Orthodox faith permeated the everyday lives of Byzantine men and women, not just when they attended church services, but at home, in the streets and even at work. The liturgical calendar, which designated certain days of the week for fasting and Sundays for worship, provided a temporal framework for the pious. Each day of the year had a special significance, whether it was a dominical feast day of Christ, a celebration of the Virgin Mary, a saint’s day, or a commemoration of key events in the lives of Christ and His Mother. Ecclesiastical rituals sanctified life passages, such as birth, marriage and death. Finally, in addition to their concerns about life on earth, Byzantines focused intensely on the afterlife, with eternal salvation as their foremost goal.
The laity at church
The Byzantine landscape, whether urban or rural, was marked by ecclesiastical structures of varying size, shape and purpose. Within the city, the laity had access to large-scale metropolitan churches, which often retained the architectural form of the venerable basilicas constructed in the early centuries of the empire. Judging from the size of the medieval basilicas that still stand in Berroia, Kalambaka, Servia, Ohrid and Edessa (medieval Vodena), as well as in other large and small Byzantine cities, hundreds of parishioners could have been accommodated within the body of a single church. These buildings provide us the spatial context in which to imagine the powerful sermons of such figures as Gregory Palamas, who, as bishop of Thessalonike (1347–59), brought the city’s residents to the heights of religious fervour.