Thursday, February 20, 2020

Preparing for Great Lent - A Lenten Reading List, Updated for 2020


Dear Parish Faithful,

What Are You Reading for Great Lent?


New to the 2020 Lenten Reading List!
There are many ways to approach the Holy Scriptures for Great Lent for consistent and attentive reading. 

Three Old Testament books are prescribed for the entire forty days: Genesis, Proverbs, and Isaiah. For the New Testament it is: The Gospel According to St. Mark and the Epistle to the Hebrews. 

For both the Old and New Testament reading, you can follow the Church calendar; or simply read at your own pace. I encourage everyone to choose from this rich offering and "stick with it" throughout Great Lent.

Yet, I have attached a Lenten Reading List to this letter for your convenience, so to offer some good choices for meaningful "supplementary" reading alongside the Scriptures. Most of these are the "classics" of contemporary Orthodox writing (going back about fifty years or so), and these books continue to nourish us on the spiritual level. These books can also be read aloud with other family members quite effectively; perhaps especially the titles with short chapters. If I can be of any assistance is narrowing down some choices, or of offering some titles not on this short list, please feel free to contact me.

Many of these various books are available for purchase right here in our parish bookstore. It would be good of you to support the bookstore. Then again, they would be available at St. Vladimir's and St. Tikhon's bookstores respectively.

Lenten Reading List, Updated for 2020