Why do we fast before Easter? It is not a diet. It is not a custom. It is not simply “cutting out meat.” Great Lent is a journey. It is a voyage. Forty days of preparation to reach the Resurrection. Fasting in Orthodoxy is not only about the stomach. It is about the heart. I give up something from the body in order to awaken the soul. I learn self-restraint. I learn that I do not live only to consume.
Christ fasted forty days in the desert before beginning His ministry. Not because we “have to,” but because we want to cleanse ourselves of whatever weighs us down. And so we arrive at Clean Monday. What does “clean” mean? It does not mean only a table free of animal products. It means a clean beginning. The Church asks for forgiveness, asks that we cleanse our thoughts. That is why, on the Sunday evening before Lent, we ask one another for forgiveness — so that we may enter the fast “clean.” Clean Monday is not simply lagana bread and kites. It is the first step of return. It is the decision to say: “I want to change. I want to rise higher.”
For Orthodoxy, Lent is not a dark period. It is a spring of the soul. Because at its end… it is not merely a festive table that awaits us. It is the Resurrection.
