A year ago, the topic "Orthodox traditions Russian family"to a certain extent, it would seem new to me. Of course, every clergyman, especially every bishop who has a certain experience of church activity, has ideas about family problems that have been formed in practice. But talking about them competently, professionally, can be far I'm not trying to sound professional, but I will just say that this topic has become especially close to me in the past year.
This is due to the fact that last autumn in the ancient Russian city of Galich and in regional center- The city of Kostroma, with the blessing of His Holiness Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Alexy II, the Synodal Department for Youth Affairs carried out a large-scale project - the II All-Russian Film Festival of Short Films "Family of Russia" was held. V competition program The festival was attended by over 200 short films presented by authors from 48 cities in 28 regions of Russia and neighboring countries. Both during the preparation process, and, of course, at the festival itself, lively discussions were held, various ideas about the place were expressed Orthodox family in the modern world, the ways and prospects of the formation of Orthodox family values in the younger generation were discussed. I also had to take part in many discussions. With great attention, the festival participants got acquainted with the wonderful, and in some cases, highly artistic films designed to affirm traditional Orthodox family values in society - the joy of fatherhood and motherhood, the moral beauty of a pious marriage and the ideal of a strong large family.
By the grace of God, I have been serving in the priesthood for over twenty years. Over the years, I had to see many families - happy and unhappy, pious and not very, strong and decayed. Probably, many will agree with me that nowadays it is very very rare... Just as true personal holiness is a precious and rarely found divine gift, so is perfection. family relations... And just as personal holiness is achieved through unceasing spiritual exploits, so family virtue comes to spouses over time and by virtue of their spiritual labors.
The secret to Christian marriage is simple. Christian marriage is about love. The ever-memorable Moscow pastor, Archpriest Gleb Kaleda, did not accidentally call the Christian family a true "school of love." But what kind of love are we talking about here?
The family is a certain fundamental feature of a person, the same as reason and religiosity. Saint Philaret, Metropolitan of Moscow, said: "God, having created the first people, entrusted to them and their descendants the further production of people into the world, entrusted, as it were, the continuation of His creative action. What a great gift!" This gift, according to the saint, is associated with the gift of natural mutual love, which by nature both parents and children have: “Does a father and mother need a feat in order to love their child? Nature does everything, without exploit and almost without the knowledge of man: where is the dignity of virtue? This is just a natural feeling, which we notice even in the wordless. Dislike of parents or children is a deeply low vice; but love for parents or children is not yet a high virtue, except special cases when it is elevated by self-denial and self-sacrifice combined with it. " And yet the great teacher of the Russian Church believes that "natural" love alone is not enough for life in a family. "Sensitive and loving heart it must be elevated from natural love to spiritual love, so that it, plunging into family ties, does not sink entirely into natural love alone. Therefore, considering the source of good in God and His blessing that we have or receive, and the hope of the good that we desire, we must raise and illuminate the deeds of nature with the spirit of grace. "
We all know the works of world literature about "first love". Of course, first love is a strong feeling. The lover for the first time experiences this state as the most extraordinary event in his (so far so short) life. But, alas, we adults know well: the feeling of first falling in love does not last for life. And, if, obeying mutual attraction, the young man and the girl decided to tie their fates in marriage, then it should be replaced by some other, much deeper relationship than the romantic feelings of the first days. If this does not happen, the laws of fallen human nature take their toll. "Do not love the world, nor what is in the world ... And the world passes away and its lust, but he who does the will of God abides forever." (1 John 2; 17). A marriage based solely on earthly feelings is easily destroyed over time.
There is also a downside to this love: burning despair that overwhelms the soul if the object of love does not reciprocate. Recall that after the release of Goethe's infamous novel The Sorrows of Young Werther, a wave of suicides rocked Europe.
Here you can also remember that dark love that "... jumped out in front of us, like a murderer jumps out of the ground in an alley, and struck both of us, how lightning strikes, how a Finnish knife strikes!", But reasoning on the topic " The Masters and Margaritas "have been on edge lately.
But now let's turn to the lives of the saints of the Orthodox Church. Many are familiar with the life of the Monk Alexy, the man of God. Even in his youth, the ascetic, who lived in Rome, left the parental home, escaping from the beautiful bride, and some time later, he returned and lived in the guise of a beggar at the threshold of his own house, in front of the parents who yearned for him, but did not recognize him.
A modern psychologist could interpret Alexei's flight as a typical reaction of emancipation to style parenting defined as "conniving hyperprotection." Imagine what a life would look like in a retelling of popular journalists of "Moskovsky Komsomolets": What an outrageous case! What a scandal! What a heartlessness of religious fanaticism towards parents and fiancées! Here, they say, dark side Orthodoxy, eastern contemplative religion, indifferent to the values of civilization.
Meanwhile, in Russian Orthodox families, the life of the Monk Alexis was perhaps the most beloved reading, which was listened to by both adults and children. Why? After all, the author of the biography openly preaches the ascetic path, and even in the radical form of foolishness for Christ's sake. But Saint Alexis was loved and revered in large and friendly Orthodox families for a very simple reason: the members of these families felt well: their family was united and fastened by the same "spirit of grace" that the ancient ascetic who left his parental home and the young bride carried in his heart ... This gracious spirit makes marriage strong and indestructible. The Christian family becomes a repository of divine love, it accumulates this love, spreads the fragrance of an atmosphere of love around itself, attracting other families to itself. Recall that Venerable Seraphim Sarovsky said: "Build a peaceful spirit and thousands of people around you will be saved." It will be fair to supplement the thought of the great saint: "Acquire a peaceful spirit in your family and thousands of families will be saved next to yours."
First of all, the family becomes a source of love for children. The atmosphere of the family strongly influences the formation of the mental image of the child, determines the development of children's feelings, children's thinking. This general atmosphere can be called "the attitude of the family". Children who grew up in an atmosphere of love carry it in themselves and further, creating their families, fill the earth with this love. Love is the only creative force. So, the family is created as a source of love and creative power for all mankind. There is no love - and any methodology of the educational process is doomed to failure.
The state is rightly reproached for insufficient attention to the problems of motherhood and childhood. Despite the recent increase, the mother's benefit remains paltry. As conscientious citizens of society, we can only welcome the introduction of maternity certificates, as well as the initiatives of local authorities aimed at supporting fertility in the regions. In this regard, I cannot fail to mention with the warmest feeling about the program approved by the Governor of the Belgorod Region Yevgeny Savchenko. You can and should invest money in social sphere... But money alone will not solve the problem. Love won't come from money. Money can relieve social tension, make life easier, but happy family it is impossible to create. I think each of you is familiar with Orthodox families raising two, three, and sometimes four children in the extremely cramped conditions of a Moscow one-room apartment. And there are countless examples of tragic family conflicts in elite ruble vskie mansions. Such a quality as the willingness to sacrifice oneself for the sake of happiness every day loved one, is not adopted in the process of acquaintance with the basics of family psychology, but comes as a gift of God's grace. "Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the Church and gave Himself for her in order to sanctify her ..." (Eph .: 25).
Most of the films presented at the aforementioned Family of Russia film festival tell about real strong Orthodox families in which a genuine spirit of love reigns. The number of such families is growing. But in general, the institution of marriage and family is going through an acute crisis. It is a mistake to believe that this crisis began from the time of perestroika. The Russian family was destroyed by the communist ideology. Recall that the classics of Marxism believed: a family based on private property, the right of inheritance and the upbringing of children at home should be abolished by the victorious proletariat. You can read more about this in " Communist Manifesto"Marx and Engels;
In the first years of Soviet power, they tried to take away the opportunity to raise children from their parents (first of all, from the father). Leon Trotsky perceived the family as the main obstacle in the cause of the revolution. It was he (probably, not without Lenin's approval) in 1918 who became the author of the revolutionary decree on the "socialization of women." By "socialization" the Bolsheviks understood the rape of female students and high school students by revolutionary sailors and Red Army men, as well as in the basements of the Cheka. This cynical decree quickly penetrated the very thick Soviet life... Of course, the mass rape of women ended up in unnecessary pregnancies. Therefore, instructions and rules for abortions were urgently developed so that you can quickly cover up your tracks. Soviet Russia became the first country to the globe, which legalized the mass murder of its unborn citizens. Abortion has become the norm in Soviet life. Oddly enough, our country uses these revolutionary instructions for carrying out abortions to this day. To this day, the number of abortions in our country remains unheard of for any civilized country.
In the view of the classics of Soviet political education (such as A. Kollontai and A. Lunacharsky), a man and a woman in a family were to be, first of all, bound by the bonds of love and comradeship, as well as by the consciousness of collective responsibility. The upbringing function of the family was delegated to society. The family, as an independent agent for raising children, could not fit into the totalitarian system. All politics Soviet power was aimed at reducing to zero the educational role of the father, and shifting all responsibility for upbringing to society. But society did not cope with the task, and, gradually, as modern psychologists convincingly show (for example, V.N.Druzhinin), the whole burden of responsibility for the family and children fell on the shoulders of the mother. The ease of the divorce procedure placed additional parenting responsibilities on the woman. The role of women increased even more due to the mass death of men during the period of mass repressions and the Great Patriotic War... In the Resolutions of the CEC and the Council of People's Commissars, in fine arts, in cinema and architecture, in mass propaganda campaigns, the role of women was exalted in every possible way. 0 men were silent.
All this led to the deformation of the entire system of family relations. After all, the Orthodox teaching about the family is quite definite: "The domination of the husband over the wife is natural. The husband is older than his wife by creation. He appears as something basic, and the wife as something and the next ... mess and in own life and to the whole house. ", - wrote on turn of XIX and XX centuries, a prominent specialist in the field of Orthodox family psychology, Archpriest Yevgeny Popov.
In the 60s and 70s, the crisis of the Soviet family was further continued. The fact is that during this period there was an increase in the economic and ideological independence of the family from the totalitarian state, the socio-political role of men increased. Interesting research was carried out by the St. Petersburg psychologist V. Semenov. He considered art publications in the very popular magazine those years, "Youth", for the period from 1955 to 1984. A total of 123 stories and stories with 236 conflict situations were analyzed. The number of insoluble family conflicts has increased from the 50-60s to the 70-80s 6 (!) Times. There is clear evidence of the disintegration of the family and the disintegration of marital relations.
Over the past decade and a half in Russian society, already free from totalitarian ideology, the institution of family and marriage has changed continuously and so rapidly that it is sometimes quite difficult to grasp the tendencies of these changes. The very concepts of "marriage" and "family" only at first glance seem familiar and understandable to us. In fact, in the view of various social groups and, in particular, in the ideas of today's youth, they have a meaning that we often do not even know about.
There are horrific statistics concerning the decline in the birth rate, the increase in the number of divorces and officially registered marriages, the increase in illegitimate births, the increase in the number of incomplete and so-called problem families, and the increase in domestic crimes.
Here are observations describing one of the contradictory trends: Today, new forms of marriage are replacing the traditional family model and officially registered marriage: trial marriage, marriage not for life. Family structure has changed everywhere. One of the main distinguishing qualities of marriage and family relations in recent decades has become the so-called nuclearization of the family. (from lat.nucleos - core). Unlike the patriarchal family, where coexistence of three or four generations was considered the norm, today the nuclear family, consisting of one core: parents and children, has become such a norm. On the one hand, the nuclear family assumes a simpler structure of relationships. But, on the other hand, in such a family, the household and psychological load that falls on the spouses increases sharply: numerous responsibilities for managing household, raising children, organizing leisure activities, etc. carried out only by husband and wife, which entails their interdependence and connectedness. And as a psychological consequence - an increase in the personal responsibility of each family member, a variety of performed family roles, often not traditional for men and women. What happens next? A man, as you know, is not very eager to share the responsibilities of the house with a woman. So, for example, men show relatively weak activity in a very laborious occupation - the upbringing of their children. They are even less willing to engage in domestic work. Thus, the load for women increases over the years, and for men it decreases. The larger the gap in workload between husband and wife becomes, the less satisfied spouses are with their marriage. The unwillingness of a man to take on some of the daily worries leads to the formation conflict situation, to the increasing dissatisfaction of a woman with her marriage. The family is rapidly heading towards divorce.
His Holiness Patriarch Alexy has repeatedly pointed out that "... the center of all educational work should be the church parish. Young men and women should be given the opportunity for interesting and useful activities, social service at the church." The years have shown that in those parishes where the rectors offer a meaningful program of extra-liturgical activities; and also where a tense spiritual life proceeds, that is, near monasteries, Orthodox communities are formed, including dozens of strong young families.
One of the most successful examples here became the St. Petersburg Orthodox youth club "Seagull", created in 1996 and uniting young people, parishioners of the Church of the Ioannovsky Monastery on the Petrogradskaya side. "We have come together for mutual help, communication, organization joint leisure, serving the Church and neighbors. We are mainly young people from 17 to 30 years old. We are grateful to God for the fact that he gave us the opportunity to get together, make friends and gain spiritual unity in life together in Christ. Striving for unity and mutual understanding is one of our goals. We would like to convey a piece of our joint joy to all of you ", - they say about themselves in" The Seagull ".
It is unthinkable to talk about the revival of the Orthodox family without preparing young people for marriage. The latter should consist in the education of all those virtues, without which it is difficult to imagine a prosperous family: mutual understanding, benevolence, attentiveness, participation, willingness to help, and, if necessary, sacrifice oneself. In order for young people to be able to harmoniously build their relationships in a future marriage, they need to know the peculiarities of the psychology of communication, interpersonal relations in a modern family. Young people should be told about all this patiently and intelligibly.
All these personal qualities formed in school years... And above all, as much as possible in early age it is necessary to instill in young people the idea of the value of the family as such. Along with the school system of preparing young people for marriage, it is necessary to continue the educational work begun with students in the framework of university courses: "Psychology of family and marriage", "Social psychology", "Family in psychological counseling". And in parallel with this, the values of the family and marriage should be promoted by means of mass media.
It is very difficult to replace the gaps in the family upbringing of children with school upbringing and upbringing in a church parish during extracurricular hours. In parish life, we are faced with the following phenomenon: it is easier to raise a family as a whole than individual offspring. Family-type summer camps have successfully proven themselves in the activities of the Synodal Department for Youth Affairs for many years. These camps are run by the Brotherhood of Orthodox Pathfinders during school holidays. Children and parents are invited to participate in them. Here children and their mothers and fathers are taught and brought up in Christian virtues.
A nation that has no concept of a family has no future. He is simply doomed to extinction. The entertainment culture and consumerist worldview imposed by the media are doing their job. From the character of a nation are washed away those substances that made it firm and courageous, capable of sacrificial feat.
Children and young people need protection not so much from terrorist attacks, but from aggressive preaching of immorality and destructive way of life for the soul and body. A stereotype is imposed: to live is to enjoy, "Take everything from life." The Orthodox Church emphatically declares her strong disagreement with the image young man living by the standards imposed by modern pop culture. There is no sight more sad for a Christian heart than the spiritual cloning of young people with the same expression in their eyes, drinking the same Coca-Cola, dancing to the same musical rhythms, speaking and feeling the same.
Unfortunately, we have already lost many children and teenagers! Today's task is not to lose a new generation for the country. And this means that from childhood it is necessary to instill in them high ideals, including family life. His Holiness Patriarch ALEXY II of Moscow and All Russia spoke at the All-Church Congress of Orthodox Youth in May 2001: “The time has come to unite the efforts of those who feel an acute anxiety for the younger generation. we will lose the country. "
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Christianity, like other religions, is rich in rituals, traditions and festivities. Learning about these customs and traditions is incredibly exciting and interesting. And it is even more interesting to be involved in all this action. So, what are the customs and ceremonies inherent in Christianity? We will find out about this in this article.
Prayer for a Christian
Every Christian is obliged to pray every day. By prayer, believers turn to God, to the saints - they ask for something, they complain. They do this in the hope that the saints will help them in solving problems, because the church speaks of the miraculous power of faith and prayer.
The cult of icons
The cult of icons
It should also be said that Christianity attaches much importance to icons. It is worth noting that before the icons kindled heated debates - someone considered them an integral attribute, and someone considered them a relic of pagan times. But in the end, the veneration of icons remained. People believe that the image of a deity will also affect a person.
In Christianity, the main attribute is the cross. The cross can be seen on temples, in clothing, and on many other elements. The cross is worn on the body. Not a single rite of Christianity can take place without the cross. This symbol is a tribute to the memory of death in the throes of Jesus Christ, who was crucified on the cross. Throughout life, people "carry their cross", acquire humility and obedience.
What are relics?
It is believed that the relics are the remains of the deceased, which, by the will of God, did not smolder, and also have miraculous power... This appeared a long time ago, when people tried to explain the incorruption of bodies by the fact that they have miraculous powers.
"Holy places
Holy places of Russia
Holy places are those that are associated with certain events. For example, a place where a miracle was performed by the will of God. People rush to such places on pilgrimage. There are a lot of such places all over the world. A similar belief also came from antiquity, when people spiritualized mountains and waters, etc., and also believed that they could influence life, bring a miracle.
Christian holidays and fasts
Holidays have a special place in Christianity. Almost every day of the year has some kind of event that is associated with God, saints and so on.
Easter holiday
Easter is one of the main holidays. This church holiday does not have a clear date, but it was created in honor of the resurrection of Jesus, who was crucified on the cross. On this day, it is customary to bake cakes, cook Easter, paint eggs. The tradition of giving eggs dates back to ancient times, when Mary Magdalene presented a red egg when she spoke about the Resurrection of Jesus. The believers decided to support this undertaking, and since then this tradition has only taken root and continues to this day. On the eve of the holiday, everyone dyes eggs and bakes cakes.
Advice
It is recommended to treat others and greet everyone with the words "Christ is Risen", and you also need to respond to such greetings in a special way "truly risen". At midnight, a church service is held, to which all believers flock. It was also customary to help the poor and needy. On this bright day, food was handed out to them, and they also took part in the bright festival.
Christmas carols are usually celebrated. On the eve of the holiday, the children dressed up and carried kutya to their homes - this is a traditional dish Christmas. The owners were offered to try kutya, while the mummers sang songs and recited poems at that time. For kutya and entertainment, the owners had to treat the mummers or give them money.
Christmastide
Christmastide
Also, Christmas is the beginning of the Christmas season, when every day means something. Christmastide lasts until baptism (January 19). On Christmastide it is customary to guess. The girls are engaged in fortune telling - they try to find out the name of the betrothed when they get married, as well as find out the answers to other questions of interest to them. It is for this reason that most fortune-telling has exactly the wedding theme.
By Christmas everyone tidied up their homes, swam and went to the bathhouse, put on clean clothes. On January 6, on the eve of Christmas, nothing was allowed to eat, but only to drink some water. After the first star appeared, everyone sat down at the table, ate food and celebrated this great day. As a rule, on the festive table one could find a variety of cooking - jellied meat, pork dishes, piglet and much, much more. It should be noted that fish and poultry were always baked whole, because it was a symbol of family unity.
Output:
Christianity is rich in various celebrations, rituals and traditions. Holidays make up a large part of this religion. Each holiday has its own rituals and traditions - they are all bright, solemn and light. Over time, some of the rituals began to be forgotten, but some are still performed from generation to generation. Moreover, some rituals and traditions are gradually beginning to revive.
1. INTRODUCTION
Tasks:
Define the concepts of "Family", "Christian family", "traditions";
Introduce parents to the traditions and culture of the Christian family;
Form the need to observe Christian traditions in the family.
Form of carrying out: teacher's report, discussion
Preparatory work: questionnaires of children and parents, preparation and design of the class, preparation of the script.
Our contemporary, scientist and priest Gleb Kaleda, in his book on the Christian family, says that monasticism is beneficial for those who are rich in love, and an ordinary person learns to love in marriage. People of modern culture, more often than not, without thinking about it, seek in marriage not a school of love, but self-affirmation and satisfaction of their passions.
In the Orthodox tradition, family life is understood as "the path to Salvation", the ascent along which is associated with the carrying of the "cross" of the daily duties of mutual concern, cooperation, understanding and harmony.
According to the Apostle Paul, man is threefold: he has a body, soul and spirit. Church-sanctified marriage unites all three components of human nature. Modern Orthodox theology defines the essence of marriage and its role in the transformation of a person as follows:
- "A Christian is called, already in this world, to have the experience of a new life, to become a citizen of the Kingdom; and this is possible for him in marriage. Thus, marriage ceases to be just a satisfaction of temporary natural impulses ... Marriage is a unique union of two beings in love, two beings who can transcend their own human nature and be united not only "with each other", but also "in Christ."
- "In marriage, a person is transformed, overcoming loneliness and isolation, expansion, replenishment and completion of his personality."
Spiritual growth of husband and wife in marriage helps conjugal love that spreads to children and warms everyone around.
The special role of the family - the "home Church" in Christian culture - is to fulfill the primordial function - the spiritual and moral upbringing of children. According to the teachings of the Church, "childbearing" (meaning not only the birth, but also the upbringing of children) is salutary for parents. Children are perceived not as an accidental acquisition, but as a gift from God, which parents are called to preserve and "multiply", contributing to the disclosure of all the strength and talents of the child, leading him to virtuous Christian life.
In the upbringing of children, the family cannot be replaced by any other social institution; it has an exclusive role in promoting the development of a child's personality. In family communication, a person learns to overcome his sinful egoism, in the family he learns "what is good and what is bad."
Main part.
2.1 Methodical development parent meeting on this topic:
"Traditions and Culture of the Christian Family"
Meeting progress
Teacher's report.
In order to talk about a Christian family, about traditions and culture in a Christian family, it is necessary to define the meaning of the concept of "family":
A family is a collection of close relatives living together, a small group based on marriage or consanguinity, whose members are connected by a common life, mutual moral responsibility and mutual assistance.
A family Is a union of two people (man and woman), based on love and understanding. The hallmark of a family is the love that underlies it; family is the visible embodiment of the love of several people for each other. Legal registration does not create a family; it does not matter the similarity of tastes, ages, professions or the number of people. The family is based on the mutual love of husband and wife and on the love of parents and children.
Family in the Christian sense there is a home Church, a single organism, whose members live and build their relationships on the basis of the law of love.
The fact that the concept of "family" has both a moral and a spiritual nature is confirmed by religious, philosophical and theological studies.
The family begins with marriage, while marriage in the Christian tradition "is a sacrament in which, with the free promise of faithful love, the marriage union of the groom and the bride is sanctified for the pure birth and upbringing of children and for mutual help in salvation."
According to St. John Chrysostom, marriage has become for Christians a "sacrament of love" in which spouses, their children and the Lord Himself participate. The fulfillment of this mysterious union of love is possible only in the spirit of the Christian faith, in the exploit of voluntary and sacrificial service to each other.
For each of its members, the family is a school of love as a constant readiness to give oneself to others, to take care of them, to protect them. On the basis of the mutual love of the spouses, parental love is born, the reciprocal love of children for their parents, grandmothers, grandfathers, brothers and sisters. Joy and sorrow in spiritually healthy family become common: all the events of family life unite, strengthen and deepen the feeling of mutual love.
I.A. Ilyin calls the family "the primary bosom of human culture." In a family, a child learns the basics of material and spiritual culture. In communication with close adults, the child develops his own human forms of behavior: the skills of thinking and speech, orientation and activity in the world of objects and human relations, moral qualities, life values, aspirations, ideals.
A sense of living continuity of generations is born in the family, a sense of involvement in the history of their people, the past, present and future of their homeland.
Only a family can raise a family man: according to a wise word I.A. Ilyin, a kind family to give a person "two sacred prototypes, in a living relation to which his soul grows and his spirit grows stronger:
The prototype of a pure mother carrying love, mercy and protection;
And the prototype of a good father, who gives food, justice and understanding. "
The philosopher calls these parental images the sources of spiritual love and spiritual faith of a person.
From time immemorial, the upbringing of a child's good disposition, the development of his ability for a virtuous life was determined by the way of life of the mother and father, by the extent to which the parents themselves could show him a good example. Without example and guidance in goodness, the child loses the ability to form as a person. The holy fathers and pastors of the Church write about this:
Saint Basil the Great: "If you want to educate others, educate yourself first in God";
Saint Theophan the Recluse: "The father and mother disappear into the child and, as they say, do not cherish the soul. And if their spirit is imbued with piety, then it cannot be that by its kind it does not act on the soul of the child";
Saint Ignatius Brianchaninov, addressing the mother of a little girl: "Know that more than all your instructions in words, your life will be the most powerful instruction for your daughter";
Priest Alexander Elchaninov: "For the upbringing of children, the most important thing is that they see their parents living a great inner life."
This is evidenced in proverbs by the wisdom of the Orthodox Russian people: "The righteous mother is a stone fence," "The father of his son teaches not badly," and many other examples ...
The traditional way of family life and modern problems of spiritual and moral education in the family:
Without being ashamed or afraid of the world, try to give your children a true Christian upbringing, communicating to them the same Christian concepts in everything, accustoming them to the Christian rules of life, stirring up love for the Church of God and all church orders ...
Saint Theophan the Recluse
Paternal and maternal line behaviors in a Russian family organically combined in a hierarchically built family structure (established order, structure of life), had a beneficial effect on the formation of the child's soul and the strengthening of family ties.
The traditional family way of life helped the child learn about life in its various manifestations and taught him to be included in this life to the best of his ability and ability. On the basis of the traditional spiritual and moral foundations of the family, the subsequent social and spiritual consistency of the individual was laid. Respect for parents, obedience to them was perceived by children as God's commandment and a necessary condition for a successful growing up. And the mother and father, realizing the peculiarities of their family ministry and their duty good upbringing children, understood both the everyday and spiritual significance of the wise pedagogical communication in family.
The modern order of life is completely different, it provokes the destruction of traditional family ties. For both men and women everything greater importance get a job, success in the professional field, the desire for prosperity. Modern parents have neither the physical nor the mental strength to raise their children. And even believers often do not perceive communication with a spouse and children as something spiritually significant in life.
Due to what the traditional structure of the family made it possible for people not to waste in vain vitality, multiply them, share them with weak neighbors?
To answer this question will help us a brief description of components of the family structure. The traditional family life has five components:
1. Customs (established, familiar forms behavior),
2. Traditions (passing from generation to generation a way of transmitting the value-meaningful content of culture, family life),
3. Relationships: heartfelt feelings and moods,
4. Rules (way of thinking, norms of behavior, habits, habits) of a good and pious life,
5. Schedule (established order in the course of affairs) of the day, week, year; in the Russian Orthodox culture, this routine was set by the system of the pious life of a Christian, all around church services, seasonal changes in everyday life and work.
Perhaps there are some (often unstable and not based on true spiritual and moral values) customs, traditions, attitudes, rules, routines in the life of a modern family. The conscious filling of these components of the life structure with traditional content will provide effective assistance in the spiritual awakening of modern children living in a vain, fickle and aggressive world.
The restoration of the traditional way of life will help the family return to the solution of the problem of spiritual and moral family education. The meaning of this task is, according to I.A. Ilyin, in "that the child has access to all spheres of spiritual experience; so that his spiritual eye opens up to everything significant and sacred in life; so that his heart, so tender and receptive, learns to respond to every manifestation of the Divine in the world and in people."
I.A. Ilyin also means means spiritual education, with the help of which the child can gain access to where "the Spirit of God breathes, calls and opens":
Nature in all its beauty, grandeur and mysterious purposefulness,
True art, giving the opportunity to experience a sense of grace-filled joy,
Genuine sympathy for all suffering,
Effective love for neighbors,
The blissful power of the act of conscience,
Courage national hero,
Creative life national genius with his sacrificial responsibility,
– direct prayer appeal to God, "Who both hears, and loves, and helps."
It is interesting to compare (and make sure of their consonance) the lists of the means of spiritual and moral education of I.A. Ilyin and the famous pastor of the Church of the mid-20th century, Archpriest Sergiy Chetverikov. Father Sergius reflects on what favors the return of a soul that has lost faith to a religious life, he names the following means:
Religious childhood memories,
Influence of fiction,
Meetings with really religious people
Visiting centers of religious life (monasteries, elders, holy places),
Reading religious literature.
In the modern situation, the awareness of the effectiveness of these means is especially important, since we are not talking about individual souls, but about generations that have lost or did not have time to gain faith. A feature of modern conditions of spiritual and moral education is that parents will have to master its traditions not only pedagogically (as applied to children), but also on a personal level (as applied to themselves). They will have to solve a double problem:
1.become carriers of the spiritual and moral culture and way of life that they seek to instill in children;
2. to create and continuously support in the family such a cultural, psychological and spiritual atmosphere in which the child's initial aspiration for the sublime, holy and good would be formed and consolidated.
Difficulties on the way to solving these problems are
1) modern secularized sociocultural environment,
2) the scarcity of social experience in mastering the traditions of Orthodox education,
3) the lack of clear, systematized ideas of parents about the traditions of the domestic family pedagogical culture and the lack of personal spiritual experience,
4) the lack of a system of spiritual and moral education of parents, pedagogical and spiritual and moral assistance to the family in raising children,
5) the spiritual weakness of today's children and parents.
In a society whose ideal is success, prosperity, any weakness causes irritation, a desire to somehow get rid of the burdensome problem as soon as possible. Therefore, modern parents have to personal experience hardly
– gain an essential understanding of fatherhood and motherhood,
Master your parenting as a patient and merciful service to God and others,
Learn to react to problems arising in the development and behavior of the child, not by irritation and active rejection, but, on the contrary, by increasing her patience and love. The spiritual poverty of a fierce child's soul can only be filled with a merciful and heartfelt parental love... Such a lively and creative love that does not accept stereotypes, we all need to learn today.
2 meeting script
Dear Parents! Today we are gathered to talk about family traditions and culture of the Christian family..
Family is a big word!
Family is a resounding word!
Family is an important word
Everyone will tell you about it.
Family is the sun shining
Family is the stars in the sky
Family is all love.
The love of sons and fathers,
Love of daughters and mothers.
We give you our love! ...
A.V. Sidorova
We have reviewed and discussed all your suggestions and essays. We really liked the tradition of the family_ (the names of the parents are called) ________________________________________:
"We are always together ..." With your permission, I will read an excerpt from your composition. This is a very touching story .. Tell us, please, about this tradition.
^ In preparation for the meeting, the parents answered the QUESTIONNAIRE questions, now we have carried out the analysis and will report the results.
What do you think, children's holidays in the family are good tradition? Do our children need them? (listen to the parents' answers and summarize)
3. ANALYSIS OF THE QUESTIONNAIRE.
Yes, a child needs a holiday like air for full development. A holiday for a child is not what it is for us adults. A holiday is an event in a child's life, and a child counts his days from holiday to holiday, as we do our years from one important event to another. And vice versa, “this childhood would be dull and gray if holidays were thrown out of it,” wrote KD Ushinsky.
4.CREATIVE ACTIVITIES
^ Game "Question - answer".
We offer parents a flower - Seven-flowered flower. Parents, at will, tear off the petal, read the question, and together we discuss the answer.Parallel to some questions include a tape recording with children's answers .
1. Can the holidays help in bringing up positive character traits in a child?
^
2.Can I have children at the same festive table with adults? In what cases, yes, no?
3. Offer a fun birthday party game for children.
4. What holidays, besides birthday, do you arrange for the child?
^
5. You are invited to visit. What rules and in what form do you remind your child?
6. You are waiting for guests, friends of your child. What do you remind him of before the guests arrive?
^
7. Children who came to visit scattered toys. What should the owners do?
8. Your child was presented with a toy that he already has. What will he do?
^
9. What gifts do you give to children?
10. How do you organize children's parties in your family?
TOTAL after the GAME "Question - Answer".
Holidays for a child are a good family tradition. Riddles, quizzes, cognitive games- develop the mind of the child. There is a holiday in the house - you need to prepare gifts, decorate the room, wash everything, clean up - this is how work enters into the life of a child. And when we sing, draw, read poetry, dance, make up, listen to music - aren't we educating our children aesthetically?
What holiday will pass without fun outdoor games, where agility and quick wits contribute to healthy growth?
5. RESULTS OF THE MEETING
-I would like to sum up the meeting: a family is a collective. Let it be small, of different ages, but a team. And in festive concerns, educational wealth is clearly manifested teamwork... The family is the basis of all that is good, positive, that is, in a child. Respect and love for family traditions is laid in the family! Love your children, respect their opinions, desires and they will answer you in kind! Make friends with children!
^ Reading the poem by A. Lopatina "Make friends with children ».
Do not spare time for children,
See the adults in them,
stop fighting and getting angry,
Try to make friends with them.
Try not to blame them,
Learn to listen, understand.
Warm them up with your warmth
Let the house become a fortress for them.
Try with them, search,
Talk about everything in the world,
Always guide them invisibly
And help them in all matters.
Learn to trust children -
Every step does not need to be checked
Respect their opinion and advice,
Children are wise men, don't forget.
Adults, hope for children
And love them with your whole soul
In a way that cannot be described.
Then you will not lose your children!
And I also want to add about the family
^
Family - protection from offense,
For kids, she is like a shield.
How strong is she armor
From cold and from fire.
Trouble happened to the baby
The family will always understand him;
Sometimes he scolds for a prank
But all the same, then he will forgive.
Family is a magic land of love,
She's like a precious paradise
In which faith and dream
It never dries up.
All children on earth need
Families are a magical land
To love and regret
So they can take off
.
^
Listen, here's my family:
Grandpa, grandmother and brother.
We have order in the house, okay
And cleanliness, why?
We have two mothers in our house
Two dads, two sons,
Sister, daughter-in-law, daughter,
And the youngest - I
What a family we have.
The modern family is strengthened by the emotional bonds between parents and children. The nature of a child's emotional well-being or distress is determined by his emotional relationship with adults in the family. Communication with adults is one of the critical factors that affect the development of the child.
Family traditions -
of course, these are holidays that are celebrated by all family members, gala dinners on weekends, when the whole family is assembled and the festive service is given. It may be a tradition to plant a tree or under New Year decorate a living tree. It is a tradition to visit exhibitions, theaters and museums with your child. These are joint games. This is also a congratulation from relatives. This includes traditional hikes, walks and picnics in nature. This is the compilation of their own pedigree, and the compilation of family albums. These are also the holidays on the occasion of the child's birthdays.
3. CONCLUSION
Tradition is translated as historically established and passed on from generation to generation forms of activity and behavior, and the corresponding customs, rules, values.traditions are a factor in the regulation of human life, this is the basis of raising children
The upbringing of a child begins with the relationship that reigns in the family between the parents. In the minds of children, habits similar to adults, tastes, preferences, preferences are deposited long before the process of realizing what is happening begins. After all, the construction of children's behavior isfollowing the example of copying.
Children are brought up not only by their parents as such, but also by the family life that develops. Attach tofamily traditionscan be on personal example the parents themselves.
It is with the family that the introduction to culture begins, the child masters the foundations of material and spiritual culture. In a family, human forms of behavior are also formed: thinking and speech, orientation in the world of objects and relationships, moral qualities, aspirations, ideals.
It is the family that gives rise to a sense of the continuity of generations, and through this, involvement in the history of a kind, and the development of the ideals of patriotism. The family, having provided stability, reveals the abilities, strengths in a family member. And when raising children, no other institution can replace the family, it belongs to herleading role in the development of the child's personality.
Traditions and Holidays
Traditions are usually associated with holidays. Before the revolution, they were attached to church year, and this was beautifully described by I. Shmelev in his book "The Lord's Summer", which became an anthology of Christian life for us - those who came to the Church after a long Soviet "pause" of unbelief.
We tried our best to imitate the family structure that took shape in tsarist Russia for centuries, but often without success. Why? Because time has changed a lot. And if in Soviet times the holidays were still tied to church holidays - the same New Year - to Christmas, March 8 - to Maslenitsa, May 1 - to Easter - then the post-Soviet period began to gravitate towards Western European values. Suddenly, it turned out that young people are happy to celebrate Halloween and Valentine's Day, which had never been heard of before. Note that these holidays are in no way tied to Russian, traditional holidays. However, the internal need for their consolidation, obviously, was, since they took root on our land.
Traditions and internal needs of the family
And yet, the creation of intra-family traditions depends only on the family itself: on its capabilities, on its orientation. Church traditions are inevitably consolidated among believers. For example, we make sure to bake our Easter cakes and paint our own eggs for Easter, despite the fact that many mothers of my age remark with surprise: “Why? You can still buy it in the supermarket, and quite inexpensively! "
To understand that these very actions and efforts to prepare your own personal special meal are a family tradition, you yourself must try to accomplish this little feat, at least once in your life! My relatives do not have any questions about the expediency of such actions - and precisely because from year to year we have been preparing for the main holiday of the year for more than ten years now. And if Christmas traditionally still remains a universal holiday, according to its traditions - a world holiday, then Easter and name days are already purely our Orthodox tradition. That is why it is interesting in the context of this article.
Church traditions as an established value
By the way, exactly church holidays bring into the life of a believing family many beautiful traditions fixed for centuries: birch branches for Trinity and fluffy willow for Vai Week, a Christmas tree and Easter cakes, birthday pies and apples on Spas. But what a beautiful female tradition is to wear blue kerchiefs for the Mother of God, green ones for Trinity, etc.
All this came or passed from those very prosperous times, when family traditions fit perfectly into national politics. It was good for our ancestors to fast, when the markets all switched to selling lean products, meat was not served in taverns, even theaters stopped working. By the way, my friend, who visited Greece during Lent, said that she could not visit the open-air theater in Athens, because the performances began only after Easter.
Family tradition strengthens the “social unit”
I will note that even such simple traditions did not appear due to the desire to consolidate them in our family, but arose naturally, based on the needs of our particular family, from its Everyday life, from the repetition of the annual cycle. The more important it is for everyone to understand that only traditions, only repeating general actions are able to strengthen the family, to connect everyone with each other with common interests and common values.
The Russian family has never been distinguished by individualism, like the Western one. It has always been strange for us to see people who lived in a family, each by himself, each with his own, separate and independent life. Our family has never been a free meeting of individuals contemplating each other at a distance, on the contrary, it is a common common being, albeit somewhat forced and not always easily tolerated, but living according to common laws.
The family is a reliable rear, it is something that will always support, endure, calm and help in difficult times. That is why, in a moment of joy, it is a common and indescribably multiplied by the number of participants, the joint joy of communication. The family tradition not only strengthens the family, it gives it the necessary impulse to live on, to love each other in sorrow and joy. Children, of course, do not make such vows to their parents, but relations of mutual assistance are consolidated in joint actions and also become a good tradition.
We are the creators of modern traditions
I will only repeat myself: to plant traditions from the outside is a completely useless exercise. Only those of them that are supported by internal necessity take root, and therefore every family now has to develop its traditions - personally. Only over time can such traditions acquire a nationwide scale, as was the case with church pre-revolutionary traditions or with the tradition of celebrating Women's Day, about which so many copies were beaten by church people, but which still remained the only women's holiday of such a general scale.
Nowadays there are practically no such national traditions left. What is being celebrated is by inertia and without its former scope. This speaks about the crisis of the state, but also about the crisis of the family as a whole. We must not allow our family to become the occasional temporary residence of individuals. This situation will gradually but steadily destroy our society from the inside.
Taking all the best from the past experience of the Russian family and reworking it in accordance with specific modern conditions - this is the task that each family faces if it wants to remain friendly and strong.
So, it turns out that it is we with you today - the creators of new good family traditions. It is both pleasant and responsible at the same time. It turns out that it depends on us what the family of our child will subsequently celebrate - Halloween or Easter.
Modern society is divided into people of faith and atheists, into true Christians, living according to the laws of the church and honoring God and people far from the Faith, vegetating in worldly vanity. Family spiritual values are passed down from generation to generation, but many families are just starting their Orthodox path from the very beginning, having lost continuity for almost a century of persecution of the Church. How to start an Orthodox family in modern society and to preserve the traditions of the Orthodox family, this question is asked by many true believing Christians who strive to create a Small Church out of a family.
Orthodox marriage
The Russian Orthodox family means the union of baptized men and women, blessed by the Church, and living according to the laws Orthodox faith... The bride and groom, who are in love with each other, gradually come to mutual love in Christ. One of the most important goals of the Orthodox family is the goal of preserving an honest immaculate marriage, which consists in avoiding lust, carnal pleasures and adultery. The indisputable wisdom of Christian marriage lies in the fact that husband and wife do not exert pressure and do not limit the freedom of action of each other, that is, such a marriage is built on the absolute trust of the husband and wife. And this trust, and confidence in each other is secured by God's blessing for marriage.
How are children raised in an Orthodox family?
There are often many children in an Orthodox family and every child is loved. Raising children in an Orthodox family is based on love and trust in each other. The elders help their parents to educate the younger ones, while drawing out experience for their future family life, and the younger ones take an example from them. Children baptized at an older age find it more difficult to accept the Church than children baptized in infancy. Kids live and grow up with a sense of Faith instilled in them by their parents. Joint prayers support the traditions of the Russian Orthodox family, unite it and allow children to get used to the fact that it is impossible to live without talking to God. For the first time in their lives, children in an Orthodox family are faced with submission to the authority of the father and mother, and this experience is the most important in a difficult situation. life path softened by love for the ruling and submissive person. By following the instructions of the parents and observing the prohibitions, the child gains inner freedom, realizing that the authority of an older person is not intended to break his character, humiliate or enslave him. By accepting punishment not as punishment, but as an instruction, the child learns to live correctly. In an Orthodox family, parents must learn to restrain and suppress their anger, not get irritated, and be able to punish with love.
Seeing how the parents love him in a Christian way, the child adopts the experience that will be useful to him in the future in the matter how to start an Orthodox family, create in it an atmosphere of striving for God, i.e. to approve the statement “family is the Little Church”.
Unchanging traditions of the Orthodox family
By keeping traditions of the Orthodox family, we become a part of the body of the Church and pass it on from generation to generation national characteristics Russian Orthodox Church. The behavior of each member of an Orthodox family in everyday life, at feasts, holidays should be religious in nature, while preserving spiritual values. It is difficult to imagine a Christian family without traditions and customs inherited by great-grandfathers. The culture of patriotic fidelity and national feeling was brought up in the family, having at its core a special relationship to the veneration of ancestors and fatherly graves. The main goal Orthodox family today, as at all times, remains the preservation and transmission of spiritual and religious values from generation to generation.
