Sober Celebration

edited December 1969 in Faith Issues
This post is to address proper celebration within the Orthodox church. We must understand that there is different types of celebration, and why we celebrate and how we celebrate. In Orthodoxy we do not see people screaming, jumping up and down, clapping jubilantly, or convulsing on the floor. At times I have seen people in tears, St. Pope Kyrillos is a good example of that, during the liturgy. Why is it that we say "celebrate the liturgy" if we are not jumping up and down and making our emotions known through actions? Because self control is key to sober celebration. Judgment has not come, therefore why must we be elated? Why must we yell, dance, and clap as loud as possible when we are still unsure of our salvation, in fact we are working towards it having not yet accomplished it.

We praise God for His mercy, His peace, and His sacrifice, not because we "feel good". We worship God because we love Him, not because we dont want to go to hell. In John 4:23-24 Christ teaches us about worshipping in "spirit and truth." St John Chrysostom teaches that truth being sound Orthodox worship and spirit being of the same character and "must be offered by that in us which is incorporeal, to wit, the soul, and purity of mind." He continues "For because both Samaritans and Jews were careless about the soul, but took great pains about the body, cleansing it in divers ways, it is not, He saith, by purity of body, but by that which is incorporeal in us, namely the mind, that the incorporeal One is served." (St. John Chrysostom Homilies on the Gospel of St. John)

Sober actions means a sober mind. The church has done things a specific way for 2,000 years for a reason, for our salvation. Introducing new forms of worship, or celebration, into the church leads not to sober mindedness but to chaos and a departure from the true Orthodox form of worship. Sober celebration is a spiritual celebration in the like mind of Christ and through His example and that of the apostles we know what sober celebration is.


  • Great post!

    However, would you consider the jumping up and down, clapping jubilantly and so on, an act of foolishness or couldn't you still consider it an act of celebration? Because, I agree that it isn't necessary, but I wouldn't agree that it can't be used to praise God as you see them do in Africa...
  • But should it be?
  • Jshouk, it is a form of celebration as we all celebrate different things in our own way, according to how we feel. However, when it comes to God we worship God how He sees fit not for our own self. Therefore we must worship and praise with a sober mind, as celebrating as the heretics will bring about physical emotion as opposed to spiritual sanity. This is why we worship in truth (the church) and the spirit (the likeness of Christ), as St John Chrysostom likens it to.

    In other religions they celebrate loudly and jubilantly because they truly believe they are already saved and ignore the majority of what Christianity and true salvation is. We are working on our salvation, working to attain it. What the other religions are doing is the same as celebrating an olympic victory before the event has even began. How does one know they are saved? Is that not a form of judgment? While we have cause to celebrate God for His mercy, peace, and sacrifice, we must do it in the mind of Christ and not for ourselves.
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