DO NOT TELL LIES!
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[01:13 pm] 23 February, 2009
Today marks the Great Lent, the period starting from the day following
the Great Barekendan and lasting till the Feast of the Glorious
Resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ.
In the period of the Great Lent, people, refraining from bodily
pleasures and sins, get prepared for the Feast of the Glorious
Resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ by means of abstinence and
repentance. Both spiritual and moral and bodily abstinence are
considered to be important.
This period of the Great Lent is also called "Salt and bread", as in
the past during the period of the Great Lent people have eaten only
salt and bread.
In the New and old Testaments there are many testimonies concerning
the period of Great Lent. Moses fasted for forty days and only then
received the Lord’s rules and canons. However, this period is related
to 40-day period of temptation of Christ in the desert, following
which our Church fathers established this period of fasting.
Fasting may be of three kinds: usual fasting, rigorous abstinence and
absolute fasting. In case of usual fasting people can eat only food
of vegetable origin. In case of rigorous fasting people refuse to eat
any food even of vegetable origin. And in case of absolute fasting
people refuse to eat any kind of food, including even bread and water.
It is also recommended that people give up their bad habits: loquacity,
deceitfulness, bad language, etc.
During the period of the Great Lent curtains in the churches are closed
in commemoration of the fact that after sinning Adam was exiled from
Eden and the doors were closed before him.