I have a question about something I’ve been
thinking about for a while. I’ve read that the Church canons say that you are
not supposed to kneel or prostrate on Sundays, but I was wondering how strictly
that’s interpreted in practice?
I currently attend a Romanian parish and among
Romanians (as you probably know) it is customary to kneel during the Our
Father, the Creed, the Gospel reading etc. and some people kneel throughout
much of the liturgy. I personally think it is a beautiful sign of reverence but
I was wondering why it has become customary and accepted in Romania but not in
other places, and if the “prohibition” against kneeling on Sundays is really
necessary or what the purpose of it really is?
I know some other parishes where people barely
show any reverence at all so it still seems to me to be better to kneel or
prostrate than to just be completely passive…
Question from a Correspondent in Europe
‘Since some people kneel in church on Sundays
and on the days of Pentecost, with a view to preserving uniformity in all
parishes it has seemed best to the holy Council for prayers to be offered to
God while standing’.
Canon XX of the First Universal Council
The canons you refer to are the above, Canon XC
of the Sixth Universal Council and Canon XV of St Peter the Martyr of
Alexandria, all from the first seven centuries. So, yes, on paper, you do not
kneel on the liturgical day of Sunday (Saturday evening to Sunday evening) and
not between Easter and Pentecost (the kneeling prayers read at Vespers of
Pentecost are the first when you kneel). Why? Because Sunday is the day of the
Resurrection and the period between Easter and Pentecost effectively the
afterfeast of the Feast of the Resurrection. If we are risen with Christ, then
we are risen and so stand.
So much for the theory. What about practice?
One of the easiest ways to tell the difference
between certain converts and Orthodox is whether they kneel on Sundays or not
(especially on the Sunday of the Cross during Lent). Converts, whether of the
zealot old calendarist or of the liberal new calendarist variety (extremes
always meet), refuse to kneel because of their head knowledge, Orthodox kneel
because of the movements of their hearts. As one person has said in answer to
an uptight convert who insisted that Orthodox stand during services: ‘No they
don’t: Russians stand, Greeks sit and Romanians kneel’.
Why this difference? It is all a question of
piety – or lack of piety. Sitting is a lack of piety (unless the person is ill,
heavily pregnant etc), which has entered the Greek Churches (including the
Antiochian) only very, very recently. Pious Russians are horrified when Greeks
and Antiochians sit during the Epistle. But kneeling is a great sacrifice. I
admire those Romanians who kneel throughout the liturgy as an act of piety
which accords with their temperament. I don’t think I could do it physically.
Equally standing is also a matter of asceticism.
A common Russian practice among bishops and
priests is to kneel at certain points during the Liturgy, for example during
‘Our Father’.
Certain converts, often of a Protestant
background, tend to interpret the canons literally, according to the letter.
Such individuals, it seems, used to be fundamentalists in their interpretation
of the Scriptures, and quote canons as they used to quote chapter and verse,
hoping perhaps to send their fellow human-beings to hell (and themselves to a
very prideful heaven). If this is the case, then it is all pure phariseeism.
(‘Do not heal or do good on the Sabbath day’).
Conclusion: Pray and then do what your heart
tells you to do, observing those around you, so that you scandalize no-one.
This is called humility and it stands above the letter of the law because it
keeps the spirit of the law. When I as a priest see metropolitans and bishops,
or for that matter pious laypeople, kneeling on a Sunday, I have no hesitation
in kneeling with them. We should refuse to put ourselves above others. I only
know that of Christ returns next Sunday, I will neither sit, nor stand, but be
on my knees in front of Him.
By Fr Andrew Phillips
Source: http://www.events.orthodoxengland.org.uk/can-we-kneel-in-church-on-sundays/
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