The Time of Abstaining from Food
Question:
On the night preceding a fast with abstinence, at what hour should we stop eating? Is it possible to eat after midnight?
Answer:
After midnight, we enter a new day, which we should begin in a state of fasting, as long as the day is a fast day. Therefore, it is not permissible on fasting days for a person to eat or drink after midnight.
If one is preparing by fasting for Holy Communion, it is required that his fast be no less than nine hours, so that he does not eat after midnight.
For example, if the Liturgy is at seven in the morning, a person should refrain from eating before ten in the evening.
In fasting, there is no such thing as a fasting with abstinence and another without abstinence, because abstaining from food is an essential element in every fast, and without it we are not truly fasting.
The period of abstinence is necessary in all fasts, but it differs in its timing from one fast to another, and from one person to another…
An article by His Holiness Pope Shenouda III – in El-Keraza Magazine – Year Eight (Issue Forty-Five) 11-11-1977
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