Eve of Apostles’ (Peter & Paul) Fast
Monday is the beginning of the Apostles’ Fast. The Church has given us two weapons–prayer and fasting– in our battle against the demonic powers, yet the temptation to set aside fasting, especially during a time of year when many like to BBQ steaks or hot dogs on the grill, becomes a temptation to cast aside one of these weapons meant for our spiritual benefit. To cast aside such a weapon would be foolish. What soldier who knows only two weapons work against a particular enemy would throw one away?
The Church has established fasting periods that actually total up to about half of the year, averaging about 180 days. Each of the seasons has its particular fasting period: the winter fast before Christmas; the spring fast of Great Lent; the summer Apostles fast; and the fall Dormition fast. Throughout the rest of the year, two more days a week–Wednesday and Friday–are assigned to fasting, with individual special fast days connected with feasts, as well, such as the Eve of Theophany, the Beheading of St. John the Baptist, and the Elevation of the Holy Cross.
Apart from being a spiritual discipline, fasting is also very healthy. Everyone should avoid meat and dairy products two days per week, in order to help keep animal fats and related cholesterol problems under control. Contemporary physicians are making no great discovery, of what the Church has known for thousands of years. The original commandment that God gave to our ancestors Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden was a fasting commandment: eat of the fruit of all the trees but this one. If the fall of mankind and the loss of paradise were the result of breaking a fasting commandment, we should probably not ignore the fasts.
With love in Christ,
Abbot Tryphon
Sunday June 23, 2019 / June 10, 2019
1st Sunday after Pentecost. All Saints. Tone eight.
Eve of Apostles’ (Peter & Paul) Fast.
Icons of the Mother of God “the Consoler of angry hearts” and “the Unbreakable Wall” (movable holiday on the Sunday of All Saints).
Hieromartyr Timothy, bishop of Prusa (362).
Finding of the relics (1609) of St. Basil, bishop of Ryazan (1295).
Synaxis of All Saints of Riazan.
St. John Maximovitch, Metropolitan of Tobolsk (1715).
Synaxis of All Saints of Siberia: St. Innocent, bishop of Irkutsk (1731); St. Macarius (Glukharev) of Altai (1847); St. Macarius (Nevsky), metropolitan of Moscow, apostle to Altai (1926); and others.
New Hieromartyr Nicholas, Basil priests and Martyr Paul (1918).
New Hieromartyr Timothy priest (1940).
St. Tamara the Confessor (1936) (Georgia).
Venerable Silvanus of the Far Caves in Kiev (14th c.).
Martyr Alexander and Virgin-martyr Antonina at Constantinople (313).
Venerable Theophanes, monk, of Antioch (363), and St. Pansemne, the former harlot of Antioch.
St. Bassian, bishop of Lodi in Lombardy (409).
St. Paul, metropolitan of Tobolsk (1770).
Hieromartyr Metrophanes, the first Chinese priest, and the Chinese New Martyrs of the Boxer Uprising, at Peking and other places in 1900.
Martyr Neaniscus the Wise of Alexandria (Greek).
St. Canides, monk, of Cappadocia (460) (Greek).
St. Apollo, bishop (Greek).
St. Alexius of Bithynia, bishop (Greek).
St. Asterius, bishop of Petra (4th c.).
The Scripture Readings
Matthew 28:16-20
The Great Commission
16 Then the eleven disciples went away into Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had appointed for them. 17 When they saw Him, they worshiped Him; but some doubted.
18 And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. 19 Go therefore andmake disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen.
Hebrews 11:33-12:2
33 who through faith subdued kingdoms, worked righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, 34 quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, became valiant in battle, turned to flight the armies of the aliens. 35 Women received their dead raised to life again.
Others were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection. 36 Still others had trial of mockings and scourgings, yes, and of chains and imprisonment. 37 They were stoned, they were sawn in two, were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented— 38 of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains, in dens and caves of the earth.
39 And all these, having obtained a good testimony through faith, did not receive the promise, 40 God having provided something better for us, that they should not be made perfect apart from us.
The Race of Faith
12 Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, 2 looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of ourfaith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Matthew 10:32-33
Confess Christ Before Men
32 “Therefore whoever confesses Me before men, him I will also confess before My Father who is in heaven. 33 But whoever denies Me before men, him I will also deny before My Father who is in heaven.
Matthew 10:37-38
37 He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. 38 And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me.
Matthew 19:27-30
27 Then Peter answered and said to Him, “See, we have left all and followed You. Therefore what shall we have?”
28 So Jesus said to them, “Assuredly I say to you, that in the regeneration, when the Son of Man sits on the throne of His glory, you who have followed Me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. 29 And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or lands, for My name’s sake, shall receive a hundredfold, and inherit eternal life. 30 But many who are first will be last, and the last first.