E-mail: himins@yandex.ru
Moscow, Russian Federation
PhD (Philology), independent researcher
The subject of the article is the attitude of religiously devout orthodox people towards secular holidays, that are popular in contemporary Russia, namely, New Year, the 23th of February, the 8th of March, the 9th of May. Tradition of celebrating these days formed during the Soviet times, to a large extent it was promoted as an alternative opposed to traditional church calendar. For this reason, orthodox people took rather critical stance towards these new traditions. This attitude has persisted even after the collapse of the Soviet Union. In the paper the reception of each secular holiday is successively analyzed. New Year as a central holiday of the year appeared in the 1930s on the basis of rethought urban Christmas traditions. For this reason orthodox people’s attitude to this holiday has always been rather reserved: usually it’s celebrating consists only in modest family table. The 8th of March, which had been established as the holiday of the left feminist movement has become generally accepted «Women’s Day» in the post-war USSR has even more negative connotations. Religiously devout orthodox women usually refuse to celebrate this holiday. They adhere to their own alternative date of female glorification — Sunday of the Myrrh-bearing Wives. Reception of this date as women’s holiday has its roots in Russian folk tradition. The 23th of February, generally accepted as paired to 8th of March «Men’s Day», is considered not so negative — it’s generally accepted as professional military holiday. Orthodox people’s reception of the 9th of May, the Victory day, which contains no historical connections with communist ideology, has not any differences from other Russians.
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