Glorification 2010

The Serbian Orthodox Church’s glorification of Justin Popović as a saint in 2010: the veneration that grew at his Ćelije grave after his death in 1979, the decision of the Holy Assembly of Bishops, and the feast on which St. Justin of Ćelije is now commemorated — 1 June (Old Calendar) / 14 June (New Calendar), with his repose on the Annunciation.

Tradition: Serbian Orthodox (glorified 2010)

From Grave to Shrine

Justin Popović died at the Ćelije convent on the Feast of the Annunciation — 25 March 1979 by the Julian calendar, 7 April by the Gregorian — and was buried there (the biographical apparatus in Popović’s Sabrana dela, ed. Bishop Atanasije Jevtić; and see Ćelije Monastery). The convent to which the communist state had exiled him became almost at once a place of pilgrimage. The veneration of Justin as a holy elder and confessor grew steadily in the last decade of communist Yugoslavia and, more freely, after its fall — sustained by his disciples, now bishops, by the wide circulation of his works, and by the reputation for sanctity that those who had known him at Ćelije attested (Andrew Louth, Modern Orthodox Thinkers: From the Philokalia to the Present, London: SPCK, 2015; Paul Ladouceur, Modern Orthodox Theology: Behold, I Make All Things New, London: T&T Clark, 2019). As with St. Xenia and other saints, the cult preceded and prepared the formal glorification: the faithful venerated Justin before the Church ratified that veneration (cf. the theology of glorification in St. Xenia: Methodology).

The Glorification of 2010

The Holy Assembly of Bishops (Sabor) of the Serbian Orthodox Church resolved to enter Justin Popović into the diptychs of the saints in 2010, decreeing his glorification and the establishment of his feast (the act of the Serbian Holy Assembly of Bishops, 2010; Ladouceur, Modern Orthodox Theology, 2019, noting the glorification). The glorification of “St. Justin the New of Ćelije” (Sveti Justin Ćelijski) recognized him as a saint of the Serbian Orthodox Church — venerated in the double character in which he had lived: as a confessor who had suffered the enmity of the atheist state and borne decades of internal exile without yielding, and as a great theologian and ascetic, the dogmatician of the God-Man (see The Confessor Under Communism; The Dogmatician).

The glorification set the seal on the movement of Serbian Orthodox renewal that Justin and his elder had led. St. Nikolai Velimirović had been glorified by the same Church a few years earlier, in 2003 (see Disciple of Saint Nikolai; St. Nikolai Velimirović); with Justin’s glorification in 2010, the two great fathers of modern Serbian Orthodoxy — the prophet-poet and the dogmatician — were both numbered among the saints, and the theological line running from them through the Justinian bishops was, in effect, ratified by the Church (Ladouceur, Modern Orthodox Theology, 2019; and see The Justinian Bishops).

The Feast

St. Justin of Ćelije is commemorated on 1 June by the Julian calendar — 14 June by the Gregorian — the feast at which the Serbian Orthodox Church celebrates his memory (the liturgical commemoration of St. Justin the New of Ćelije; the Serbian Church calendar). His repose on the Annunciation (25 March / 7 April) is also remembered, but because the Annunciation is one of the Great Feasts of the Lord and the Theotokos, the distinct saintly commemoration is kept on the June date (on the Great Feasts, cf. Orthodoxy: Great Feasts). The symmetry of his birth and death — both on the Annunciation, eighty-five years apart — is regularly noted in his commemoration as a mark of providence over his life (the biographical apparatus, Sabrana dela; and see Blagoje Popović of Vranje).

The Cult Today

The center of the cult is Ćelije itself, where Justin’s relics rest and where pilgrims come; his icon — depicting the bearded elder-theologian, often with a scroll or book — has spread through the Serbian Orthodox world and beyond, and services and an akathist to him have been composed (the liturgical materials for St. Justin the New; Ladouceur, Modern Orthodox Theology, 2019). His veneration is not confined to Serbia: he is honored across the Orthodox world, and — in a fact inseparable from the reception debate — with particular fervor in the traditionalist and anti-ecumenist milieux that claim him as their patron (see How His Stance Is Received Today). The glorification thus placed the Church’s authority behind a saint whose theological witness remains, in one of its dimensions, actively contested — a tension the honest observer notes rather than resolves.

What the Glorification Claims and Does Not Claim

It is worth stating precisely, in the terms this repository uses, what the glorification of 2010 does and does not settle. In glorifying Justin, the Serbian Orthodox Church recognized and ratified his holiness — the sanctity of his life of prayer, asceticism, confession, and love, attested by the cult and by those who knew him (cf. the theology of ecclesial glorification in St. Xenia: Methodology). It did not thereby canonize every sentence of his polemics or resolve the dispute over how his critique of ecumenism should be applied; the veneration of a saint is the reception of a holy life, not the certification of every position he held (see How His Stance Is Received Today; Legacy and Assessment). The Church glorified the confessor and the man of God; the theological questions his writings raise remain, as such questions always do, open to the Church’s continuing discernment.

See Also

References

  • Serbian Orthodox Church, Holy Assembly of Bishops (Sveti Arhijerejski Sabor), act of glorification of St. Justin (Popović) of Ćelije, 2010. (The decree of glorification and the establishment of the feast.)
  • Popović, Justin. Sabrana dela. Ed. Bishop Atanasije (Jevtić) et al. Belgrade: Manastir Ćelije. (Biographical apparatus: the dates of repose and the cult.)
  • Ladouceur, Paul. Modern Orthodox Theology: Behold, I Make All Things New. London: T&T Clark (Bloomsbury), 2019. (The glorification and Justin’s standing; Nikolai’s glorification in 2003.)
  • Louth, Andrew. Modern Orthodox Thinkers: From the Philokalia to the Present. London: SPCK, 2015. (The growth of the cult and Justin’s reputation.)
  • Liturgical materials (service and akathist) for St. Justin the New of Ćelije; the Serbian Orthodox Church calendar (feast on 1/14 June).