December 19, 2025

Events of the day

• St Nicholas the Wonderworker, Archbishop of Myra in Lycia

  Polyeleos rank

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

• Vespers

  Composite reading — Proverbs 10, 3, 8

• Vespers

  Proverbs 10:31–11:12

• Vespers

  Wisdom of Solomon 4:7–15

• Matins Gospel

  John 10:9–16

  Show the text

  ⁹I am the door. If anyone enters in by me, he will be saved, and will go in and go out, and will find pasture.

  ¹⁰The thief only comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I came that they may have life, and may have it abundantly.

  ¹¹I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

  ¹²He who is a hired hand, and not a shepherd, who doesn’t own the sheep, sees the wolf coming, leaves the sheep, and flees. The wolf snatches the sheep, and scatters them.

  ¹³The hired hand flees because he is a hired hand, and doesn’t care for the sheep.

  ¹⁴I am the good shepherd. I know my own, and I’m known by my own;

  ¹⁵even as the Father knows me, and I know the Father. I lay down my life for the sheep.

  ¹⁶I have other sheep, which are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will hear my voice. They will become one flock with one shepherd.

• Epistle

  Titus 1:15–2:10

  Show the text

  ¹⁵To the pure, all things are pure; but to those who are defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure; but both their mind and their conscience are defiled.

  ¹⁶They profess that they know God, but by their deeds they deny him, being abominable, disobedient, and unfit for any good work.

  ¹But say the things which fit sound doctrine,

  ²that older men should be temperate, sensible, sober minded, sound in faith, in love, and in perseverance:

  ³and that older women likewise be reverent in behavior, not slanderers nor enslaved to much wine, teachers of that which is good,

  ⁴that they may train the young wives to love their husbands, to love their children,

  ⁵to be sober minded, chaste, workers at home, kind, being in subjection to their own husbands, that God’s word may not be blasphemed.

  ⁶Likewise, exhort the younger men to be sober minded.

  ⁷In all things be showing yourself an example of good works. In your teaching, be showing integrity, seriousness, incorruptibility,

  ⁸and soundness of speech that can’t be condemned, that he who opposes you may be ashamed, having no evil thing to say about us.

  ⁹Exhort servants to be in subjection to their own masters and to be well-pleasing in all things, not contradicting,

  ¹⁰not stealing, but showing all good fidelity, that they may adorn the doctrine of God, our Savior, in all things.

• Epistle · St Nicholas

  Hebrews 13:17–21

  Show the text

  ¹⁷Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they watch on behalf of your souls, as those who will give account, that they may do this with joy, and not with groaning, for that would be unprofitable for you.

  ¹⁸Pray for us, for we are persuaded that we have a good conscience, desiring to live honorably in all things.

  ¹⁹I strongly urge you to do this, that I may be restored to you sooner.

  ²⁰Now may the God of peace, who brought again from the dead the great shepherd of the sheep with the blood of an eternal covenant, our Lord Jesus,

  ²¹make you complete in every good work to do his will, working in you that which is well pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

• Gospel

  Luke 21:37–22:8

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  ³⁷Every day Jesus was teaching in the temple, and every night he would go out and spend the night on the mountain that is called Olivet.

  ³⁸All the people came early in the morning to him in the temple to hear him.

  ¹Now the feast of unleavened bread, which is called the Passover, was approaching.

  ²The chief priests and the scribes sought how they might put him to death, for they feared the people.

  ³Satan entered into Judas, who was also called Iscariot, who was counted with the twelve.

  ⁴He went away, and talked with the chief priests and captains about how he might deliver him to them.

  ⁵They were glad, and agreed to give him money.

  ⁶He consented, and sought an opportunity to deliver him to them in the absence of the multitude.

  ⁷The day of unleavened bread came, on which the Passover must be sacrificed.

  ⁸Jesus sent Peter and John, saying, “Go and prepare the Passover for us, that we may eat.”

• Gospel · St Nicholas

  Luke 6:17–23

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  ¹⁷He came down with them, and stood on a level place, with a crowd of his disciples, and a great number of the people from all Judea and Jerusalem, and the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, who came to hear him and to be healed of their diseases;

  ¹⁸as well as those who were troubled by unclean spirits, and they were being healed.

  ¹⁹All the multitude sought to touch him, for power came out of him and healed them all.

  ²⁰He lifted up his eyes to his disciples, and said, “Blessed are you who are poor, God’s Kingdom is yours.

  ²¹Blessed are you who hunger now, for you will be filled. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh.

  ²²Blessed are you when men hate you, and when they exclude and mock you, and throw out your name as evil, for the Son of Man’s sake.

  ²³Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven, for their fathers did the same thing to the prophets.

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

Saints and icons

• St Nicholas the Wonderworker, Archbishop of Myra in Lycia
• Prayer of the day: Troparion of St Nicholas