of the temple where my great-grandfather served, in the village of Znamenskoye. I entered this temple - the windows are broken, there is no dome, and the floor is so partially lost. I took this stone for myself. How nice that my great-grandfather walked on this floor! Well, for me this is a shrine, and he is now a glorified person, but this does not mean that he should be gnawed and swallowed.
- Dear Father Demetrius, is it possible to canonize Patriarch Alexei I in terms of the timing of his death? Can we, the laity, help bring this closer?
- I think no. This will come to light over time. We now have some kind of excitement around canonization. What is canonization? This is glorification. Patriarch Alexei I famous throughout the world. The time will come - there will be miracles on his grave. This is a natural process. It doesn't happen right off the bat.
- Father, how not to fall into negligence and overcome the cooling off to prayer after fasting, if on Easter days you feel joy and some kind of relaxation?
We must act not on feelings, but on faith. Faith commands us to pray without ceasing. Therefore, I want, I don’t want, I can, I can’t - do I need to brush my teeth? Necessary. Need to wash? - Necessary. Need to pray? - Necessary. As one person put it: you need to pray more often than breathe - see how great it is!
- Many are embarrassed that on Sundays or Easter days you can’t make bows, read the psalter ...
- Again you can't! Well, who will forbid? Well, do you want me to bow to the ground now? In the temple - yes, in the temple there is a certain order, but at home in the cell who is your master? Well, here in our church the chandeliers were not lit - I gave them penance, they bowed, however, not in the church, but at home - and what's wrong? What's wrong with bowing a good thing- bow.
- They are afraid of offending God.
Oh... Let this be the biggest sin in our lives. How can you offend God with a bow? This is an opinion about God as... I won't even say what.
- Ivan the Terrible is still a murderer or not, and what can you read on this topic?
Well, any book on history, and it is clear that the murderer. And government in some cases forced to resort to murder. In our country, thank God, the death penalty is prohibited, but all the same, the militants are extinguished in the jungles of the Caucasus - a necessary thing, otherwise they will blow up cities. An element of murder is always present, but Ivan Vasilievich did it with voluptuousness and sometimes completely unfairly. A large number of innocent people suffered from it.
- What to do if a child of 2.5 years old began to show anger?
You need to love him more, and it is necessary that anger does not manifest itself in his presence. Remove from the house all sorts of modern cartoons, where all the time anger, fights, ridicule, although every person, even a small one, is a sinner. It is necessary to create an atmosphere of rejection of evil, and then he will see that when he shows evil, then everyone turns away from him, and he will feel that this is not true and will begin to resist this within himself.
- To love and turn away - how is it?
- For educational purposes. When a man loves... A lover says to his beloved, you know, I think about you all the time. It often happens that people loving friend friend, call each other, so we, if we love a baby, we are not distracted from him for a minute. We think about his mental health all the time. Each of our words and actions with him should carry an educational charge.
We are commanded to pray without ceasing. How is this possible in modern conditions?
- It's very possible. Praying does not mean saying words all the time. Prayer means to have all the time in the mind and heart of God and never be distracted from it.
- That is, the motive for an act is to please God?
In theory, all life should be like this: whether we eat or drink, we do everything for the glory of God. We raise children for God. All for God.
- I didn’t intentionally tell a lie to the priest at confession, and I didn’t have the courage to immediately admit it. I took communion with the determination to tell everything in the near future, but then it didn’t work out. Now I'm suffering. Maybe she took communion in condemnation, since she deceived? And how to be now?
Well, you can always start over, always repent.
- Father, when you don’t have the courage to confess something in confession ...
Well, you said it yourself - write then.
Well, it's embarrassing to write.
- What does it mean to be ashamed? Shame - it, of course, burns, but it heals like a mustard plaster. If a person does not feel shame, then this is a very serious spiritual illness.
- Many people say - I'm lying so that it doesn't get worse, because by telling the truth, you can greatly complicate the relationship. And how to be-stop lying? But then there will be difficulties, or is such a lie possible?
This needs to be looked at in a specific situation.
- They appear all the time.
Well, let them arise that they pester me? If you want - lie, but what have I got to do with it? Understand yourself - there is a conscience, there is God, there are people. Why is this hanging on me?
- Here you can see not a specific answer is needed, but some kind of reasoning.
We have already talked about this topic. A man is running. He runs into the entrance, calls - open, hide me. A bandit with an ax runs after this man and rings the doorbell: did such and such run to you?
What do you need: to tell the truth or “no, I didn’t run”? Well, of course - to lie. Again, what is the motive - do we want to save a person by this or to keep our self-interest? And then you can always keep silent.
- Often people ask to lie to cover their sin.
Well, every situation is different. If you act not rashly, but reasonably, you can avoid a bad situation in 99% of cases. It's just that people are used to lying - the easiest way since childhood.
- How to properly communicate with sisters in faith and just acquaintances in order to avoid idle talk and gossip?
As the ancient reverend said - run people and you will be saved. How to avoid? - Avoid communication. The less you communicate, the less idle talk. Especially with sisters. With whom you sit in the same room side by side 5 days a week and 8 hours a day. A difficult task, but quite doable.
In such teams, there are quite strict principles, and if you don’t obey them, then leave. And where will you go if you are near retirement age? There is a way out of any situation. For example, give a box of chocolates to everyone sitting in this room for a birthday, a name day, Christmas, Easter, a birthday of a son, a husband and thereby compensate for the shortcomings of his silence. They will say - well, this is such a character, but they gave me candy. If there is a problem, then it must be solved. There are still no ready-made answers, because I advised them, what if they all have diabetes, they don’t eat sweets, so something else is needed.
- A relative refuses to wear a cross. How to be-persuade or retreat?
- Burn at the stake. Why persuade? The Apostle Paul did not wear a cross, the Apostle Peter, too, John the Theologian loved Christ very much, he also did not wear a cross. Why persuade, if a person does not want to, I do not understand. You can persuade the child to put on a coat, if it's windy outside, he still doesn't seem to understand.
- For many, it comes to panic, to tragedy, if a son or daughter takes off the cross, and with all their might they try to put it back on.
Because they treat the cross as a magical amulet - this is not correct and sinful. The tragedy is not that he took off the cross that hangs on a string around his neck. The tragedy lies in the fact that he is not a Christian - this is a tragedy for the believing heart. But there are plenty of people who wear a cross and are not Christians. What is better - formally wear a cross? In my opinion, this is more blasphemous.
Well, maybe some kind of hope glimmers in the soul, that since he wears a cross, maybe he will come to his senses. Or some say they don't take communion, but at least they drink holy water.
Well, it means that some kind of connection with the church is preserved, but all the same, a person is not saved by this, but is saved only by repentance. That is, people in the Pharisees demand external signs manifestations of religiosity, but this is nothing in the eyes of God. And for some, there is a general panic - you know, we buried the deceased, but forgot to put on the cross - what should we do now? Why, tear open the grave, open the coffin and put on a cross? On the grave stands, and that's enough. It's just that people attach importance to things that don't matter so much.
Some fathers do not even take communion if a person without a cross has come.
And how do they know that without a cross? What do they do x-rays? I have wooden cross, his X-ray does not show. How can you determine?
- Let's say the person himself confessed.
A-ah-ah, well, there is nothing to take communion. If for him it has such a formal essence, well, get it - get treated for magic.
- The child went to church, took communion, prayed, confessed, and at the age of 14 he began to resist, at 16 he stopped going to church altogether, and you can’t drag him there with any force. What will we do?
- Nothing. The man has grown. What has been sown, will slowly sprout. There will be a struggle in the soul. As F. M. Dostoevsky said, the devil will fight with God. Childish apostasy turns into male apostasy, and he himself decides whom he should believe in, where he should go, how he should live.
- But the fact that the child stopped going to church is what? Lack of upbringing?
- This is the lack of a father's example. He did not see an example in his father Christian life- that's the problem. So this family was not a house church - absolutely 99% of the time.
- Father, I know the family, mother, father and children always went to church. Then one of the children says: I do not want such a family, and he does everything contrary to what was in his family.
- Quite possible. spirit of contradiction. What is Christianity? This is when people become morally the best. When a son can say - my dad is the best, because he has never seen more love from anyone than the one that his father sends to him from his heart. And he will be like a dad. I want to be a policeman like my dad. The Pope is a Christian and I am a Christian. And here something is not right. So, someone on the street, in the classroom, at school, on the screen turned out to be better than dad - more attractive.
- A modern dad, if he takes care of the family, he works, and the child spends much less time with him.
It's not about time at all. The thing is, he loves. My late father had a tremendous influence on me and on my other brothers. He never taught us anything. He did not utter more than one phrase in two days, he was always silent. He just was. Here is his reaction - how he answers, how he walked, how he looked, how he smiled - that brought up. And not at all some time. He also worked, everyone works. But what if the father does not work, then what kind of upbringing is this? Non-working father - who can he raise? Real freaks. All dads who don't work have ugly kids.
- Already almost 10 years of marriage, and the Lord does not give children. We mourn and pray, we go to shrines, we ask, but the Lord does not give. What is it? Maybe some unrepentant sin in life or some other reason?
Well, you need to ask the doctors. There are 1 million orphans in the country - you can choose.
-I want mine.
- Yes, it will be yours. I see that someone in our parish was adopted - after 2 months they completely forget that he is not his own. They buy a cat in the market and love it, but here is a baby.
You have to be humble, but humility is not enough.
I sympathize - without humility there is no salvation.
Well, in this situation, what other ways to have a baby are acceptable?
- Depends on what. Insemination is acceptable.
- Or is it better to wait for God to lend and take care of someone?
This, of course, is preferable, because by taking an orphan from an orphanage, you save a person from prison - this is a great blessing. You, perhaps, will save someone's life by this - not only him, but the one to whom he could break his head in the entrance to take away the bag. Because our modern orphan care system - it doesn't teach children. Here, the prosecutor's office recently came to our orphanage, asking: what are these children's panties hanging? Well, we answer: the children washed. Ka-a-ak??!!! Do you force children to do laundry? Imagine, it turns out that according to the law, the prosecutor's office is against children washing panties and T-shirts after themselves. And then what will grow out of them?
This is where our show comes to an end. Help you Lord.
Fasting and Prayer Before Communion
Until this year, I confessed and took communion only once in my life, in adolescence. Recently I decided to take communion again, but I forgot about fasting, prayers, confession... What should I do now?
According to the canons of the Church, before communion, it is obligatory to abstain from intimate life and communion on an empty stomach. All the canons, prayers, fasting are simply means to set oneself up for prayer, repentance and the desire to improve. Even confession, strictly speaking, is not obligatory before communion, but this is the case if a person regularly confesses to one priest, if he does not have canonical obstacles to communion (abortion, murder, going to fortune-tellers and psychics ...) and there is the blessing of the confessor is not always necessary to confess before communion (for example, Bright Week). So in your case, nothing particularly terrible happened, and in the future you can use all these means of preparing for communion.
How long to fast before communion?
Strictly speaking, the "Typicon" (charter) says that those who wish to receive communion must fast during the week. But, firstly, this is a monastic charter, and the “Book of Rules” (canons) contains only two necessary conditions for those wishing to take communion: 1) the absence of intimate marital relations (not to mention prodigal ones) on the eve of communion; 2) Communion must be taken on an empty stomach. Thus, it turns out that fasting before communion, reading canons and prayers, confession are recommended for those preparing for communion in order to more fully evoke a repentant mood. In our time on round tables devoted to the topic of Communion, the priests came to the conclusion that if a person observes all four major fasts during the year, fasts on Wednesday and Friday (and this time takes at least six months a year), then the Eucharistic fast is enough for such a person, i.e. . take communion on an empty stomach. But if a person has not gone to church for 10 years and decided to take communion, then he will need a completely different format for preparing for communion. All these nuances must be coordinated with your confessor.
Is it possible for me to continue preparing for communion if I had to break the fast on Friday: they asked me to remember the person and gave non-fast food?
You can say this in confession, but this should not be an obstacle to communion. For breaking the fast was forced and justified in this situation.Why are kakons written in Church Slavonic? Because they are so hard to read. My husband doesn't understand anything he reads and gets angry. Maybe I should read aloud?
It is customary in the Church to hold services in Church Slavonic. We also pray in the same language at home. This is not Russian, not Ukrainian, and no other. This is the language of the Church. There are no obscenities, swear words in this language, and in fact, you can learn to understand it in just a few days. After all, he has Slavic roots. This is the question of why we use this particular language. If your husband is more comfortable listening while you read, you can do so. The main thing is that he listens carefully. I advise you to sit down in your free time and parse the text with the Church Slavonic dictionary in order to better understand the meaning of the prayers.
My husband believes in God, but somehow in his own way. He believes that it is not necessary to read prayers before confession and communion, it is enough to recognize sins in oneself and repent. Isn't this a sin?
If a person considers himself so perfect, almost holy, that he does not need any help in preparing for communion, and prayers are such help, then let him take communion. But he remembers the words of the Holy Fathers that we then partake worthily when we consider ourselves unworthy. And if a person denies the need for prayers before communion, it turns out that he already considers himself worthy. Let your husband think about all this and with heartfelt attention, reading the prayers for communion, prepare to receive the holy Mysteries of Christ.
Is it possible to be in the evening service in one church, and in the morning for communion in another?
There are no canonical prohibitions against such practice.
Is it possible to read the canons and the following to the sacrament during the week?
It is better with attention, thinking about the meaning of what is being read, so that it is really a prayer, to distribute the recommended rule for communion for a week, starting with the canons and ending with prayers for communion on the eve of receiving the Mysteries of Christ, than to subtract thoughtlessly in one day.
How to fast and prepare for communion while living in a 1-room apartment with unbelievers?
The Holy Fathers teach that one can live in the desert and have a noisy city in one's heart. And you can live in a noisy city, but there will be peace and quiet in your heart. So, if we want to pray, we will pray in any conditions. People prayed both in sinking ships and in the trenches under bombardment, and this was the most pleasing prayer to God. Who seeks, he finds opportunities.
Communion of children
When to Communion a Baby?
If in churches the Blood of Christ is left in a special chalice, then such babies can be communed at any moment, at any time, as long as there is a priest. This is especially true in big cities. If there is no such practice, then a child can be communed only when a liturgy is performed in the temple, as a rule, on Sunday and on major holidays. With babies, you can come to the end of the service and take communion in the general order. If you come with babies to the beginning of the service, they will begin to cry and this will interfere with the prayers of the rest of the believers, who will grumble and be indignant at unreasonable parents. Drinking in small quantities can be given to an infant of any age. Antidor, prosphora is given when the child is able to use it. As a rule, babies are not communed on an empty stomach until they are 3-4 years old, and then they are taught to take communion on an empty stomach. But if a 5-6-year-old child, out of forgetfulness, drank or ate something, then he can also be communed.
The daughter from the year partakes of the Body and Blood of Christ. Now she is almost three, we have moved, and in the new temple the priest gives her only Blood. At my request to give her a piece, he made a remark about the lack of humility. Reconcile?
At the level of custom, indeed, in our Church, a baby up to 7 years old is communed only with the Blood of Christ. But if a child is accustomed to communion from the very cradle, the priest, seeing the adequacy of the baby when he grows up, can already give the Body of Christ. But you need to be very careful and control so that the child does not spit out a particle. Usually full communion babies are given when the priest and the baby get used to each other, and the priest is sure that the child will fully consume Communion. Try once to talk with the priest on this topic, motivating your request by the fact that the child is already accustomed to partaking of both the Body and the Blood of Christ, and then humbly accept any reaction from the priest.
What to do with clothes that a child vomited on after communion?
The part of the garment that has come into contact with the sacrament is cut out and burned. We patch the hole with some kind of decorative patch.
My daughter is seven years old and she will have to go to confession before taking communion. How can I prepare her for this? What prayers should she read before communion, what about a three-day fast?
The main rule in preparing for the reception of the Holy Mysteries in relation to young children can be concluded in two words: do no harm. Therefore, parents, especially mothers, must explain to the child why confess, for what purpose to take communion. And the prescribed prayers and canons are gradually, not immediately, perhaps even read with the child. Start with one prayer, so that the child does not overwork, so that it does not become a burden for him, so that this coercion does not push him away. Similarly, with regard to fasting, limit both the time and the list of prohibited foods, for example, give up only meat. In general, at first it is necessary that the mother understands the meaning of preparation, and then, without fanaticism, she gradually teaches her child step by step.
The child has been vaccinated against rabies. He can't drink alcohol for a whole year. What to do with the sacrament?
Believing that the sacrament is the best medicine in the universe, when we approach it, we forget about all the limitations. And according to our faith, we will heal both the soul and the body.
The child was prescribed a gluten-free diet (bread is not allowed). I understand that we eat the Blood and Body of Christ, but the physical characteristics of the products remain wine and bread. Is Communion possible without partaking of the Body? What is in wine?
Once again, the sacrament is the best medicine in the world. But, given the age of your child, you can, of course, ask to receive communion only with the Blood of Christ. The wine used for communion may be real wine made from grapes with added sugar for strength, or it may be a wine product made from grapes with alcohol added. What kind of wine is used in the temple where you take communion, you can ask the priest.
Every Sunday the child was communed, but the last time when he approached the Chalice, he began to have a terrible hysteria. The next time it happened in another temple. I'm desperate.
In order not to aggravate the negative reaction of the child to the sacrament, you can try to simply go to the temple without taking communion. You can try to introduce the child to the priest, so that this communication will smooth out the child’s fear, and over time, he will again begin to partake of the Body and Blood of Christ.
Communion for Easter, Bright Week
Is it necessary to observe a three-day fast, subtract the canons and the following in order to take communion for Bright Week?
Beginning with the night liturgy and throughout all the days of Bright Week, communion is not only permitted, but also commanded by the 66th Canon of the Sixth Ecumenical Council. Preparation these days consists in reading the Paschal canon and following Holy Communion. Starting from the week of Antipascha, communion is prepared as throughout the year (three canons and a follow-up).
How to prepare for communion in continuous weeks?
The Church, as a loving mother, cares not only for our souls, but also for our bodies. Therefore, on the eve of, for example, a rather difficult Great Lent, it gives us some relief in food through a continuous week. But this does not mean that we are forced to eat more these days. fast food. That is, we have a right, but not an obligation. So how you want to prepare for communion, so prepare. But remember the main thing: first of all, we prepare our soul and heart, cleansing them with repentance, prayer, reconciliation, and the stomach comes last.
I heard that on Easter you can take communion, even if he did not fast. Is it true?
There is no special rule that allows communion specifically on Easter without fasting and without preparation. On this issue, the answer must be given by the priest after direct communication with the person.
I want to take communion on Easter, but I ate soup on non-fasting broth. Now I'm afraid that I can't take communion. What do you think?
Remembering the words of John Chrysostom, which are read on Easter night, that those who fast do not condemn those who do not fast, but we all rejoice, you can boldly approach the sacrament of communion on Easter night, deeply and sincerely realizing your unworthiness. And most importantly, bring to God not the contents of your stomach, but the contents of your heart. And for the future, of course, we must strive to fulfill the commandments of the Church, including fasting.
During communion, the priest in our church reprimanded me for not coming to communion during fasting days, but coming at Pascha. What is the difference between communion in the Easter service and "simple" Sunday?
You need to ask your father for this. For even the canons of the Church welcome Communion not only at Pascha, but throughout the entire Bright Week. No priest has the right to forbid a person to take communion at any liturgy, if there are no canonical obstacles to doing so.
Communion of the elderly and sick people, pregnant women, nursing mothers
How to Approach Communion for the Elderly at Home?
It is advisable to invite a priest to sick people at least during Great Lent. Will not interfere with other posts. Necessarily during an exacerbation of the disease, especially if it is clear that the case is coming to an end, without waiting for the patient to fall into unconsciousness, his swallowing reflex will disappear or he will vomit. He must be in a sober mind and memory.
My mother-in-law recently passed away. I offered to invite the priest home for confession and communion. Something was stopping her. Now she is not always conscious. Please advise what to do.
The Church accepts the conscious choice of a person, without violating his will. If a person, being in memory, wanted to start the sacraments of the Church, but for some reason did not do this, then in case of clouding of the mind, remembering his desire and consent, you can still make such a compromise as communion and unction (this is how we commune infants or insane). But if a person, being in his right mind, did not want to accept the sacraments of the Church, then even in the event of a loss of consciousness, the Church does not force the choice of this person and cannot receive communion or unction. Alas, it is his choice. Such cases are considered by the confessor, directly communicating with the patient and his relatives, after which the final decision is made. In general, of course, it is best to find out your relationship with God in a conscious and adequate state.
I am diabetic. Can I take communion if I take a pill in the morning and eat?
In principle, it is possible, but if you wish, you can limit yourself to a pill, take communion at the first services, which end in the early morning. Then eat healthy. If it’s impossible without food for health reasons, then stipulate this at confession and take communion.
I have a thyroid disease, I can't go to church without drinking water and eating. If I go on an empty stomach, it will become bad. I live in the provinces, the priests are strict. Does that mean I can't take communion?
If it is required for medical reasons, there are no prohibitions. In the end, the Lord does not look into the stomach, but into the heart of a person, and any literate, sane priest should understand this very well.
For several weeks now I have not been able to take communion due to bleeding. What to do?
Such a period can no longer be called an ordinary female cycle. Therefore, it is already a disease. And there are women who have similar phenomena for months. In addition, and not necessarily for this reason, but for some other reason, during such a phenomenon, the death of a woman may also occur. Therefore, even the rule of Timothy of Alexandria, which forbids a woman from communion during "women's days", nevertheless, for the sake of fear of a mortal (threat to life), allows communion. There is such an episode in the Gospel when a woman suffering from bleeding for 12 years, desiring healing, touched the robes of Christ. The Lord did not condemn her, but on the contrary, she received recovery. Considering all of the above, a wise confessor will bless you to take communion. It is quite possible that after such a Medicine you will be healed of a bodily ailment.
Does the preparation for confession and communion differ for pregnant women?
For military people participating in hostilities, the service life is considered as a year for three. And during the Great Patriotic War in Soviet army soldiers were even given front-line 100 grams, although in peacetime vodka and the army were incompatible. For a pregnant woman, the time of bearing a child is also “ war time”, and the Holy Fathers understood this very well when they allowed pregnant and lactating women to relax in fasting and prayer. Pregnant women can still be compared with sick women - toxicosis, etc. And the rules of the church (the 29th canon of the holy apostles) for the sick are also allowed to relax the fast, up to its complete abolition. In general, every pregnant woman, according to her own conscience, based on the state of her health, determines the measure of fasting and prayer herself. I would recommend taking communion as often as possible during pregnancy. Prayer rule communion can be performed while sitting. You can also sit in the temple, you can not come to the beginning of the service.
General questions about the sacrament
In recent years, after the Sunday Liturgy, I begin to have severe headaches, especially on the days of Communion. With what it can be connected?
Such cases in various variations are quite common. Look at all this as a temptation in a good deed and, of course, continue to go to church for services without succumbing to these temptations.
How often can you take communion? Is it necessary to read all the canons before communion, observe fasting and go to confession?
The purpose of the Divine Liturgy is the communion of believers, that is, bread and wine are turned into the Body and Blood of Christ in order to be eaten by people, and not just by the serving priest. In ancient times, a person who was at the liturgy and did not take communion was then obliged to give an explanation to the priest why he did not. At the end of each liturgy, the priest, appearing in the Royal Doors with the Chalice, says: "Come with the fear of God and faith." If a person takes communion once a year, then he needs both a preliminary weekly fast in food and canons with prayers, and if a person observes all four major fasts, fasts every Wednesday and Friday, then he can take communion without an additional fast, fasting with the so-called Eucharistic fast , i.e. take communion on an empty stomach. As for the rule for communion, we must realize that it is given in order to arouse repentant feelings in us. If we often take communion and we have this feeling of repentance and it is difficult for us to read the rule before each communion, then we can omit the canons, but it is advisable to read the prayers for communion after all. At the same time, one must remember the words of St. Ephraim the Syrian: “I am afraid to take communion, realizing my unworthiness, but even more so - to be left without communion.”
Is it possible to receive communion on Sunday if you were not at the all-night vigil on Saturday because of obedience to your parents? Is it a sin not to go to the service on Sunday if relatives need help?
To such a question, the conscience of a person will give the best answer: was there really no other way out not to go to the service, or is this a reason to skip prayer on Sunday? In general, of course, it is desirable for an Orthodox person, according to the commandment of God, to attend worship every Sunday. Before Sunday afternoon, it is generally desirable to be at the Saturday evening service, and especially before Communion. But if for some reason it was not possible to be in the service, and the soul longs for communion, then, realizing one’s unworthiness, one can take communion with the blessing of the confessor.
Is it possible to take communion on a weekday, i.e., after communion go to work?
It is possible, at the same time, to protect the purity of your heart as much as possible.
How many days after communion do not bow and bow to the ground?
If the liturgical charter (during Great Lent) prescribes bowing to the ground, then starting from the evening service, they can and should be laid. And if the charter does not provide for bows, then on the day of communion only bows are performed from the waist.
I want to take communion, but the day of communion falls on the anniversary of the pope. How to congratulate the father, so as not to offend?
For the sake of peace and love, you can congratulate your father, but do not stay long at the holiday so as not to “spill” the grace of the sacrament.
Batiushka refused me communion because my eyes were tinted. Is he right?
Probably, the priest thought that you are already a mature enough Christian to realize that people go to church not to emphasize the beauty of their bodies, but to heal their souls. But if a beginner has come, then under such a pretext it is impossible to deprive him of communion, so as not to forever scare him away from the Church.
Is it possible, having received communion, to receive a blessing from God for some work? Successful job interview, IVF procedure...
People take communion for the healing of soul and body, expecting to receive some kind of help and God's blessing through the sacrament in good deeds. And IVF, according to church teaching, is a sinful and unacceptable business. Therefore, you can take communion, but this does not mean at all that this sacrament will help in the unpleasing work you have planned. The sacrament cannot automatically guarantee the fulfillment of our requests. But if we generally try to lead a Christian way of life, then, of course, the Lord will help us, including in earthly matters.
My husband and I go to confession and communion in different churches. How important is it for spouses to partake of the same Chalice?
No matter what Orthodox canonical church we partake of, anyway, by and large, we all partake from the same Chalice, consuming the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. From this it follows that it is absolutely unimportant whether spouses commune in the same church or in different ones, for the Body and Blood of the Savior are the same everywhere.
Prohibitions for communion
Can I go to communion without reconciliation, for which I have neither the strength nor the desire?
In the prayers before communion there is a kind of announcement: “Although eat, man, the Body of the Lady, first reconcile thee to those who grieve.” That is, without reconciliation, a priest cannot allow a person to take communion, and if a person decides to take communion arbitrarily, then he will take communion in condemnation.
Is it possible to receive communion after desecration?
It is impossible, it is only allowed to taste the prosphora.
Can I take communion if I live in an unmarried civil marriage and confessed my sins on the eve of communion? I intend to continue such a relationship, I'm afraid, otherwise my beloved will not understand me.
It is important for a believer to be understood by God. And God will not understand us, seeing that the opinion of people is more important for us. God wrote to us that fornicators do not inherit the Kingdom of God, and according to the canons of the Church, such a sin excommunicates a person from communion for many years, even if he reforms. And the cohabitation of a man and a woman without a signature in the registry office is called fornication, this is not a marriage. People living in such "marriages" and taking advantage of the indulgence and kindness of the confessor, in fact, really set them up before God, because the priest has to take on their sin if he allows them to take communion. Unfortunately, this messy sex life has become the norm of our time, and the shepherds no longer know where to go, what to do with such flocks. Therefore, take pity on your fathers (this is an appeal to all such prodigal cohabitants) and legitimize your relationship at least in the registry office, and if you mature, then receive a blessing for marriage and through the sacrament of the wedding. You have to make a choice what is more important for you: the eternal destiny of your soul or temporary bodily comforts. After all, even confession without the intention to improve in advance is hypocritical and resembles a trip to the hospital without a desire to be treated. To admit you to communion or not, let your confessor decide.
The priest imposed a penance on me and excommunicated me from communion for three months, because I had an affair with a man. Can I confess to another priest and, with his permission, receive communion?
For fornication (intimacy outside of marriage), according to the rules of the Church, a person can be excommunicated from communion not for three months, but for several years. You do not have the right to cancel the penance imposed by another priest.
My aunt told fortunes on the nut, then she confessed. The priest forbade her to take communion for three years! How should she be?
According to the canons of the Church, for such actions (in fact, classes in the occult), a person is excommunicated from communion for several years. So everything that the priest you mentioned has done is within his competence. But, seeing sincere repentance and a desire not to repeat anything like this again, he has the right to shorten the period of penance (punishment).
I have not yet completely got rid of sympathy for Baptism, but I want to go to confession and take communion. Or wait until I am completely sure of the truth of Orthodoxy?
Whoever doubts the truth of Orthodoxy cannot proceed to the sacraments. So try to fully assert yourself. For the Gospel says that “according to your faith it will be given to you,” and not according to formal participation in the sacraments and rites of the church.
Communion and other sacraments of the Church
I was invited to be the godmother of the child. How long before baptism should I take communion?
These are not interconnected ordinances. In principle, you must take communion constantly. And before baptism, think more about how to be a worthy godmother, who cares about the Orthodox upbringing of the baptized.
Is it necessary to confess and receive communion before the unction?
In principle, these are unrelated sacraments. But since it is believed that unrecognized sins that are the cause of human illnesses are forgiven in unction, there is a tradition that we repent of those sins that we remember and know, and then we unify.
Superstitions about the sacrament of communion
Is it permissible to eat meat on the day of communion?
A person, when going to see a doctor, takes a shower, changes his underwear... Similarly, an Orthodox Christian, preparing for Communion, fasts, reads the rules, comes to Divine Services more often, and after Communion, if it is not a fast day, you can eat any food , including meat.
I heard that on the day of communion you can not spit anything and kiss anyone.
On the day of communion, any person takes food and does it with a spoon. That is, in fact, and, oddly enough, licking a spoon many times while eating, a person does not eat it with food :). Many are afraid to kiss the cross or icons after communion, but they “kiss” the spoon. I think you already understand that all the actions that you mentioned can be done after drinking the sacrament.
Recently, in one of the churches, the priest instructed confessors before communion: “Do not dare to come to communion, those who brushed their teeth or chewed gum this morning.”
I also brush my teeth before work. You don't really need to chew gum. When we brush our teeth, we take care not only of ourselves, but also that others around us do not hear an unpleasant smell from our breath.
I always go to communion with a bag. The temple worker told her to leave. I got annoyed, left my bag and, in a state of anger, took communion. Is it possible to approach the Chalice with a bag?
Probably the devil sent that grandmother. After all, the Lord does not care what we have in our hands when we approach the Holy Chalice, for He looks into the heart of a person. However, there was no point in getting angry. Repent of this in confession.
Is it possible to contract some kind of disease after communion? In the temple where I went, it was required not to lick the spoon, the priest himself threw a piece into his wide open mouth. In another temple, they corrected me that I was taking the sacrament incorrectly. But it's very dangerous!
At the end of the service, the priest or deacon consumes (finishes) the sacrament left in the Chalice. And this despite the fact that in the vast majority of cases (what you wrote, I generally hear for the first time that a priest “loads” the sacrament into his mouth, like an excavator), people take communion by taking the sacrament with their lips and touching a liar (spoon). I myself have been using the remaining Gifts for more than 30 years, and neither I nor any of the other priests have ever infectious diseases didn't get sick after that. Going to the Cup, we must understand that this is a Sacrament, and not an ordinary plate of food from which many people eat. Communion is not ordinary food, it is the Body and Blood of Christ, which, in fact, cannot initially be sources of infection, just as icons and holy relics cannot be the same source.
My relative says that communion on the day of the feast of St. Sergius of Radonezh is equal to 40 communions. Can the Sacrament of Communion be stronger on one day than on another?
Communion for any Divine Liturgy has the same power and meaning. And in this case there can be no arithmetic. The one who receives the Mysteries of Christ should always be equally aware of his unworthiness and be grateful to God for allowing him to take communion.
Why come to all-night vigil? Can this service be skipped? What about those who don't have time?
Every Christian tries to get to the temple every Sunday. And if he fails for some reason, he realizes that this is not in the order of things. And what about the all-night vigil?
Is it necessary to attend the evening service? After all, you can confess right during the liturgy. Or should the presence at the All-Night Vigil be as obligatory for the faithful as the presence at the Liturgy?
Our sacrifice to God
Archpriest Igor Fomin
Archpriest Igor Fomin, rector of the Church of St. Alexander Nevsky at MGIMO (Moscow):
The liturgical day is the totality of all divine services of the daily circle, the crown of which is the liturgy.
Why is it so difficult to pray at the All-Night Vigil and so easy at the Liturgy? Because the all-night vigil is our sacrifice to God, when we sacrifice our time, some external circumstances to Him. And the liturgy is God's sacrifice to us. And it is often much easier to take it. But strangely enough, the degree of acceptance of this sacrifice from God depends on how much we are ready to sacrifice to Him.
The All-Night Vigil is formally an obligatory service before Communion.
The whole structure of worship reminds us of the events of the divine world order, it should make us better, set us up for the sacrifice that Christ prepares for us at Holy Communion.
But there are various circumstances under which a person cannot get to the vigil: a grumpy wife, a jealous husband, urgent work, and so on. And these are the reasons that can justify a person. But if he is not present at the all-night vigil because he is watching the football championship or his favorite series (note that I am not talking about guests here - after all, this is a little different), then the person is probably sinning internally. And not before the church charter, not even before God. He's just stealing from himself.
In general, it is impossible to rob a Church, a temple, even if you take out all the icons and some material values. Spiritual world This is not a bank or a shop. You will not harm the Church with your unworthy behavior. But for you, the internal consequences of this are disastrous.
Everyone should think for himself. If he has the opportunity to attend the all-night vigil, then he must do so. If this is not possible, then it is worth considering: how can I worthily spend this evening before communion in order to prepare for the reception of Christ's holy Mysteries. Maybe you should not watch TV, but should focus on spiritual reflection?
If a person wants to take communion every Sunday and worries if he will also be in church every Saturday and be left without days off, without rest, the question arises - why should he take communion every Sunday?
The Lord says, “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matt. 6:21). If your treasure is in the cinema, at the TV, at the stadium - postpone the sacrament until better times: for a week, for a month, for a year.
Motivation that drives a person is very important here. If you are used to taking communion every Sunday, and this does not change you spiritually, does not transform you, then why do you need it?
Maybe then take a measure of frequency, which is in the church charter: communion - once every three weeks. The time for preparing for communion in the charter is defined as follows: a week - you prepare, fast on dry food, read prayers. Then you take communion, internally keep what you have received for a week, rest for a week and prepare again. There is an option when everyone discusses the form of preparation for communion with their confessor.
If a person sets himself a certain schedule for communion, that's good. Only then should he treat this sacrament accordingly.
Not only debt...
Archpriest Alexander Ilyashenko
Archpriest Alexander Ilyashenko, rector of the Church of the All-Merciful Savior in the former Sorrowful Monastery (Moscow):
First of all, it is necessary to say about the beauty of the all-night vigil, its content, its spiritual and actual saturation: the service reveals the history of the holiday, and its meaning and meaning.
But since, as a rule, people do not understand what is read and sung in church, they simply do not perceive much.
It is surprising that the Russian Orthodox Church has preserved in its entirety a very complex, thoughtful service. For example, in Greece there is no such thing in the parishes. They adjusted to modern life and this is justified in its own way. There is no evening service, Vespers is not served, the morning begins with Matins.
We serve both Vespers and Matins in the evening. This is a kind of convention, but it is well thought out, and those who made the decision about just such a course of worship understood the charter better than we did and decided that it would be more correct to remain faithful to the tradition.
Greece made a different decision. Matins is served there, as a rule, according to one type. We have an all-night vigil - solemn, bright, colorful, during which many hymns are sung. In Greece - more monotonous, but quickly. The entire service, including the liturgy, takes about two hours. But this is precisely in parish churches.
In the monasteries, and even more so on Mount Athos, the charter is preserved in all severity. The All-Night Vigil goes on throughout the night.
We do not, and this is also a kind of convention, a kind of reduction. But those who developed it, made the decision to reduce it based on certain circumstances, they still wanted to preserve the beauty of Orthodox worship for the laity.
But here a difficulty arises - we live in the 21st century: busy, long distances, people get tired, the environment is terrible, health, or rather, ill health, corresponds to it. Although I think that the peasants, who worked tirelessly from morning to evening in the summer, were physically tired more than ours. But still, they had enough strength to finish the working day earlier on Saturday, wash in the bathhouse and go to the church for the vigil, and in the morning for the liturgy.
It may be that in some ways it is more difficult for us than for our recent ancestors, physically we are much weaker. But, nevertheless, we urge not to hide behind our weaknesses, but to find strength and go to the all-night vigil, especially those who want to take communion. So that they can confess on the eve of the liturgy, without taking up the time of the Sunday service.
But if people have small children who have no one to leave with, or there are some other objective reasons, you won’t tell them: “If you weren’t at the all-night vigil, then you won’t take communion.” Although someone can say so: if a person showed precisely sloppiness, laziness, relaxation ...
It is important to strive to ensure that our parishioners love the worship of our Church and consider it not only a duty, but also a joy to be present in the temple.
B 
without "social protection"
Archpriest Alexy Uminsky
Archpriest Alexy Uminsky, Rector of the Church of the Life-Giving Trinity in Khokhly (Moscow):
There is a certain circle of divine services, and the all-night vigil is a necessary part of the Sunday service. But there are circumstances certain level when a person is unable to go to the vigil. But he can go to the Liturgy and partake of the Holy Mysteries of Christ.
It is quite a common practice of services in our Russian Orthodox churches abroad that the majority of parishioners living in different cities come only for Sunday services. Therefore, in most cases, only Sunday liturgy exists in churches.
This is also due to the fact that if the priest serves not only the liturgy, but also adds to it, say, matins, then the service will be performed for about four hours. This is not only hard to understand, but also related to transport schedules, parking fees…
But the fact that only the liturgy is served is not an obstacle for parishioners who come to take communion to receive the holy Mysteries of Christ.
But if a person has the opportunity to attend the All-Night Vigil, and simply out of laziness, out of negligence, does not want to go, then this can become an obstacle to communion.
Yes, it turns out that the temple "occupies" both weekends of an ordinary person working five days a week. But only those living in the XX, XXI centuries used to things like two days off. Previously, people did not have such social protection". They worked for six days, and devoted the seventh to the Lord God.
The question is not whether it is possible to lie on the couch instead of the vigil. Here the answer is clear. Another thing is that people can have quite justified family concerns. In the end, it is at this time that the ordered furniture from the store should be brought. Or - they invited a person dear to the whole family to the anniversary. If we have spent this jubilee godly, why should it be an obstacle to communion?
But this doesn't happen every Saturday. But simply deciding that the all-night vigil is an optional thing, and I will not go to it, is wrong.
Oksana Golovko