“Preaching to the choir” means trying to convince someone who already agrees with you. It comes from the church, where the choir stood behind the preacher. It’s used to indicate agreement and can also suggest that further discussion is pointless.
Preaching to the choir is an English idiom meaning that a person is trying to get or persuade another person or group to believe or agree with something they already believe or agree with. Preaching to the choir and preaching to the converts are similar idioms with the same meaning, but preaching to the choir is the most commonly used.
This particular idiom derives from the traditional church where the choir, or choir, of a church stands behind the preacher who sings hymns expressing the faith of the church while the preacher delivers a sermon, hoping to reach the unbelievers in the congregation. The preacher would not turn around and deliver the sermon to the choir rather than the congregation, as this would be considered a futile or pointless act. Therefore, the idiom reflects the same principle.
Someone might say “you are preaching to the chorus” if you offer a heated or impassioned explanation of your social, political or moral views and they already agree with your position. This is a way of letting you know that there is or will not be any debate about what you are saying and that I fully agree. They might even insinuate that you can stop spending energy trying to convince them of your point because it’s a point they’ve already made on their own.
Similarly, an individual may rant or vent their feelings about a topic and conclude with a statement such as, “I know, I’m preaching to the choir.” This is an expression that indicates that the person simply wanted to vent his feelings about an issue with someone he knew would understand and agree with him, rather than someone who would discuss the issue or offer a different perspective.
While the idiom is rarely used in conjunction with a verbal insult in social conversation, it could be an indicator that the speaker is wasting his or her time in a conversation and should move on to another topic.
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