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Great Lent begins for Orthodox Christians

The Great Lent is the time for the absolution of sins, penance and the undergoing of testsdrinking and diversions, the Patriarch added

© Aleksandr Ryumin / TASS

MOSCOW, March 11. /TASS/. The Great Lent, the longest lent in the church calendar with the most severe restrictions, starts for Orthodox Christians on Monday. It will last almost 50 days and will end with the main Christian holiday - Easter, the day of the Resurrection of Jesus, which will be celebrated on April 28 this year.

"The upcoming Great Lent is devoted to the fight against sins. If we do not change for the better during the lent, than we vainly worked, prayed and fasted. It does not mean that we should stop fasting if we don’t see the result, but we should understand, not feeling the result, that something wrong is going on in our life," Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia said during a liturgy in Shrove Sunday ahead of the lent.

"The Great Lent is the time for the absolution of sins, penance and the undergoing of tests, including restrictions in food, drinking and diversions, but this are just means directed at the change of our souls," the Patriarch added.

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