September 14, 2026

Events of the day

• Exaltation of the Precious and Life-giving Cross

  Twelve Great Feast

  Commemorates the finding of the Lord's Cross by the holy Empress Helena in Jerusalem (4th century). A strict fast day.

Fasting

Fast day · Exaltation of the Cross

Exaltation of the Cross: strict fast, food with oil.

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

• Vespers

  Exodus 15:22–16:1

• Vespers

  Proverbs 3:11–18

• Vespers

  Isaiah 60:11–16

• Matins Gospel

  John 12:28–36

  Show the text

  ²⁸Father, glorify your name!” Then a voice came out of the sky, saying, “I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again.”

  ²⁹Therefore the multitude who stood by and heard it said that it had thundered. Others said, “An angel has spoken to him.”

  ³⁰Jesus answered, “This voice hasn’t come for my sake, but for your sakes.

  ³¹Now is the judgment of this world. Now the prince of this world will be cast out.

  ³²And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.”

  ³³But he said this, signifying by what kind of death he should die.

  ³⁴The multitude answered him, “We have heard out of the law that the Christ remains forever. How do you say, ‘The Son of Man must be lifted up?’ Who is this Son of Man?”

  ³⁵Jesus therefore said to them, “Yet a little while the light is with you. Walk while you have the light, that darkness doesn’t overtake you. He who walks in the darkness doesn’t know where he is going.

  ³⁶While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become children of light.” Jesus said these things, and he departed and hid himself from them.

• Epistle · Elevation

  1 Corinthians 1:18–24

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  ¹⁸For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are dying, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.

  ¹⁹For it is written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise. I will bring the discernment of the discerning to nothing.”

  ²⁰Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the lawyer of this world? Hasn’t God made foolish the wisdom of this world?

  ²¹For seeing that in the wisdom of God, the world through its wisdom didn’t know God, it was God’s good pleasure through the foolishness of the preaching to save those who believe.

  ²²For Jews ask for signs, Greeks seek after wisdom,

  ²³but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews, and foolishness to Greeks,

  ²⁴but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God;

• Epistle

  Galatians 4:28–5:10

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  ²⁸Now we, brothers, as Isaac was, are children of promise.

  ²⁹But as then, he who was born according to the flesh persecuted him who was born according to the Spirit, so also it is now.

  ³⁰However what does the Scripture say? “Throw out the servant and her son, for the son of the servant will not inherit with the son of the free woman.”

  ³¹So then, brothers, we are not children of a servant, but of the free woman.

  ¹Stand firm therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and don’t be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.

  ²Behold, I, Paul, tell you that if you receive circumcision, Christ will profit you nothing.

  ³Yes, I testify again to every man who receives circumcision that he is a debtor to do the whole law.

  ⁴You are alienated from Christ, you who desire to be justified by the law. You have fallen away from grace.

  ⁵For we, through the Spirit, by faith wait for the hope of righteousness.

  ⁶For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision amounts to anything, nor uncircumcision, but faith working through love.

  ⁷You were running well! Who interfered with you that you should not obey the truth?

  ⁸This persuasion is not from him who calls you.

  ⁹A little yeast grows through the whole lump.

  ¹⁰I have confidence toward you in the Lord that you will think no other way. But he who troubles you will bear his judgment, whoever he is.

• Gospel · Elevation

  John 19:6–11, 13–20, 25–28, 30–35

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  ⁶When therefore the chief priests and the officers saw him, they shouted, saying, “Crucify! Crucify!” Pilate said to them, “Take him yourselves, and crucify him, for I find no basis for a charge against him.”

  ⁷The Jews answered him, “We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God.”

  ⁸When therefore Pilate heard this saying, he was more afraid.

  ⁹He entered into the Praetorium again, and said to Jesus, “Where are you from?” But Jesus gave him no answer.

  ¹⁰Pilate therefore said to him, “Aren’t you speaking to me? Don’t you know that I have power to release you and have power to crucify you?”

  ¹¹Jesus answered, “You would have no power at all against me, unless it were given to you from above. Therefore he who delivered me to you has greater sin.”

  ¹³When Pilate therefore heard these words, he brought Jesus out and sat down on the judgment seat at a place called “The Pavement”, but in Hebrew, “Gabbatha.”

  ¹⁴Now it was the Preparation Day of the Passover, at about the sixth hour. He said to the Jews, “Behold, your King!”

  ¹⁵They cried out, “Away with him! Away with him! Crucify him!” Pilate said to them, “Shall I crucify your King?” The chief priests answered, “We have no king but Caesar!”

  ¹⁶So then he delivered him to them to be crucified. So they took Jesus and led him away.

  ¹⁷He went out, bearing his cross, to the place called “The Place of a Skull”, which is called in Hebrew, “Golgotha”,

  ¹⁸where they crucified him, and with him two others, on either side one, and Jesus in the middle.

  ¹⁹Pilate wrote a title also, and put it on the cross. There was written, “JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS.”

  ²⁰Therefore many of the Jews read this title, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, in Latin, and in Greek.

  ²⁵But standing by Jesus’ cross were his mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene.

  ²⁶Therefore when Jesus saw his mother, and the disciple whom he loved standing there, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son!”

  ²⁷Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother!” From that hour, the disciple took her to his own home.

  ²⁸After this, Jesus, seeing that all things were now finished, that the Scripture might be fulfilled, said, “I am thirsty.”

  ³⁰When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, “It is finished.” He bowed his head, and gave up his spirit.

  ³¹Therefore the Jews, because it was the Preparation Day, so that the bodies wouldn’t remain on the cross on the Sabbath (for that Sabbath was a special one), asked of Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.

  ³²Therefore the soldiers came, and broke the legs of the first, and of the other who was crucified with him;

  ³³but when they came to Jesus, and saw that he was already dead, they didn’t break his legs.

  ³⁴However one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and immediately blood and water came out.

  ³⁵He who has seen has testified, and his testimony is true. He knows that he tells the truth, that you may believe.

• Gospel

  Mark 6:54–7:8

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  ⁵⁴When they had come out of the boat, immediately the people recognized him,

  ⁵⁵and ran around that whole region, and began to bring those who were sick, on their mats, to where they heard he was.

  ⁵⁶Wherever he entered, into villages, or into cities, or into the country, they laid the sick in the marketplaces, and begged him that they might just touch the fringe of his garment; and as many as touched him were made well.

  ¹Then the Pharisees and some of the scribes gathered together to him, having come from Jerusalem.

  ²Now when they saw some of his disciples eating bread with defiled, that is unwashed, hands, they found fault.

  ³(For the Pharisees and all the Jews don’t eat unless they wash their hands and forearms, holding to the tradition of the elders.

  ⁴They don’t eat when they come from the marketplace unless they bathe themselves, and there are many other things, which they have received to hold to: washings of cups, pitchers, bronze vessels, and couches.)

  ⁵The Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why don’t your disciples walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat their bread with unwashed hands?”

  ⁶He answered them, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written, ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.

  ⁷But they worship me in vain, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’

  ⁸“For you set aside the commandment of God, and hold tightly to the tradition of men—the washing of pitchers and cups, and you do many other such things.”

Source: Orthocal: lectionary data — Slavic tradition, New Calendar (OCA practice). Text: World English Bible.