December 11, 2024

Events of the day

• Monk-martyr Stephen the New; Martyr Irenarchus

  Commemoration

Fasting

Fast day · Nativity Fast

Nativity Fast, Wednesday and Friday: xerophagy.

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

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

  2 Thessalonians 2:1–12

  Show the text

  ¹Now, brothers, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to him, we ask you

  ²not to be quickly shaken in your mind, and not be troubled, either by spirit, or by word, or by letter as if from us, saying that the day of Christ has already come.

  ³Let no one deceive you in any way. For it will not be, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of destruction,

  ⁴he who opposes and exalts himself against all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, setting himself up as God.

  ⁵Don’t you remember that, when I was still with you, I told you these things?

  ⁶Now you know what is restraining him, to the end that he may be revealed in his own season.

  ⁷For the mystery of lawlessness already works. Only there is one who restrains now, until he is taken out of the way.

  ⁸Then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will kill with the breath of his mouth, and destroy by the manifestation of his coming;

  ⁹even he whose coming is according to the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders,

  ¹⁰and with all deception of wickedness for those who are being lost, because they didn’t receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved.

  ¹¹Because of this, God sends them a working of error, that they should believe a lie;

  ¹²that they all might be judged who didn’t believe the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

• Gospel

  Luke 20:1–8

  Show the text

  ¹On one of those days, as he was teaching the people in the temple and preaching the Good News, the priests and scribes came to him with the elders.

  ²They asked him, “Tell us: by what authority do you do these things? Or who is giving you this authority?”

  ³He answered them, “I also will ask you one question. Tell me:

  ⁴the baptism of John, was it from heaven, or from men?”

  ⁵They reasoned with themselves, saying, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will say, ‘Why didn’t you believe him?’

  ⁶But if we say, ‘From men,’ all the people will stone us, for they are persuaded that John was a prophet.”

  ⁷They answered that they didn’t know where it was from.

  ⁸Jesus said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.”

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

Saints and icons

• Prayer of the day: The Trisagion