Coffee with Sister Vassa Ep.15 (Nativity Fast / Рождественский Пост / Advent)

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Published on Dec 8, 2013 by Coffee with Sr. Vassa
Captions available in RUSSIAN, GERMAN/Deutsch, UKRAINIAN, SERBIAN, GREEK, ROMANIAN, BULGARIAN, ENGLISH. Also available in iTunes for iPhone and iPad! Theology with a bit of humor. The 15th episode. The Nativity/Christmas Fast and Advent. Please SUBSCRIBE here on Youtube, and follow us on Twitter! A brief, weekly program discussing the Church calendar and liturgy. Hosted by Dr. Sr. Vassa Larin of the University of Vienna in Austria.

Coffee Break w Sr. Vassa 5: Self-Limitation & Will

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Published on Nov 30, 2014 by Coffee with Sr. Vassa
Subtitles: ENGLISH
On preparing for Christmas during Advent and the Nativity Fast. A brief, 2-minute Christian reflection, hosted by Dr. Sr. Vassa Larin of the University of Vienna, Austria.

We associate fasting, zillions, naturally with self-limitation, and some of us might be procrastinating about beginning our fast and re-focusing on the up-coming feast. Because we do tend to procrastinate about something we perceive from its negative side; something we perceive perhaps as a big “no,“ rather than a big “yes.“ So I would like to suggest to you that fasting is actually a big “yes“ rather than a “no.“ It is an act of will, with a very clear vision or goal in mind: the vision of the upcoming feast, in this case the birth of our Saviour in Bethlehem. In this decisive act of taking on a conscious preparation for this event, in body and in soul, we are saying “yes“ to embracing the feast, together with the community of our tradition. The reason this involves self-limitation is, really, that any act of will is tied to self-limitation, as very helpfully G. K. Chesterton points out in this wonderful little book that I happened to be looking at recently. It‘s called “Orthodoxy“ – you probably already know this book. Anyway, here Chesterton writes that: “Every act of will is an act of self-limitation. To desire action is to desire limitation. In that sense every act is an act of self-sacrifice. When you choose anything, you reject everything else.“ So, that might be obvious, but, as we limit ourselves in certain ways these weeks before Christmas, let‘s remember this obvious fact: that we do so because we want to.