In everyday life, a Christian is not much different from an ordinary person. Worship is another matter.
Among Orthodox Christians-Old Believers, the ancient pious custom of wearing special clothes for prayer in church is preserved. In fact, it is the same attire as was used in Ancient Russia in everyday life: a kaftan or a Russian shirt with a skew collar, worn untucked and under the belt, for men, and a sarafan for women.
A woman covers her head with a scarf. According to the tradition of central and northern Russia, it is pinned in front in a special way with a pin. In the southern regions of Russia, Ukraine, Moldova, and Romania, the scarf is tied with a knot. A scarf should be made of opaque fabric, not bright or colorful, but modest and decent for prayer and being in church. A woman should cover her head so that no hair is visible. A pinned scarf covers the shoulders and chest. On Sundays and feasts, it is customary to wear white scarves and those of other light colors. On fasting days (this also includes the feasts of the Exaltation of the Honourable Cross, September 27, and the Beheading of John the Baptist, September 11), black scarves and those of other dark colors are worn. A married woman must also
wear a povoinik (kichka) under her headscarf – a special cap that the priest blesses her with prayer during the wedding.
If there is no possibility to sew a sarafan or caftan for prayer, ordinary modest, neat clothes, loosely fitting the body parts, dull in color, with long sleeves, are suitable for visiting the temple.
High-heeled shoes are inappropriate. It is impossible to walk through the temple unnoticed in such shoes, and it will be very difficult to bow to the ground and stand the service to the end.
For men, dress shoes, trousers and an untucked shirt with a belt are appropriate. It is not customary to go to church wearing a tie, short-sleeve shirt, jeans or sportswear.
The question of clothing worthy of a Christian has a rich canonical and literary tradition. Many holy fathers and teachers, who wrote about what a pious Christian should look like, considered this seemingly private issue to be a matter of church-wide significance. According to Canon 71 of the 6th Ecumenical Council, a Christian is excommunicated from the Church if he puts on “some clothing not according to general custom.” Old Believers always took traditional dress seriously, especially the fashion of prayer clothing. In churches today
you can see men in caftans and boots; under the caftan they wear an untucked shirt, belted with a woven or wicker belt with an ornament embroidered with a prayer or a memorial inscription. Women, especially in the choir, wear sarafans and scarves pinned under the chin, and the color of the scarf can change depending on the feast (for example, red is worn on Easter, and green on the Trinity Day). Old Believers, who for some reason do not have such attire, wear decent clothes, which in no case expose either shoulders or arms.
The consecrated council decided to write an admonition to Christians to wear clothes according to local custom but decent, modest, corresponding to the rank of an Orthodox Christian and the house of God – the house of prayer. A similar determination and admonition was made by the Consecrated Council in 1905.
