The inner significance of fasting is best summed up in the triad: prayer, fasting, almsgiving. Divorced from prayer and from the reception of the Holy Mysteries (Sacraments) unaccompanied by acts of compassion, our fasting becomes pharisaical or even demonic. It leads, not to contrition and joyfulness, but to pride, inward tension, and irritability. The link between prayer and fasting is rightly indicated by Father Alexander Elchaninov. A circle of fasting says to him: 'Our work suffers and we become irritable...I have never seen servants [in pre-revolutionary Russia] so bad-tempered as during the last days of Holy Week. Clearly, fasting has a very bad effect on the nerves.' To this Father Alexander replies: 'You are quite right...If it is not accompanied by prayer and an increased spiritual life, it merely leads to a heightened state of irritability. It is natural that servants who took their fasting seriously and who were forced to work hard during Lent, while not being allowed to go to church, were angry and irritable.

Another characteristic still to be added, namely the Tradition of the Church is universal in space and time. Saint Vincent of Lerins, a bishop and writer in France during the 5th century, writes that "we must hold what has been believed everywhere, always, and by all" (Common, 2). Indeed, the Church with all her members, always, from the time of her inception until the end of time, accepts and teaches everywhere the redemptive work of Christ. This does not mean that the Church and Her Tradition move within numerical, geographical or chronological limits. The Church and Her Tradition, although they live in history, are beyond history.

There is so much more to a Greek Orthodox parish than supporting it financially and attending the Sunday Divine Liturgy. The parish is a community of Orthodox Christian believers who are united by a common Creed of faith, Tradition, and mission.

Saturday, Friday 22nd is the First Saturday of the Souls. On the day before the Sunday of the Last Judgment, and in close connection with the theme of his Sunday, there is a Universal Commemoration of the dead 'from all the ages.' (There are further commemorations of the dead on the second, third, and forth Saturdays in Holy Lent.) Before we call to mind the Second Coming of Christ in the services on Sunday, we command to God all those departed before us, who are now awaiting the Last Judgment. In the texts for this Saturday there is a strong sense of the continuing bond of mutual love that links together all the members of the Church, whether alive or dead. For those who believe in the Risen Christ, death does not constitute an impassable barrier, since all are alive in Him; the departed are still our brethren, members of the same family with us, and so we are conscious of the need to pray insistently on their behalf. (Lenten Triodion)

The teaching or Apostolic Tradition was transmitted from the Holy Apostles themselves to their successors, the bishops and the presbyters, Saint Clement, Bishop of Rome (2nd century A.D.), and probably a Disciple of the Holy Apostles himself, described this historical truth:

The term "tradition" comes from the Latin traditio, but the Greek term is parasosis and the verb is paradido. It means giving, offering, delivering, performing charity. In theological terms, it means any teaching or practice which has been transmitted from generation to generation throughout the life of the Church. More exactly, paradosis is the very life of the Holy Trinity as it has been revealed by Christ Himself and testified by the Holy Spirit.