The decisions of the Church councils and the writings of the Church Fathers are insufficient in preserving the Church tradition.
The Laymen have an essential role in preserving tradition alive, by practising it in their daily life and their worship.
For traditional Church life cannot be transmitted by canons or through books but through practice and life.
Every true believer represents a living stone of the spiritual temple of God.
He is laid on other previous living stones, i.e., he ‘receives the traditional life Church from the past generations, and at the same time he bears other living stones, i.e., he deposits this life into the life of the future generations. Thus, he becomes a living ‘member of the Church of Christ, who transmits its traditional life by practising it daily.
Now, we can define the “traditional believers” not as those who study accurately the Church canons and acknowledge the details of the rites or recite the church hymns etc... but rather who discover their unity with God in Jesus Christ by the Holy Spirit through preserving and practising the Church canons, rites, hymns etc...
The Laymen have an essential role in preserving tradition alive, by practising it in their daily life and their worship.
For traditional Church life cannot be transmitted by canons or through books but through practice and life.
Every true believer represents a living stone of the spiritual temple of God.
He is laid on other previous living stones, i.e., he ‘receives the traditional life Church from the past generations, and at the same time he bears other living stones, i.e., he deposits this life into the life of the future generations. Thus, he becomes a living ‘member of the Church of Christ, who transmits its traditional life by practising it daily.
Now, we can define the “traditional believers” not as those who study accurately the Church canons and acknowledge the details of the rites or recite the church hymns etc... but rather who discover their unity with God in Jesus Christ by the Holy Spirit through preserving and practising the Church canons, rites, hymns etc...
+ Fr. Tadros Malaty, Traditon and Orthodoxy, 51
