For family people, fasting presupposes, among other things, abstinence from marital communion. However, there may be exceptions to this rule. For example, a believing wife wants to fast and abstain from marital communion, but an unbelieving husband does not want to. We must not allow fasting to destroy the family. As St. John Chrysostom says, "She who abstains against the will of her husband will not only lose the reward for abstinence, but will give an answer for his adultery, and an answer more severe than himself. Why?

Because it deprives him of lawful copulation, throws him into the abyss of debauchery." In some cases, a person has to sacrifice his own piety and his ascetic rules in order to preserve the integrity of the family. Father Alexander Schmemann speaks well about what our attitude to fasting should be in one of his best books, "Great Lent", which I recommend you all to read: A serious attitude to fasting means, first of all, that we will treat it, as far as possible, at the deepest level of our consciousness - we will perceive it as a spiritual call that requires a response, decision, constant effort.

We know that it is for this purpose that the Church has established the weeks of preparation for Great Lent. This is the time for a response and a decision. Both the best and the easiest way to do this is to devote ourselves to the leadership of the Church, at least by meditating on the five Gospel readings that the Church offers us during the five weeks preceding Lent: desire (Zacchaeus), humility (the Publican and the Pharisee), return from exile (the Prodigal Son), judgment (the Last Judgment) and forgiveness (the Forgiven Resurrection).

These Gospel readings should not only be listened to in church, but they should be brought home with you and compared with my life, my marital status, my professional duties, my concern for the material side of life, my attitude towards certain people with whom I live. Questions and Answers - Is it possible to watch TV during Lent?

- Some do not turn on the TV at all during fasting. Others watch only religious programs and news. But if you live in a family where your loved ones want to watch certain programs, then in most cases there is nothing you can do about it. Maintaining peace in the family is much more important than fulfilling certain ascetic prescriptions. If the turned off TV becomes a source of quarrels, enmity, then this is wrong.

When a believer comes to a house where everyone is watching TV, and turns it off indignantly and saying that it is Lent, you must repent, and you are having fun, etc., I think this will bring the opposite result: it can turn people away not only from fasting, but from the Church in general. Often, believing parents, in order to guide their children on the right path, forbid them to watch TV.

And in the soul of a child a strong and bitter protest can gradually grow not only against the parents, but also against the Church in general, against the entire church order. A child should not feel deprived of what is available to other children. It is much more important to gradually introduce the child to the meaning of what is happening in the Church, to reveal to him the meaning of fasting so that fasting is a joy for him, so that he himself strives to observe it.

- St. Macarius of Egypt, when guests came to him, broke the fast and offered to eat everything he had. Did he do the right thing? - Hospitality is more important than fasting. If we impose the burden of fasting on ourselves, then we do it for our spiritual development, for our spiritual perfection. But we should not impose the burden of fasting on other people, especially those who need hospitality.

If a believer comes to us, about whom we know that he is fasting, it is natural that then we prepare an appropriate meal for him and for ourselves. But if someone comes who does not fast, or a person who needs to be fed with something more substantial than, say, potatoes or cabbage, then, probably, there will be no sin in breaking the fast.

- What about the "swallowed anger", which then, after fasting, breaks out even stronger? - "Swallowed anger" is only the first stage when we learn not to let our anger spill out. This must be followed by a second stage, when a person begins to work on his heart and puts not only his outward behavior, but also his inner movements, before the judgment of the Gospel.

If anger comes to your heart, think of Christ, who was nailed to the cross and prayed for his tormentors. Remember the saints in whose lives something incomparably more terrible and tragic happened than what happens to us, but they accepted it with humility and love. Remember John Chrysostom, who was deposed from the archbishop's throne, exiled, beaten by guards, and reached the extreme state of exhaustion from hunger.

When he was dying, abandoned and betrayed by everyone, he said: "Thank God for everything." There are many similar examples. We need to remember them at the moment when we are ready to burst out in anger over some trivial matter - when, for example, we are served insufficiently heated soup, or someone is late for a meeting with us, or we are presented with a poorly drafted document to sign. One more point.

It often happens that irritation arises for one reason, and is poured out on some person for a completely different reason. For example, you missed the bus, the doors slammed in front of your nose, then a passing car threw mud at you. And when you come to work, it is easiest to pour out the accumulated anger on your colleagues. After all, the bus and the car are gone, that is, the objects that caused your anger are no longer there, and the employee is nearby.

But the car has left, and the man remains, and with him you can enter into a long, sometimes, perhaps, many years war over a trifle. No external factors should dominate us enough to cause anger or irritation. - How to separate a person from his action? - As the father did in the parable of the prodigal son. The son acted disgustingly, but his father continued to love him.