Here we are, the eve of the most special time of year - Great Lent. Today is Forgiveness Sunday, and also the day we prepare for tomorrow's beginning of Great Lent.
My preparation tonight consists of flipping my music to church music only. I have prepared my reading. The refrigerator is starting to look empty and ready for an abundance of fruits and vegetables (to come tomorrow). But most importantly, the soul... My soul feels in need of and ready for this time of prayer, repentance and spiritual labor. I cannot wait to attempt to empty myself of worldly things and take in the words of the Holy Fathers, listen to the beautiful words of spiritual music, read the Scriptures and focus on and remember what is truly important.
I am currently listening to the Forgiveness vespers service at the Sretensky monastery in Moscow...you can listen to any of their services (at any time) on their website.... They have the most beautiful singing! Once you are on their page, scroll down the page and you'll see on the right hand side a place to play their most recent church service. You can also play other services that they have recorded in the past if you click around a bit.
Getting back to Great Lent...
I've finalized my Lenten reading choices, and here they are.
The Psalter (actually, I have joined a Psalter Group for this Lent like I did for the Christmas fast...Being accountable for my reading each day makes it even more likely that I get to my reading each day)
This book, The Art of Salvation, is on its way in the mail to me, and should be arriving tomorrow. I cannot wait to read it, because I have heard it is incredible.
The Missionary Letters of Saint Nikolai Velimirovich. Except, I am reading Part 3 instead of Part 1 (the order of reading these does not really matter, and I couldn't find Parts 1 and 2 right now amongst our boxes).
The Spiritual Life by St. Theophan the Recluse. I have been actually reading this book for quite a while now, reading one chapter each day. The chapters are rather short, and are actually letters that St. Theophan wrote to one of his spiritual children. Each chapter finds me thinking "wow!"
Actually, I should mention that though this may seem like a lot of books, they are all actually either consisted of letters or extremely short chapters, so they make for a quick read during my morning cup of coffee. I am going to read ONE chapter/letter a day in each of these books. For the Psalter, I'll be reading one Psalm a day.
In addition to these books, I have a lenten tradition of my own that I'll be continuing. Pravoslavie.ru has a daily reading for each day of Great Lent, and I really look forward to this readings each day. They always pertain to that particular day of Great Lent, and even though the readings are the same each year I am always learning something new from them.
The last thing I will be doing for myself this Great Lent is using this new Orthodox Lenten Study workbook which I recently downloaded from Orthodox Mom. She created this very handy spiritual reading/writing guide that I am excited to test out! There are readings for each day of Lent, complete with a little writing section per each day. If you'd like to download it, it is available for purchase for $6 on her website (click on Orthodox Mom above to navigate to the site).
Happy Fasting to you all!
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