Icon corner

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
This article is about the religious Red Corner (Icon Corner). For the movie, see Red Corner.
The Sick Man by Vasili Maximov (1881) portrays a woman kneeling in prayer before the icon corner (Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow).
An icon corner in Romania.

The icon corner, sacred corner or red corner, (Greek: εικονοστάσι) is a small Christian worship space prepared in the homes of Eastern Orthodox, Greek-Catholic, Eastern Lutheran and Roman Catholic[1] Christians. It has pre-Christian roots[2] and also appears in homes of Rodnovers.[3] The analogous concept in Western Christianity is the home altar.

History

The

Consecration of a Church. Once a year, the priest will come to bless the house with Theophany Water
.

Background

An Orthodox Christian is expected to pray constantly. According to Bishop

Kallistos Ware, "[I]n Orthodox spirituality, [there is] no separation between liturgy and private devotion."[4] Thus the house, just like the Temple
(church building), is considered to be a consecrated place, and the center of worship in the house is the icon corner.

An icon corner is normally

pussywillow from Palm Sunday, candles from Pascha
(Easter), and other sacred items, as well as a personal Commemoration Book (containing the names of family and loved ones, both living and departed, to be remembered in prayer).

Ideally, the icon corner is located so that it is visible when one first enters the house from the main entrance. Traditionally, when first entering the house, an Orthodox Christian would venerate the icons before greeting the members of the house.

A traditional Orthodox family will gather together every day for morning and evening prayers. Sometimes, at the end of the prayers, the head of the household will take the hand censer and cense the icons and all the members of the household.

Often, in addition to the icon corner, a family will hang a small "portal icon" (usually of the

Virgin
and Christ Child) by the door, which is venerated by family and guests whenever going in or out of the house.

Citations

  1. ^ Pokuć 2014, p. 53–54.
  2. ^ Mosio 2012, p. 154.
  3. ^ Shizhenskiy 2017, p. 164.
  4. ISBN 0-14-020592-6
    ), p. 310.

Sources

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Icon corner.
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