Copyrighted material. For private use only.
On 18 October in the Russian Federation Government Building a regular session of the Commission of Religious Questions of the government of RF was held under the chairmanship of deputy chairman of the government of RF, Valentina Matvienko. The session heard a report from the Ministry of Justice of RF. According to ministry data, 56 percent of previously registered religious organizations have undergone reregistration. Among the reasons for the unsatisfactory pace of reregistration which were noted was insufficient action on the part of leaders of confessions in submitting the charter documents required by law. The commission recommended that executive governmental agencies facilitate the acceleration of this process. A discussion arose over the question of working out state educational standards for the "Theology" degree. Members of the commissions and representatives of a number of religious organizations expressed their opinion regarding the benefits of its introduction into state educational institutions. The commission recommended to the Ministry of Education of Russia that it give further study to this question. To this end it was suggested that meetings, seminars, and "round tables" for thorough discussion be conducted, with participation of all interested parties. A decision was made to create a working group, including interested ministries and religious organizations, for improving the regulatory bases for issues of turning over to religious organizations federally owned property that has religious significance. (tr. by PDS, posted 22 October 2000)
NEW RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS UNDER THREAT IN RUSSIA
Agence France Presse, 20 October 2000
Nearly half of new religious movements which operate in Russia could be banned in 2001 if they do not submit proper documents to register, the Russian foreign ministry warned Friday.
A 1997 law makes it harder for new, often aggressively active religious movements to operate in Russia, forcing them to register with the government while traditional religions do not have to do so.
According to the foreign ministry, only 56 percent of the new groups (8,962) have registered. If the remainder do not comply by December 31, 2000, they will be forced to cease their activities, it said in a statement.
Russian Interior Minister Vladimir Rushailo recently said he was "concerned" about the expansion of sects in Russia, adding that the situation threatened national security.
The United States earlier this month condemned what it classed as a recent spate of religious intolerance in Russia and called on the Russian authorities to take measures to remedy the situation.
Washington has repeatedly sought to protect the rights of members of the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Church of Latter Day Saints (Mormons) in Russia. (posted 22 October 2000)
In the town of Tsageri, located in western Georgia, the police brutally treated the members of the "Watchtower" sect, better known as "Jehovah's Witnesses." The sectarians arrived in Tsageri from various parts of the country, but instead of conducting joint prayer services they were forced to defend themselves from the police. Representatives of the sect claim that the local forces of order acted on instructions from Tbilisi.
In contemporary Georgia the dispersal of sectarians would not be a remarkable event but the issue is that Georgia already is on the secret "black list" of the Council of Europe because of the Jehovists. There, because of the efforts of the chair of the Committee on Cooperation with Georgia, Ursula Shleikher, a document is being drawn up which, upon adoption, will define Georgia as a country in which there is religious intolerance.
The difficulties for the Jehovists began when Guram Sharadze decided to go after them. A person of nationalistic orientation, he managed to get a district court of the Georgian capital to review the registration of the Jehovah's Witnesses. The sectarians were declared outside the law because of the incompatibility of their doctrine with Georgian legislation which forbids the propagation of ideas whose implementation could cause physical or moral harm to the individual. Subsequently very brutal and cynical acts of dispersal and violence against Jehovists were reported throughout the country, which provided a basis to speak of organized persecutions of the sectarians. And priests often were observed among the perpetrators.
When the matter reached the stage of an international uproar, the Georgian Orthodox church issued a declaration in which it declared that it was not involved in the pogroms. The entire blame for the incidents was placed on a priest who was excommunicated long ago and on his devotees. This ex-priest, who assumed an inquisitorial and exorcist mission, has distinguished himself subsequently on many occasions by showing up almost simultaneously in various parts of Georgia where any Jehovist talk has been noticed.
But an excommunicated and unfrocked priest, whose actions fall into the criminal category of hooliganism, is one thing; an attack on sectarians by police is another. But for Georgia there could be very serious difficulties in the Council of Europe, of which Georgia is very proud to be a member. Religious intolerance, like racial and national discrimination, is just about the greatest crime in the eyes of democratic Europe. (tr. by PDS, posted 21 October 2000)
FREEDOM OF CONSCIENCE OR FREEDOM OF CONFLICT?
Activity of religious extremists in Georgia is considered by the patriarchate
as discrediting the Orthodox church
by Nodar Broladze
Nezavisimaia gazeta, 17 October 2000
The construction of civil society in Georgia with rigorously functioning rules of a "democratic community" seems not to inspire everybody. Moreover the Georgian public has been practically forced to observe with alarm phenomena that exceed contemporary social norms. The issue is something that amounts to local crusades. It is difficult to say anything different about the recent militant attack of a mad crowd upon the offices of the independent newspaper "Rezonansi," led by a citizen dressed in clerical garb.
The anger of the thugs was brought out by articles that condemned people who had a medieval frame of mind. This time the false clerics and their flocks reached such a frenzy that they welded shut the entrance to the editorial office and threatened its workers with violence and anathema.
The reporters' error was that they provided a thoroughly adequate assessment of the conduct of the aggressive fanatics who undertook the defense of the purity of Christian doctrine from "infringements" on the part of local adherents of the Jehovah's Witnesses. This religious organization with its numerous groups and affiliates was created with the aid of representatives of foreign countries that operated in Georgia contrary to the interests of the defenders and zealots of Georgian Orthodoxy. The conflict that began several years ago has lasted until now and it has led the Jehovists into court. These trials have mostly been won by Jehovah's Witnesses because the decisions were made in accordance with specifics of existing legislation. One of the suits filed for prohibiting Jehovist activity in the country was recently approved, although the Jehovah's Witnesses, who have been activated by the intolerance of their opponents, are not about to surrender and they have taken countermeasures. However the question is not just about the legislative requirements, since a law on religion has still not been adopted and many judicial decisions are based on the provisions of the constitution.
The situation gives direct evidence of the deficiency of the cultural views of that portion of society that somehow is trying to hinder the free development of democratic processes. Since it is not possible to suspect the patriarchate of sympathy for the Jehovists and the law enforcement agencies have not taken sufficient measures against the hooligan priests, those who hate the Jehovists and other "unchristians" enjoy a certain support. It suffices to recall the two beaten youths who showed up in front of the courthouse after one of the judicial sessions.
The occasion for the bloody beating of sectarians was the conduct by the Jehovists of a special meeting for accepting a number of citizens into their community. While the response of the extremists had a religious tinge, it also displayed characteristics of the political and social aspects of the past decade. No fewer than 100 persons, mostly women, attacked the headquarters of the Jehovists. They were led by the former priest Fr Vasily, who four years earlier had broken with the patriarchate on the issue of ecumenism. But the point is that the issue of ecumenism has been abandoned by the holy father to the opponents of the patriarchate who are primarily Zviadists [followers of Zviad]. Father Vasily (secular name, Vasily Mkalavishvili) drove away priests who were appointed in the diocese, beat up the Orthodox clergy he did not like, and flagrantly ignored decrees of the Catholicos Patriarch of all Georgia, Ilia II. The group that supports Vasily has since been characterized by the adherence of most of its members to the former president Zviad Gamsakhurdia.
Father Vasily, who mixed his ministry with politicized events in defense of the ideas of the Zviadists, often was the focus of attention of society at large. In 1995 the Holy Synod deposed him from the clerical rank, after which he was an ordinary citizen. However, after he was removed from the church he continued to celebrate the liturgy under the open sky. He attempted to set himself up as an alternative spiritual leader of Orthodox Christians in one of the districts of the Georgian capital and to establish his influence against that of the patriarchate, and so he began organizing attacks on a district scale upon the meeting places of sectarians and Jehovists. Since then loud summons have resounded, to destroy the "satanic forces" and to eliminate the nests of the heterodox. Sometimes they beat women severely and pulled their hair, but they also attacked the men. When they first attacked the Jehovists the "holy father" assaulted several sect members with a heavy cross. But people of his team were even more zealous. The pogroms became more thorough.
The culprits in the first outburst were arrested, but then they were released, including the former priest Vasily, from whom promises not to leave were elicited. However a signature on a document promising not to leave was no means of "reformation." And militant processions to teach a lesson to the Jehovists and their involuntary "accomplices," who defended democratic liberties for the youth, continued, which evoked even greater agitation in public and nongovernmental organizations. A criminal case on the charge of hooliganism and damage to public buildings was initiated in the city police administration. However this only motivated the religious extremists to achieve new "feats." Unfortunately parliament delayed in the adoption of a law on religion, the need for which was often noted. There is no clear basis to make such disruptive actions clearly criminal or to establish the state's attitude toward one or another sect, and this situation encourages contemporary religious and political obscurantists.
Obviously the Orthodox church is not enthusiastic about the activity of the Jehovah's Witnesses in Georgia. And obviously this is not just a matter of different reading of religious texts nor attempts of one or another sectarian movement to interpret sacred scriptures. Nor is it just that the Orthodox church and the patriarchate are trying to block an independent approach to the study and acceptance of Christianity. Although all of this cannot but upset clerics. The Jehovists, in the opinion of the church hierarchs, at every opportunity are trying to recruit into their ranks naive and unstable citizens and to lead them to renounce Orthodoxy. However this does not mean, according to representatives of the patriarchate, that the attacks of the religious extremists of Vasily Mkalavishvili's team could be approved in the least. The position of the Orthodox clergy is that by their outrageous, but criminal, actions the followers of Mkalavishvili are attempting to draw attention to themselves from the public and political circles and to promote themselves as the most active and consistent advocates of the triumph of Orthodoxy. In reality this promotes the disorientation of believers and the creation of a situation where religious associations are persecuted. Such an impression can produce an undesired effect. For example, it could evoke sympathy for the Jehovists. The patriarchate sees a serious threat in the outburst of the extremists that discredits the Orthodox church. Many observers consider that "these people are a kind of pathological misanthropic sect that is much more fearsome than the Jehovists or anybody else."
One cannot but note that the appearance of intolerance in such an aggressive form ten years ago characterized a portion of the followers of Zviadism. Zviad Gamsukhrdia served for a substantial portion of the population that was marginalized on the basis of a religious perspective, as a kind of compensation for their helplessness. And their current leaders resist integration into the international community and attempt to avoid the influence of western civilization and culture.
The overwhelming majority of people who support such views give a positive assessment of the actions of the makers of the pogrom. They enjoy the support of a small group of nationalistic deputies, who are nostalgic for the times when the country was ruled by Zviad. It is obvious that such a development will not improve the image of a country which achieved its independence with no intention of establishing its autonomy in isolation from international relations. (tr. by PDS, posted 21 October 2000)
COURT IN REPUBLIC OF GEORGIA CONVICTS VICTIMS OF MOB ATTACK ON JEHOVAH'S
WITNESSES
For Immediate Release October 5, 2000 (source unidentified)
TBILISI, GEORGIA On September 28, two victims of a mob attack were themselves convicted of "hooliganism," while two of the attackers were not. The victims will appeal the decision.
The Gldani-Nadzaladevi Court in Tbilisi convicted Marian Abaradze and Zaza Koshadze, two victims of an October 1999 mob attack on a religious meeting of Jehovah's Witnesses in Gldani. Gldani. Abaradze was sentenced to three years probation, and Koshadze to 6 months.
Despite the public prosecutor's request, the judge refused to convict two women who had admitted participating in the attack. One of the women told the court that she had burned literature belonging to Jehovah's Witnesses and would do it again. The claim against these women was sent back for further investigation. The prosecutor said that he will appeal the decision because there is sufficient evidence to convict the women.
On October 17, 1999, a mob led by defrocked Orthodox priest Basili Mkalavishvili attacked Jehovah's Witnesses, beating men, women and children with clubs and iron crosses. Sixteen victims required hospital treatment. One woman lost part of her vision permanently. State investigators did not charge the leaders of the attack. Instead, two elderly women were charged, as well as two of the victims. To date, no other attackers have been charged. None of the attackers have been convicted.
The decision against Abaradze and Koshadze is scandalous, said defense counsel Mamuka Chabashvili. "The victims are condemned, and admitted wrongdoers go unpunished," he said. "This injustice shows that the entire trial was a farce from the beginning. How can there be a fair hearing when a mob takes over a court and intimidates everyone, including the judge?"
During a recess of the trial on August 16, 2000, a mob of about 80 Orthodox
extremists stormed the courtroom. Security guards watched but did not
interfere. On August 17 outside the courthouse, the same mob attacked and
threw rocks at a journalist and a human rights advocate who were present
to observe the trial. (posted 21 October 2000)
Church in danger of being left without priesthood
by Aleksei Rukavishnikov
Moskovskii komsomolets, 19 October 2000
In his report at the last bishops' council of RPTs in August Patriarch Alexis II sounded a real alarm regarding the state of religious education in Russia. As soon as next year, the patriarch reported, financing of the Moscow and Petersburg seminaries and academies, which in the past ten years have been subsisting on famine rations, will be stopped.
The patriarch's warning was a voice crying in the wilderness. Evidently His Holiness still has not been able to resolve the conflicts between diocesan bishops and church staff workers who are directly responsible for the state of religious education. Both the chairman of the Academic Committee of the patriarchate, Archbishop Evgeny Reshetnikov of Verei, and the chairman of the Department of Religious Education and Catechesis, Hegumen Ioann Ekonomtsev, have often been suspected of financial irregularities. It is they who are guilty of the catastrophic condition of church education in Russia.
The personnel policy of Archbishop Evgeny, the rector of the Moscow ecclesiastical schools, is as simple as can be. To talented teachers receiving 300 rubles per month each, the rector declared, "You should be proud that you are working in the Moscow Ecclesiastical Academy. If you don't like it, leave!" And the teachers are leaving. The rector prelate himself graduated from the academy, after a fashion, with weak grades. However he clearly understands what discipline is; according to students the seminary under the present rector has been transformed into something like a strict regime prison colony. In the hopelessly antiquated dormitory buildings, neighboring the spacious rector's apartments, the future ministers of Christ languish half-starving in cramped quarters and despair. "Doing time" as they put it.
The situation in the St. John the Divine Russian Orthodox University, whose rector is Hegumen Ekonomtsev, is no less bleak. The rector himself, the writer of science fiction novels and erotic poetry, is a refined adept of esoterica and occultism, who is fearfully distant from people. Even bishops suggest that the hegumen's combination of church and occultic ideas in the same bottle is simply too much. He consorts with bohemians and is a friend of oligarchs. He used sponsors' funds donated for restoring the buildings of the Vysoko-Petrov monastery for building his own villa but the rector does not venture to raise the pay of the impoverished teachers.
Ekonomtsev's university receives financial aid from abroad. However, how the funds are distributed nobody knows. But the reconstruction of the Orthodox university lags noticeably behind the construction of the hegumen's dacha. He quite often travels "for therapy" to Germany and the Austrian Alps. One recalls the fate of the talented church intellectual Deacon Andrei. After his forced departure from the Russian Orthodox University he undertook the writing of interminable apologetical works. Once at a meeting with foreign clergy Ekonomtsev expressed the thought that the transformation of the Russian church should happen in a natural "biological" way.
Has the Holy Synod managed to draw the necessary conclusions from the
patriarch's report and save the system of religious education? If the Russian
church does not make timely personnel reform in the near future, it will
be left without literate priests. (tr. by PDS, posted 20 October
2000)
by Oksana Alekseeva
Kommersant, 20 October 2000
For the sake of criminal investigation and morality
Yesterday a briefing on the mutual relations of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) of Russia and the Russian Orthodox church was held at the MVD. The police and church are ready to fight together against crime and to strengthen morality.
As should be expected, there was no briefing but there was a traditional police account, this time about the number of thefts of church valuables each year and the security of churchware, as well as about "joint work for the spiritual and moral training of law enforcement officers."
The head of the administration of regional and public communications of MVD, police General Major Alexander Tolmachev, and a staff member of the department of the patriarchate for relations with the army and law enforcement agencies, Archpriest Aleksei, in almost identical works spoke of the moral support for soldiers of interior troops fighting in Chechnia. At present ten Orthodox priests are ministering there. "If before taking a bullet in the chest for all of us a soldier needs to receive a blessing, then at that time the priest must be next to the soldier in the trench," Archpriest Aleksei said. He phrased his attitude toward hazing in the army extremely laconically: "What father doesn't whip his children? There is nothing horrible in hazing." The main problems in the Russian army, in the archpriest's opinion, come from Russian reporters who falsely describe and reveal the actions of soldiers in their reporting, noting only what is negative. At the end Fr Aleksei said that he considers concrete help for the police on the part of the church to be possible; if a person comes to confession and repents of crimes committed or planned, then the priest should report this to law enforcement agencies, without giving the name of the penitent. That is what the archpriest's notions of confession are like.
General Tolmachev, naturally, thanked the Russian Orthodox church and Patriarch Alexis II personally for everything and he reported that MVD is ready to cooperate closely with other religious confessions, particularly the Muslim and Jewish ones. (tr. by PDS, posted 20 October 2000)
A PRIEST CAN PREVENT TERRORIST ACT
by Svetlana Khazova
Nezavisimaia gazeta, 20 October 2000
"The fundamental task of the Orthodox church in cooperating with MVD is moral and material support of the individual, regardless of religious confession," said the head of the administration of regional and public communications, Alexander Tolkachev, at a briefing yesterday that was devoted to the mutual relations of MVD of Russia and the Russian Orthodox church.
Since August 1996 a number of agreements on cooperation between MVD of the republics, GUVD, UVD of the components of RF, and local diocesan administrations of RPTs have been signed. Priests have been engaged not only in educational and corrective work among law violators but also have shown social support for officers of MVD. Thus, in Orel province the mother superior of a convent set up feeding points for homeless children. The Presentation monastery made its offices available to children of the village of Tolstoi-Yurt.
The chairman of the Department for Relations with Military Forces and Law Enforcement Agencies of the Moscow patriarchate, Archpriest Aleksei, told how sometimes people report that they are intending to commit a crime and the priest can influence the criminal and talk him out of it. Besides that, when a criminal intends to commit a crime against the state, a terrorist act for example, the priest can report to law enforcement agencies the time and place for committing the crime, without revealing the name of the malefactor. According to Archpriest Aleksei, this would not be a violation of the secrecy of the confessional.
The cooperation of MVD with the church is mutually beneficial. Thus at the present time officers of law enforcement agencies have secured around 600 items belonging to the Russian Orthodox church. In the course of six months in 2000, officers of internal affairs solved 101 crimes having to do with theft of historical and church valuables. (tr. by PDS, posted 20 October 2000)
Today at the Kiev railway station in Moscow Patriarch Alexis II of Moscow and all-Rus consecrated a train car to the icon of the Mother of God called the Hodigitria (Pointer of the Way). The Ministry of Transportation donated this train car as a charitable gift to the Saint Sergius Holy Trinity lavra. The car represents a church on wheels with a small bell under the ceiling. The outside of the car is decorated with biblical scenes. A second car will be placed next to it as a residence for the persons who accompany the car. The goal of the mobile church is ministry to Orthodox believers on the territory of Russia and the CIS, especially in places where there are no active churches. (tr. by PDS, posted 20 October 2000)
CHURCH ROLLS ALONG THE RAILS
by Alexander Korolev
Trud, 20 October 2000
This past Wednesday at the Kiev rail station the minister of transportation, Nikolai Aksenenko, handed to Patriarch Alexis II of Moscow and all-Rus a symbolic key to the church train car, a generous gift to the Russian Orthodox church from railroad workers in the bimillennial year of Christianity. Thereby, as the minister noted, a tradition of using mobile churches that existed in prerevolutionary Russia was revived.
The patriarch thanked the specialists of the Voronezh train car renovation factory and the Voitovich Moscow train car construction factory and the artists of the "Sofrino" enterprise and the Saint Sergius Holy Trinity lavra, all of whom planned, equipped, and decorated the mobile church. The primate of the church consecrated it to the Hodigitria icon of the Mother of God (the name means "Pointer of the Way"). On both exterior platforms of the train car church there are large Hodigitria icons.
Within this church will be conducted the divine liturgy, baptisms (it has a font), and weddings. A second car will travel along with the church, which is a comfortable residence for priests. The church car will go to designated places in Russia and countries of CIS with the help of passenger train crews. The core of this kind of church ministry, which is especially needed in remote places, is evangelistic.
The patriarch designated the abbot of the Saint Sergius Holy Trinity lavra, Archimandrite Feognost, Archbishop Ioann of Belgorod and Starooskolsk, and the chairman of the evangelism department of the Moscow patriarchate the trustees of this unusual church.
It is expected that the first journey of "Hodigitria" will be made to Archangel diocese. (tr. by PDS, posted 20 October 2000)
CHURCH SET ON THE RAILS
by Sergei Ionov
Kommersant-Daily, 19 October 2000
Train car consecrated
Yesterday, at the Kiev railway station of Moscow Patriarch Alexis II of Moscow and all-Rus consecrated a church on the railroad. The train car church was donated to the church in the name of railway workers by Minister of Transportation Nikolai Aksenenko.
The car was built by the Voronezh and Moscow Voitovich car renovation factories.
The mechanisms and bodies of two previously used train cars were renovated at Voronezh and made ready for further work. One was designated specifically as a church and the second was supposed to become the train car living cell for priests. The finishing work was entrusted to the Voitovich factory which in the soviet era had a great deal of experience in outfitting lounge cars for members of the Politburo and government.
While the work was still going on, the director of the Voronezh factory, Vitaly Voronov, claimed that they were filling a regular order of the Moscow Railway and he did not know anything about any patriarchate. Nevertheless he admitted that they had to work at a greatly accelerated pace.
At the Voitovich factory the cars were brought up to the necessary conditions. The train car church contains everything that must be in a regular church: altar, iconostasis, and small bell under the ceiling. The car church is even decorated outside. In the residence car there are coupes for the staff of the mobile church, a vestry, and even a small religious library.
Who ordered all of this became evident yesterday. Nikolai Aksenenko donated the car as a gift from the Ministry of Transportation to the Saint Sergius Holy Trinity lavra.
In the mobile church, which is dedicated to the Hodigitria icon of the Mother of God, holy day liturgies and baptisms and funerals of Orthodox believers will be conducted at railroad stations of those towns and settlements throughout Russia where their own churches are not operating.
Patriarch Alexis II thanked the railroad workers and Minister Aksenenko personally for a deed well-pleasing to God and he blessed the donors. (tr. by PDS, posted 20 October 2000)
RUSSIAN CRUSADERS TAKE TO THE RAILWAYS.
Orthodox church battles influx of western missionaries by launching
prayer train to take its faith to remote areas
by Amelia Gentleman in Moscow
The Guardian (UK), 20 October 2000
An extravagantly gilded church on wheels drew out from one of Moscow's central railway stations late last night, embarking on the first stage of an unusual evangelical crusade to some of Russia's most impoverished regions. This mobile church is the latest weapon in an ongoing battle being waged by the Russian Orthodox church to win back believers in remote areas - many of them already being wooed by zealous missionaries from abroad.
The night train arriving in Archangel this morning will be carrying two newly-built church carriages, staffed by six priests and a team of 12 singing trainee clerics.
Moscow railway workers have spent the past six months ripping the plastic brown bunks and floors from redundant train compartments, replacing them with every thing needed to create a Russian Orthodox church: a golden pulpit and altar, a collection of richly-painted icons and bells hanging from the ceiling.
A specialist carriage refitting factory - famous during Soviet times for the luxurious train compartments it built for travelling Politburo members - was contracted to fit out the interior.
Stained glass windows have been fitted in place of the grime-encrusted originals. The gloomy brown and green of the state railway fleet have been stripped away and replaced with gold leaf. The second compartment has been converted into a travelling monastery for up to 20 priests, complete with a small library.
Beggars and drunks were removed from the freshly-scoured platforms at Moscow's Kievsky station for the consecration ceremony on Wednesday - when Patriarch Alexei II sprinkled holy water on to the train. He was joined by the railways minister, Nikolai Aksenenko (a former prime minister and one-time associate of the entrepreneur Boris Berezovsky) whose department paid an undisclosed sum for the project.
"This is the most expensive carriage in all Russia," the deputy head of the train factory revealed. "The gold leaf alone cost 2m roubles [50,000 pounds]."
Over the next few weeks the carriages will travel by night to isolated parts of the frozen northern Archangel region, stopping at distant villages which have tiny railway stations but no church.
During the day the priests will carry out an intensive programme of weddings, funerals and christenings and conduct prayer services for the locals. The trainee clerics will sing from the in-built choir section of the church carriage.
Father Sergei Popov, the train's senior priest, said they would be travelling primarily to regions where there were high levels of unemployment, poverty and alcoholism.
"Most of the village churches were destroyed after the revolution. People like these are in 17desperate need of spiritual support," he said.
He said his mission was also to ensure that this spiritual support was not provided by representatives from the Jehovah's Witnesses movement, the Mormons or any of the international sects which have been recruiting huge numbers of followers in Russia since religious freedom returned.
"We want to bring these lost and neglected people back to the Russian Orthodox faith," Father Popov said.
This is Russia's second church on wheels. Tsar Nicholas II ordered the first to be built in 1896 to take the state religion to the heathen heartland of Siberia. (posted 20 October 2000)
RUSSIAN PRIESTS SAVE SOULS ON THE TRAIN TO ARCHANGEL
by Kevin O'Flynn in Moscow
Telegraph, 22 October 2000
SENIOR Russian Orthodox clergymen are deploying a "church on wheels" to curb poaching by foreign missionaries who have won many converts since the Soviet ban on religious freedom ended.
A lavishly gilded Orthodox train, complete with stained-glass windows, is heading for the frozen Far North, where most villages and communities have not seen a religious minister for decades. It set off for Archangel, in north-west Russia, last week. As it prepared to leave platform two of Moscow's Kievsky station, Patriarch Alexei II, the Orthodox leader, sprinkled holy water on the train's two carriages while a choir sang.
He said: "We bless this church to help people to return to their faith." One of the carriages has been converted from its former drab and sombre brown decor to a chapel decorated with icons of the Virgin Mary and Child. A golden altar serves as the focal point of worship. Bells hang from the ceiling.
Destination signs have been replaced by prayers written in large letters along both sides of the carriage. The second coach provides accommodation for the priests, students and railway workers who will travel on missionary journeys to remote regions.
A typical journey will consist of one day in a village, starting with Mass and a series of weddings, baptisms and other religious ceremonies, before an overnight journey to the next destination. Alexei II said the mobile church would carry the faith to the many small and remote places in Russia that do not have access to a conventional church or priest.
Archpriest Georgy Studyonov, who accompanied Alexei II during the blessing ceremony, said: "Everything is completely like a real church - even better than some churches. I was astounded. It was all done with love."
The Orthodox Church in recent years has stepped up efforts to reach out to remote communities. It already has a number of boat churches, which sail the rivers of the Volga in southern Russia and the Ob in Siberia, bringing services to the riverbanks where churches are uncommon. The Far North is a vast area with few churches and an especially large influx of foreign missionary sects, such as the Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons, whose activities are resented by Orthodox leaders.
As part of efforts to restore the nation's spiritual life after 70 years of communism, about 12,000 churches have been built or renovated over the past decade. The new train is reminiscent of the era of Tsar Nicholas II, who ordered a church on wheels to be built in 1896 to take the Orthodox Mass to the farthest reaches of Siberia.
The idea for a modern version came three years ago when a priest proposed the move at the All Russia Convention for Railway Workers, said Viktor Skorik, the deputy general director of the Moscow Carriage Building Factory, which carried out the project. It was paid for by Russia's Railways Ministry.
Mr Skorik said: "There was a carriage at the start of the century, then there was a break, and now there is again. Today is a return of the memories of the last century." (posted 22 October 2000)
Since the middle of August a wave of articles devoted to the subject of the "president's spiritual advisor" has flooded the mass media which for some reason have been called "liberal." All media have unanimously favored the version that his spiritual advisor is the abbot of the Presentation stauropigial monastery, Archimandrite Tikhon Shevkunov. Long articles have appeared in three prominent publications. "Moskovskii komsomolets" of 16 August published "Spiritual advisor of his majesty." On first glance Aleksei Rukavishnikov's article, written under the careful supervision of Sergei Bychkov, follows MK traditions. But upon careful reading one cannot avoid seeing that the only one who is criticized in it is Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad, while Archimandrite Tikhon is honored as one of the "most consistent critics of the tobacco metropolitan," thanks to whom "recently the influence of prelate [Kirill] Gundiaev among bureaucrats has fallen sharply." His long-time antidemocratic position, which has been proclaimed since 1990 (and for many sounds, for some reason, like "Russian Orthodoxy"), is noted.
The article states directly that "thanks to the archimandrite" the notorious banker Sergei Pugachev obtained "access to the body" (i.e., president-- M.Sh.) Pugachev's financial aid supports the existence of the television program "Russkii dom" and the magazine of the same name and finances the enormous publishing of the Presentation monastery. To be sure, there is no mention that Pugachev got "access" to Chisty Lane without Fr Tikhon's help, but on the contrary the chairman of the administration of Mezhprombank is the guarantor of the economic and churchwide influence of the Transfiguration monastery and its abbot.
The article presents some strange and unconfirmed facts. For example, the MK writer says that "if one trusts Archimandrite Tikhon's claims, Vladimir Putin regularly makes confession to him. It is he who instructs the president in spiritual life." We have tried intensely to recall just where Fr Tikhon claimed such a thing and we could not do it. The text also contains a "swipe" at President Yeltsin, who supposedly "did not suspect" the existence of Archimandrite Ioann Krestiankin, whom Putin greeted on his ninetieth birthday. That is not true. The first president of Russia visited the Pskov caves monastery and met with Fr Ioann.
The main point of Aleksei Rukavishnikov's article is at the end: "The appearance of the president's personal spiritual advisor is fraught with unpleasant consequences for Patriarch Alexis II. Although as a 'sincerely believing Orthodox person' Putin emphasizes his respect and loyalty for the patriarch, his heart, as Fr Tikhon claims, is not with the primate of the church. Under a "churched" president, who is guided by the authority of elders, the role of the patriarch becomes ritualistic. The president understands church matters well. The chief actors of the Yeltsin era have left the political stage. Of course, the patriarch has hastened to distance himself from them, but Putin remembers everything. . . ."
It is difficult to comment about such speculations. They should be denied or confirmed, in the first place, by the ones who are the chief protagonists of the article, Archimandrite Tikhon and President Vladimir Putin.
"Moskovskie novosti" of 5-11 September 2000 printed "Pastor from Lubianka." The tone of the article leaves no doubt that its writer, Yury Vasiliev, has a negative approach to Shevkunov, Putin, and the Moscow patriarchate as a whole. The most important thing in this article is that to Vasiliev's remark, "many people speak of your closeness to the supreme authority of Russia," Archimandrite responded curtly and clearly: "What nonsense!" Yury Vasiliev permits himself to doubt Fr Tikhon's sincerity.
It follows from the fact that he gives an extremely critical description of the activity of the Presentation monastery (the fundamentalists set the Black Hundreds against the Kochetkovites; they cooperate with "Pamiat," they "slander" Yeltsin) that the MN writer calls Archimandrite Tikhon "a priest who is close to Putin," and then "the shadowy pastor of the second president," and then claims that he "exerts 'spiritual' influence on the Kremlin." The purpose of the article is unclear. If the editors wanted to call readers' attention to the danger of the influence of Fr Tikhon on the president, it had the opposite effect; a majority of Orthodox were simply confirmed in the idea that "there must be something to it," and the humble abbot of Presentation monastery is an extremely influential person to whom the '"liberals" of MN are prepared to devote a whole page. Everything of which Moscow News accuses Shevkunov evokes enthusiasm in many "patriotically" minded Orthodox. That includes his very close relations with officers of the former KGB, which Archimandrite Tikhon not only does not hide but which he proudly reports to the whole world.
As is known, in the present-day national Orthodox "grouping" it is considered good form to claim that the Stalin-Khrushchev-Brezhnev-Andropov-Gorbachev KGB was infested with patriots who were concerned about Russia and its world-wide military might, Stalin was the benefactor of the church and the greatest state builder in the history of Russia, who worked for the good of the Russian nation, and the notions of "human rights" and "freedom of conscience" are incompatible with the Russian conception of Orthodoxy.
"Profile" of 18 September 2000 published "Archimandrite Tikhon: 'Russian patriotism has always had a defensive character.'" Finally Fr Tikhon addressed all questions with regard to his relations with Putin. The interview given to Sergei Cherepov was extensive; it mixed in everything, reflections on the history of Russia and comparison of "freedom of speech" with the use of drugs, alcohol, and abortions (Fr Tikhon advocates the restriction but for some reason not the prohibition of them). It also contains interesting stories of how Chechen soldiers chased Fr Tikhon around Grozny (either under Maskhadov or federal occupation) in order to assassinate him and how at the end of the eighties he was recruited by KGB (unsuccessfully). But, with all respect to the head of the Presentation monastery, we are primarily interested in the topic of the "president's spiritual advosor." The reporter touches on these "delicate circumstances" twice. The first time indirectly: "Your reverence, recently much has been said about your influence on Russian President Vladimir Putin. Under what circumstances did you become acquainted with him?" The second time directly: "The spiritual advisor of the president also keeps many state secrets." Neither time did Fr Tikhon interrupt with his curt answer, "Such nonsense. No, I am not the spiritual advisor of the president of Russia." He preferred to talk evasively about how "in public political circles the unshakeable conviction has been created that the president of Russia must be directed by somebody. That's the way it has been for the past fifteen years [that is, since 1985 when the Gorbachev reforms began, which gave freedom to the church, and independent Russia did not even exist yet--M.Sh.]. The groups having the influence changed, but it was not especially difficult to identify them. And today something different is happening. Both those who for many years have directed the president and those who served their interests (without forgetting about themselves) are frantically searching but are unable to find the source of the influence on Putin. Who is directing him? The oligarchs? No. The family? No. The military or FSB? No. The West, international circles, the media? Sorry, but still no. And finally they found him. It turns out its Fr Tikhon, your humble servant. [It is typical that after the successive ascent from the oligarchs, to international circles and the media, Fr Tikhon considers himself the crown of the searches--M.Sh.] Actually the essence of the matter is that Putin is simply an independent person and this quality of his has been confirmed more and more, pleasing some and producing panic in others. May the Lord grant that this president will be directed only by God, his own conscience, his love for Russia, and healthy reason. [Not a word about the constitution or any other law. That's not a mere president but an autocratic absolutist--M.Sh.] I know him [Putin--NGR] to be an Orthodox person who does not intend to conceal his convictions. [It is difficult to believe Fr Tikhon's words that he knows Putin after the interview by CNN commentator Larry King, in which the president of Russia answered King's direct question by not only not declaring himself Orthodox but also, noting that he "prefers not to spread information about this topic," he stated the thoroughly liberal, un-Orthodox convictions: "I believe in mankind. I believe in its good intentions. I believe that we have all been placed here to do good. And if we do this together, success awaits us. In relations among states as well. The main thing is that in this way we will achieve comfort." --M.Sh.] As regards spiritual questions which can face every Christian, you can be sure that the president has someone to resolve them with. He is close to and well acquainted with the patriarch. . . ."
Who needed this wave of articles which rolled in the print media (reporters of the television stations also turned to the editors of NG-religii for consultants)? We do not dare to answer this question. It is quite obvious that contradictory information on this matter coming for everywhere could hardly be of benefit to Archimandrite Tikhon. Under many prominent sovereigns there were "spiritual advisors" (Sylvester under Ivan the Terrible, Nikon under Alexis Mikhailovich, Feofan Prokopovich under Peter I). Their fates were unenviable (except for Prokopovich whom contemporaries considered responsible for the petrine church reforms). How could such a reasonable man as Fr Tikhon let himself approach the summit of power while wearing the label "personal confidante of the head of state"? He would be too visible to extremely dangerous (in the direct sense of the word) and influential competitors.
And if he lets himself be used by people who are incomparably more influential than a humble abbot of a Moscow monastery (even one next door to FSB) then one hopes that Archimandrite Tikhon will be lucky enough to resist those temptations that are evident to an Orthodox monk, for if he yielded to them he would place himself in inescapable peril. (tr. by PDS, posted 16 October 2000)
If material is quoted, please give credit to the publication
from which it came.
It is not necessary to credit this Web page. If material
is transmitted electronically, please include reference to the URL, http://www.stetson.edu/~psteeves/relnews/.