My former fellow-prisoner the Romanian Orthodox Deacon John Stanescu, suffered in jail for his faith. Colonel Albon, director of the slave labor camp, was informed that someone had dared to preach in a cell. He entered the cell carrying a cane and demanded to know the culprit. When no one responded he said, "Well, then all will be flogged."

Bodily purity is primarily attained through fasting, and through bodily purity comes spiritual purity. Abstinence from food, according to the words of the son of grace, Saint Ephraim the Syrian, means: "Not to desire or demand much food, either sweet or costly; to eat nothing outside the stated times; not to give oneself over to gratification of the appetite; not to stir up hunger in oneself by looking at good food; and not to desire one or another sort of food."

When one holds a discussion with pseudo-Christians about hard asceticism of the body and spirit for the love of Christ, they become angered, calling you a hoaxer, a pagan or a barbarian.

If you want to test the faith of a Christian, talk to them about asceticism. The faithful will feel compunction, while the lukewarm, those who are fake and faithless, will protest.

All four of them were of the Royal Tribe of Judah. When Nebuchadnezzar destroyed and plundered Jerusalem, Daniel, as a boy, was taken off into slavery together with Jehoiachin, King of Judah, and many other Israelites. The account of his life, sufferings and prophecies can be found in detail in his book. Utterly given to God, Daniel from his early youth received from God the gift of great discernment. His fame among the Jews in Babylon began when he denounced two lecherous and unrighteous elders, and saved the Babylonians stemmed from the day when he solved and interpreted the dream of King Nebuchadnezzar.

The Holy Sacrament of Repentance and Confession can rightly be called "the Forgotten Medicine." The whole world is lying in evil. Every one of us is infected with the deadly disease (virus) of sin, and one can be cured from the disease! The medicine is provided, and it is miraculous at that. You are healed the moment you take it. But we do not reach for it, to be healed and to lighten our conscience. Why? Because we have forgotten and neglect it.

This new life is our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is now born in Bethlehem, as He Himself said during the last days of His earthly life: "I am the way, and the truth, and the life" (John 14:6).