December 2, 2024

Events of the day

• Prophet Obadiah; Martyr Barlaam; Sts Barlaam and Ioasaph, Prince of India

  Commemoration

Fasting

Fast day · Nativity Fast

Nativity Fast, Monday: cooked food without oil.

• Meat: not allowed
• Dairy & eggs: not allowed
• Fish: not allowed
• Oil: not allowed
• Wine: not allowed

Food rules are reference church information. Agree your personal measure of fasting with a priest; consult a doctor if you are ill.

Readings of the day

• Epistle

  1 Thessalonians 2:20–3:8

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  ²⁰For you are our glory and our joy.

  ¹Therefore when we couldn’t stand it any longer, we thought it good to be left behind at Athens alone,

  ²and sent Timothy, our brother and God’s servant in the Good News of Christ, to establish you, and to comfort you concerning your faith,

  ³that no one would be moved by these afflictions. For you know that we are appointed to this task.

  ⁴For most certainly, when we were with you, we told you beforehand that we are to suffer affliction, even as it happened, and you know.

  ⁵For this cause I also, when I couldn’t stand it any longer, sent that I might know your faith, for fear that by any means the tempter had tempted you, and our labor would have been in vain.

  ⁶But when Timothy came just now to us from you, and brought us glad news of your faith and love, and that you have good memories of us always, longing to see us, even as we also long to see you,

  ⁷for this cause, brothers, we were comforted over you in all our distress and affliction through your faith.

  ⁸For now we live, if you stand fast in the Lord.

• Gospel

  Luke 17:20–25

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  ²⁰Being asked by the Pharisees when God’s Kingdom would come, he answered them, “God’s Kingdom doesn’t come with observation;

  ²¹neither will they say, ‘Look, here!’ or, ‘Look, there!’ for behold, God’s Kingdom is within you.”

  ²²He said to the disciples, “The days will come when you will desire to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and you will not see it.

  ²³They will tell you, ‘Look, here!’ or ‘Look, there!’ Don’t go away or follow after them,

  ²⁴for as the lightning, when it flashes out of one part under the sky, shines to another part under the sky; so will the Son of Man be in his day.

  ²⁵But first, he must suffer many things and be rejected by this generation.

Source: Orthocal: lectionary data — Slavic tradition, Julian calendar. Text: World English Bible.

Saints and icons

• Prayer of the day: Morning prayer of St Macarius the Great