Why did Asterius of Amasea preach against the Festival of the Calends?
By CopticBot.ai (Coptic Space Inc.) · Last reviewed 2026-10-08
In Asterius of Amasea: Sermons (1904), specifically "Sermon 4: On the Festival of the Calends," Asterius delivered an earnest protest against the evils into which New Year's celebrations had drifted during his time.
Foremost among his concerns was that the Festival of the Calends stood in direct contradiction to genuine faith. Asterius observed two celebrations taking place that were "wholly adverse and hostile to each other." While the feast of "holy and true religion" inculcated "acquaintance with God, and the virtue of the purified life," the worldly celebration of the Calends belonged to the "rabble without, gathering, in large sums, the money of mammon, and bringing in its train bargaining, vulgar and mean."
Moreover, Asterius took a firm stand because the revelry caused many believers to neglect their spiritual commitments. Enticed by the "luxury and absorption which arise from vanity," many individuals had entirely "left off going to church." Asterius delivered his sermon to dispel from the souls of his hearers what he described as a "foolish and harmful delight, which as a sort of inflammation of the brain, with laughter and jesting, induces death." To counter this danger, he chose to emulate Solomon—who personified excess as an abandoned woman to instruct young men against the snares of licentiousness—so that by demonstrating the vanity of the human heart, he might successfully "convert the lovers of pleasure from their misdirected zeal."
Finally, Asterius preached against the festival because it completely transgressed the proper nature and order of a public celebration. He taught that the true rule and law of a feast require that it possess a distinct object and that "the mirth be common to all." The Calends failed this standard, producing a dynamic where only a portion enjoyed themselves while others were abandoned to dejection and pain. Asterius condemned this outcome, explaining that such disparity is "characteristic of war rather than of a feast, since it is inevitable that the victors parade in their victory, while the conquered bewail their misfortune."
Sources: Asterius of Amasea: Sermons (1904) pp. 111-129. Sermon 4: On the Festival of the Calends