You handle them with your priest’s help, and you start slowly. That’s the short answer. The longer one is that fasting in Orthodoxy isn’t about perfection or earning anything. It’s medicine for the soul, and like any medicine, the dose matters.
The Church has a fasting rule. It’s pretty clear on paper. We abstain from meat, dairy, eggs, fish, wine, and olive oil during Great Lent and other fasting periods. We fast every Wednesday (when Christ was betrayed) and Friday (when He was crucified). Add it all up and you’re looking at roughly 180 days a year. If you’re coming from a Baptist background in Beaumont, that probably sounds insane.
Here’s what nobody tells you at first: the rule exists as a target, but it’s applied pastorally. The fancy word is economia. It means your priest can adjust the rule based on your health, your work schedule, where you are spiritually. If you’re working twelve-hour shifts at the refinery and just learning to pray, he’s not going to hand you the full monastic rule and wish you luck.
Start Where You Can
Most priests will tell inquirers and new converts to start with Wednesdays and Fridays. Just those two days. No meat, no dairy. See how that goes. Get used to the rhythm of it. Then maybe you add Great Lent the next year, or you start keeping the Nativity Fast in December. You build up to it.
I’ve watched people try to go from zero to full strict fasting in one week. It doesn’t work. They either burn out or they get proud about their fasting, which defeats the whole point. Metropolitan Kallistos Ware talks about this: fasting without prayer and almsgiving is just a diet. Worse, it can become a source of pride. You’re not trying to impress God or rack up points. You’re trying to quiet your body so your soul can hear.
The purpose of fasting is to make space. When you’re not thinking about what’s for dinner or whether you can have cream in your coffee, you notice things. You notice how much of your day revolves around food and comfort. You notice your dependence on God. You get hungry, and that hunger reminds you that you’re hungry for something bigger than barbecue.
Fr. Alexander Schmemann wrote that fasting is about entering into the paschal mystery. It’s preparation. We fast before Pascha because we’re getting ready for the Resurrection. We fast on Wednesdays and Fridays because we’re remembering what Christ did for us. It’s not arbitrary.
The Actual Rules (and Their Flexibility)
Great Lent is the strictest fast. Weekdays you’re off meat, dairy, fish, oil, and wine. Weekends are a little easier, usually oil and wine are permitted, sometimes fish depending on the day. Holy Week ramps back up. Some people eat almost nothing on Good Friday.
The Nativity Fast before Christmas is gentler. The Dormition Fast in August is short but strict. The Apostles’ Fast varies in length depending on when Pascha falls. Your parish will have a calendar that lays it all out. Antiochian parishes usually publish one every year.
But here’s the thing: if you’re pregnant, nursing, diabetic, elderly, a kid, traveling for work, or dealing with any number of other real-life situations, the rule bends. It has to. The fast is supposed to heal you, not harm you. Talk to your priest. He’ll help you figure out what’s actually doable.
Some people can’t fast from food at all for medical reasons. That’s fine. Fast from something else. Fast from complaining. Fast from your phone. Fast from whatever’s got a hold on you. The point is self-denial and turning toward God, not checking boxes.
Don’t Make It Weird
If you’re fasting and your non-Orthodox family invites you to dinner, you don’t have to make a scene. Eat what’s set before you and keep your fast quietly the rest of the week. St. Paul has some things to say about this. The fast is between you and God and your priest. It’s not a badge.
Also, don’t judge people who are fasting differently than you. You don’t know what their priest told them. You don’t know their health situation. Someone eating fish on a strict fast day might have a blessing you don’t know about. Mind your own plate.
The goal is to reach Pascha or the feast day or Sunday’s Liturgy with your soul awake and ready to receive the Eucharist. If you’ve spent the whole fast feeling smug about your discipline or resentful about the rules, you’ve missed it. Better to fast imperfectly with humility than perfectly with pride.
Talk to your priest. He’ll help you start somewhere reasonable. And when you mess up, because you will, just go to confession and start again. The fast isn’t about being perfect. It’s about learning to depend on God instead of yourself.
