Abbot Metodije about the celebration of Christmas

The greatest Christian holiday is Easter, but Christmas has a special joy and warmth that sets it apart from other holidays.

Such was my experience of this holiday when I lived in the world, but it has not changed even here in the monastery. On Mount Athos, church holidays are celebrated with long and solemn services, and every year the monks try to penetrate as deeply as possible into the theological meaning of the celebrated events, so that folk customs related to certain holidays are not practiced here.

Nevertheless, on Christmas, when we as a brotherhood gather after the liturgy and the festive meal in the hall for brotherly meetings, it is unobtrusively decorated with oak twigs and straw on the floor. To see where we came from and where we come from.

(From an interview given to “Politika”, January 2017)

Photo: monk Milutin Hilandarac