Copyrighted material. For private use only.
It can be said without exaggeration that our entire society has engaged in the current discussion about what the new anthem of Russia should be like. Even the representatives of the largest religious confessions have not remained on the sidelines.
The chairman of the Department of External Church Relations of the Moscow patriarchate, Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad, considers the decision to rewrite the words of the soviet anthem "fundamentally incorrect" since it would be a "great mistake to view the anthem of the country as a mechanical joining of music and words where it is possible to make a change in essential parts."
Under such an approach it will be difficult to avoid a "dangerous ambiguity," says the metropolitan, adding that "the words 'Inviolable Union. . .' are forever imprinted in the anthem of the soviet epoch and they are a part of our history, which we hardly have the right to distort in accordance with the vicissitudes of the realities of life."
At the same time he considers that the "revival of the union state would be a sufficient basis for the revival of the soviet anthem."
Metropolitan Kirill called Glinka's "Patriotic Song" more appropriate for a contemporary Russian anthem. "This is worthy music and I suggest that it is possible to write fitting words for the anthem," the metropolitan said. Just as successful an alternative, in his opinion, would be the song "Glory" from the opera "Ivan Susanin."
If one chooses between the two melodies that the presidium of the State Council proposed to present for the State Duma deputies to discuss, then the supreme mufti of Russia and the European countries of CIS, Talgat Tajuddin, would give preference to the music by A. Aleksandrov. "In the soviet anthem there was triumphalness, pride in our country, and confidence in the future; this music gripped the soul and thus, probably, it would be better to bring it back," the leader of the Muslims said in an Interfax interview.
At the same time he noted that for him as a believing person "what is most important are the words," and if one rewrites the soviet anthem, then in the new text "there certainly must be a reference to God and also the idea that all of us are children of a single homeland." "Besides this," the mufti continued, "in the new anthem it is necessary to mention our ancestors and the immensity of the Russian spaces in which there should be hope for the future and not a drop of pessimism."
"In any case," T. Tajuddin noted, "the adoption of a new anthem must not be done hastily so that it will not be necessary to rewrite it five years later, since this would be unbecoming for such a great state as Russia."
The chief rabbi of the country, Adolph Shaevich, also stated that he likes the music of Aleksandrov better than the current Russian anthem. "It really moves the spirit as an anthem should. I have not heard this tune for a long time, but when it was played in the past (of course, not on the radio in the morning, but at all the ceremonial occasions) it made an impression. It seems to me that it would not be bad if appropriate words were now composed for it," A. Shaevich said in an Interfax interview.
The music of the soviet anthem does not evoke in the chief rabbi a negative association with the past since, in his opinion, "there is no point in ascribing any intentions to music that is connected with that period."
To the contrary, Shaevich thinks, Aleksandrov's melody "could remind Russians about the best moments of our history which is behind us." "Despite the absurdity and nonsense which our society has endured, Russia remains as always a great state and a worthy anthem could inspire its citizens to restore Russia's past greatness." He added that "anthems should evoke something and they are not written just for the sake of accompanying the raising of the flag." (tr. by PDS, posted 6 December 2000)
MOST RUSSIANS LIKE PRESENT TRICOLOUR - PUBLIC POLLS.
ITAR-TASS News Agency, 6 December 2000
Most Russians like the present Russian national white-blue-red tricolour, say public opinion polls, held late in October and early in November.
According to a poll, sponsored by the Public Opinion Fund, the Russian tricolour is to the liking of 68 percent of the polled, while 20 percent do not like it. According to the data of the Independent Analytical Centre, 67 percent of respondents favoured the tricolour as the Russian national flag, while 31 percent are against. . . .
The Central Spiritual Board of Moslems of Russia and CIS European countries backed the Russian president-sponsored Russian state symbols on behalf of millions of Russian Moslems.
A statement by this organisation says that these symbols -- the state flag, the flags of the Armed Forces and the navy, the anthem and the coat of arms -- "personify difficult but glorious history of our Homeland which united, under its protection, ancient peoples and followers of traditional confessions in the sixth part of land".
The Buddhist traditional Singha of Russia expressed support for the president in his decision to preserve symbols of state power of the Russian Federation: the tricolour, the anthem to Alexandrov's music and the coat of arms depicting the two-headed eagle.
A statement by this organisation received by Itar-Tass says that this decision by the Russian president "is aimed at strengthening quietude and for supporting civic peace in Russia. . . ." (posted 6 December 2000)
MOSCOW PATRIARCHATE SUPPORTS NATIONAL SYMBOLS CHOSEN BY STATE COUNCIL
Interfax, 5 December 2000
The Moscow patriarchate welcomes the Russian national symbols chosen by the State Council.
"I think that on Monday the president made a very worthy decision that will ease public confrontation over the subject," spokesman for the Russian Orthodox Church Father Vsevolod Chaplin told Interfax on Tuesday.
"It is very important that all the country's symbols in this case are considered as a set, that is to say the pre-revolutionary flag and coat of arms are taken demonstrating continuity with the pre-revolutionary period of our history, and at the same time the music by [Alexander] Alexandrov demonstrating continuity with the Soviet epoch, which was marked by horrible tragedies of course, but also contained many good things," Chaplin said.
"Thus continuity of all Russia's history is restored and demonstrated," he said.
Chaplin said in his opinion, "the debate on the anthem, emblem and flag will continue," but still "there is a great number of people who regard Alexandrov's music as their anthem and the opinion of these people should not be ignored, especially as according to different polls these people constitute the majority."
The patriarchate hopes "the Duma and other government bodies authorized to tackle the problem will resolve it within a reasonably short time considering that the public is tired of uncertainty in the sphere of national symbols and expects a solution to the issue," Chaplin said.
He denied reports that head of the Russian Orthodox Church Patriarch Alexy II had categorically opposed Alexandrov's music. The patriarch "never denied the possibility of returning the music of the old anthem. He only said that national symbols should not split the public, but unite it," Chaplin said. "Moreover, the patriarch never spoke in favor of any specific version of the anthem," he said. (posted 6 December 2000)
GOD KNOWS, BUT NOT THE ANTHEM
by Vitaly Tsepliaev
Argumenty i fakty, 6 December 2000
The disputes have not subsided over what the new Russian anthem will be like. As to the music everything is clear--both the president and the duma are inclined to the melody of Aleksandrov. But a hitch has developed with the text. For some reason it has seemed to many that the best new text for the old tune has been composed by the proven anthem writer S. Mikhailkov. But not so. That is, the composer of "Grandfather Stepa" actually has written the words but they have not evoked enthusiasm in the Kremlin (although, they say, other alternatives are even worse).
A reporter from "A i F" has managed to learn about this composition. Alongside a series of traditional patriotic verbiage there is also something new--an appeal to God. Lines like "Glory, Russia! The Lord is over you!" are repeated several times at precisely the place where earlier "the party of Lenin [led] us to the triumph of communism." The presidential administration was surprised, to put it mildly. As one of the officials noted, "in the first place, Russia is a secular state. In the second, it is multinational. If there is to be an appeal to the Lord, then it is necessary to mention in the anthem both Allah and Buddha." In general, the Duma will be advised to approve for now only the coat of arms, flag, and melody of the anthem and the matter of the words will be "worked out." (tr. by PDS, posted 6 December 2000)
MUSIC BY ALEKSANDROV, WORDS BY PUSHKIN.
Vladimir Putin has returned to Russians the anthem of USSR and the Red Flag
by Evgeny Yuriev
Segodnia, 5 December 2000
After summoning to the Kremlin the leaders of the duma fractions, members of the presidium of the State Council, representatives of both houses of parliament, and the head of the TsIK, the president proposed "discussion" of the issue of the state symbols. There was no need for "discussion" however. The news that the decision about state symbols had already been made in the Kremlin had been "leaked" even before the participants in the meeting learned about its agenda. So at the meeting Putin, in essence, just presented the audience with the fact: Russia will enter the third millennium to the tune of the "march of the bolshevik party."
The Kremlin does not intend to change the current coat of arms and flag. The problem, thus, is just the anthem. Glinka's "Patriotic Song," it seems, is insufficiently patriotic to remain the national symbol of the country. The Kremlin is more impressed with the stalinist anthem which summons up the past greatness of the country. The duma is being advised to confirm it. At the same time, a competition for producing better lyrics will be announced. The president intends to approve the words personally, by edict. Along with the USSR anthem the president will return the Red Flag to the country. Although as the flag of the armed forces.
Vladimir Putin's nostalgic sentiments are shared by the governors he named to the presidium of the State Council and, naturally, the leaders of the duma leftists. The position of the Union of Rightist Forces and Yabloka, under the present alignment of forces, could hardly make a difference in the outcome of the duma vote on state symbols. But in any case the Kremlin has decided to protect itself and to "package" the bills: those who vote against the anthem must openly also reject the tricolor with the eagle. It is expected that the package will be presented for discussion on Friday and duma members will be advised to vote for it immediately on third reading. Thus the anthem will be confirmed without words.
"There still are people living who endured the horrors of the stalinist camps," the president said in his address to the nation, apparently referring to the stalinist undertone of the USSR anthem. "But . . . they are under the influence of just the darker sides of our common history, when the regime treated people harshly and unjustly." And in such a case, the president asked rhetorically, where should one place Pushkin, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Chaikovsky, Mendeleev, Lobachevsky, and Gagarin, and such geniuses as Shostakovich, Korolev, and Dunaevsky?
Really, where? Under the eagle or under the Red Flag? (tr. by PDS, posted 6 December 2000)
OLD SONG, NEW WORDS
New York Times, 6 December 2000
Vladimir V. Putin is proposing a new national anthem for Russia using
the music of the old Soviet anthem with new lyrics. Here
are an English translation of the first stanza and refrain of the old
lyrics written by Sergei Mikhalkov and a proposed set of lyrics
he wrote this fall:
OLD
Unbreakable Union of freeborn Republics,
Great Russia has welded forever to stand.
Created in struggle by will of the people,
United and mighty, our Soviet land!
Sing to the Motherland, home of the free,
Bulwark of peoples in brotherhood strong.
O Party of Lenin, the strength of the people,
To Communism's triumph lead us on!
NEW
Powerful wings outstretched above us
The Russian eagle soars in the heights.
The glorious tricolor, symbol of the Fatherland
Leads Russia's people onwards to victory!
Glory to our free Fatherland --
Of fraternal peoples in eternal union!
People's wisdom passed down from forefathers!
Glory to the Homeland! God is above you! (posted 6 December 2000)
RETURN OF SOVIET ANTHEM OPPOSED
Associated Press, 5 December 2000
President Vladimir Putin's proposal that Russia adopt the music of the Soviet anthem as its national hymn will only divide the country, Russian liberals wrote in an open letter Tuesday.
The Russian Orthodox Church, meanwhile, said it approved of the plan and the anthem "restored and demonstrated'' continuity in Russian history, the Interfax news agency reported. The church, a harsh critic of the Soviet era, was expected to oppose the anthem.
Putin on Monday called for establishing the music, written by Alexander Alexandrov, as Russia's official anthem. He also proposed making the familiar white, red and blue flag the official flag and bringing back a Soviet-era red banner as the military's flag.
The symbols must be approved by the lower house of parliament, the State Duma, which is to discuss the issue Friday. The Duma already has given first-reading approval to reinstating the anthem.
Putin praised the music by Alexandrov because it inspired generations of Soviet athletes to strive for gold, was played for the first man in space and honored the victory over Nazi Germany in World War II.
Polls show most Russians like the Soviet anthem, Putin said.
But in an open letter published Tuesday in the Izvestia newspaper, prominent Russian writers and intellectuals said they heard a different story in the stirring chords -- one of political repression and labor camps.
The music should be retired for good, they said.
"The head of state should realize that millions of countrymen, including those who voted for him, will never respect an anthem trampling on their convictions and insulting the memory of victims of Soviet political reprisals,'' the liberals wrote.
Also, the music is used by the Russian Communist Party -- without words -- to represent their movement, and therefore cannot be used as an anthem for all Russians, they said.
The music is "one of the most striking symbols of the bygone epoch and no new lyrics will be able to erase the words attached to it that forever glorify Lenin and Stalin,'' they wrote.
Communist leader Vladimir Lenin and dictator Josef Stalin are directly praised in the original lyrics. Putin has suggested replacing the lines with mention of a Russian eagle, but did not suggest exact phrasing. (posted 6 December 2000)
RUSSIAN LAWMAKERS SET TO REVIVE STALIN ANTHEM
Reuters, 5 December 2000
Russia's parliament is expected to vote Friday to restore Communist dictator Josef Stalin's rousing anthem as the national song for post-Soviet Russia, but liberals warned of "resurrecting phantoms'' from a bloody past.
Communists and centrists in the State Duma hailed President Vladimir Putin's proposal to revive the old anthem, suggesting a quick end to a decade of wrangling that has left the nation's first song without words.
Agrarian leader Nikolai Kharitonov said bills to confirm the anthem change and new state emblems could cruise through the lower house of parliament in a single day. As constitutional measures, they need a two-thirds majority in the 450-seat Duma.
Putin, as expected, threw his support late Monday behind a return to the stirring melody composed by Alexander Alexandrov in 1943 while much of European Russia was under German occupation. It was personally approved by Stalin.
A competition to find new lyrics will be held, but a Kremlin source has told Reuters the author of the original words, poet Sergei Mikhailkov, now 87, had penned new verses which Putin favors.
Liberals decried the move, but Patriarch Alexiy II, head of the influential Russian Orthodox Church, endorsed it.
Ex-Russian President Boris Yeltsin had dumped the Soviet anthem after the collapse of Communism in 1991. But leftists in parliament failed to agree lyrics for his new music, a song by 19th-century composer Mikhail Glinka which few Russians can hum.
Athletes complained the wordless tune left them in embarrassed silence at sporting events and sapped morale.
ARMY'S RED FLAG OF VICTORY
Putin balanced the choice of the old Soviet anthem with the adoption of the red-blue-and-white flag and twin-headed eagle as state emblems -- tsarist era throwbacks embraced under Yeltsin.
But the Kremlin chief said the armed forces should retain the red flag as a tribute to their supreme sacrifices in the defeat of Nazi Germany during World War Two.
"If we accept that we cannot use the symbols of previous epochs, including the Soviet epoch...then we must agree that our fathers and mothers lived useless, senseless lives. That they lived in vain,'' Putin said in a televised address.
"I cannot accept this with either head or heart.''
Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov was effusive.
"Young people, sportsmen, talented people, are asking for the Soviet Union anthem to be brought back, because when this music was heard around the planet everyone stood up immediately and felt very proud,'' he said in televised comments.
But Boris Nemtsov, leader of the liberal Union of Right-wing Forces, said Putin had made a "huge political error.''
Dozens of leading cultural figures warned in an open letter on the front page of Tuesday's Izvestia newspaper that the move risked "resurrecting phantoms'' from Russia's dark history.
CHURCH BACKING
Patriarch Alexiy, once thought to oppose a move evoking a Soviet state that repressed religion, said Putin had "made a very worthy decision which reconciles the confrontations within society on this issue.''
The tune represented "continuity with the Soviet era, which, of course, was a terrible tragedy, but during which there was also a lot of good,'' Interfax news agency quoted him as saying.
Muscovites gave Putin's announcement a mixed reception.
"I think he made absolutely the right choice, a compromise choice,'' said lottery ticket seller Valentina, 63. ``It unites democrats and Communists, and that's what a national anthem should do. I wasn't a Communist myself but it was, of course, the music of our victory in World War Two.
Vyacheslav, 32, a stevedore at Moscow's Kievski railway station, said he favored anything that took the country back to Soviet times. But gynecologist Alexandra sighed and said: "With all the problems this country has I think there are better things for them to do than waste time on such nonsense.'' (posted 6 December 2000)
An appeals court decision against the Salvation Army here appears to be an ominous sign for dozens of religious organizations with links to the West, just as they face a year-end deadline for registering with the Russian government.
The decision, announced Tuesday (Nov. 28), could well force the Salvation Army to relocate its headquarters, move five congregations into home churches and shut down operations that include providing about 6,000 meals a month to the city's homeless and poor.
"In terms of the legal processes, it is the end of the road," said Colonel Ken Baillie, an American who commands the Salvation Army's operations in Russia and four other former Soviet republics.
"We've had registration here for six years. Never a problem. With the new law, we had to re-register," he said, adding that an appeal to Russia's Supreme Court was unlikely.
The appeals court upheld a lower court ruling that the Salvation Army is a foreign-based "military association" and therefore ineligible for registration as a full-fledged religious organization. Under a controversial 1997 law, the registration is necessary for religious groups to function as legal entities with the right to enter into contracts, open bank accounts and hire employees.
According to the most recent statistics from the Justice Ministry, about 60 percent of the religious groups required to register by Dec. 31 have completed the process. Failure to do so could result in court-ordered "liquidation" under a law adopted earlier this year that extended the original deadline by one year.
In addition to the Salvation Army, local congregations of evangelical Protestants and Jehovah's Witnesses across Russia have sought court orders forcing the Ministry of Justice to re-register them after initial denials.
Jehovah's Witnesses lawyer John Burns said the fast-growing faith won court decisions in Tartarstan but is still fighting for recognition in Chelyabinsk, where a local television station aired accusations the Jehovah's Witnesses store chemical weapons.
One of Russia's top religious freedom lawyers, Vladimir Ryakhovsky, said he worries the decision against the Salvation Army bodes ill for other minority faiths based outside Russia, including Mormons, Roman Catholics and various Protestant groups.
Ryakhovsky, who has also helped Jewish, Muslim and Old Believer Orthodox communities fight for registration, said Pentecostal Protestant groups typically have the most problems. "These are big churches and very active. They will have several thousands parishioners, young people, professionals," said Ryakhovsky, adding that in small, provincial towns such a congregation stands out. "Of course, someone doesn't like this. And, often the local Orthodox priest will put pressure on the Ministry of Justice."
Leaders of the 80-million member Russian Orthodox Church, the country's most dominant and politically connected faith, consistently deny meddling in the process but, at the same time, vow to vigilantly protect their faithful from what they consider to be dangerous sects. Of the up to 16,000 religious organizations that must re-register, those affiliated with the Russian Orthodox Church are the most numerous.
Ryakhovsky speculated that if enough of them fail to make the deadline, "there will be a lot of pressure to extend it" a second time.
Meanwhile, the Russian Orthodox Church is further strengthening its ties to various government departments, often assigning a patron saint, ranging from St. Barbara for the Ministry of Defense's Rocket Corps to Wednesday's naming of St. Matthew for the much-dreaded Tax Police.
Aside from the re-registration requirement, other aspects of the 1997 law are causing problems. For example, the head of a religious organization must be a Russian citizen or permanent resident. This requirement means that the foreign bishops of two of Russia's four Roman Catholic Apostolic Administrations -- dioceses answerable directly to the pope -- cannot register as legal entities.
Both bishops had their initial applications for Russian citizenship denied earlier this year and are now hoping the Holy See can work out a deal through diplomatic channels. A Vatican diplomat in Moscow who asked that his name not be used said Rome has made a formal request to Russian President Vladimir Putin that the bishops be granted citizenship.
Citizenship is vastly preferable to permanent resident status for the highly mobile bishops because permanent residents in Russia must receive government permission every time they want to leave the country, a process that can sometimes take weeks.
In a telephone interview from his seat in Irkutsk, a Siberian city located five time zones east of Moscow, Bishop Jerzy Mazur said that when he spoke to local officials about becoming a citizen, they "explained that I can achieve citizenship by marrying a Russian woman."
While Catholic officials in Moscow say they are confident the parishes serving Russia's estimated 500,000 Roman Catholics will make the Dec. 31 deadline, they complain that local authorities are often reluctant to issue long-term visas to priests and nuns. The overwhelming majority of the over 400 clergy serving across Russia's 11 time zones are foreigners.
In some cases, foreigners are required to leave Russia every three months to get a new visa. In Bishop Mazur's Apostolic Administration of Eastern Siberia, the world's largest diocese at 30 times the size of France, the visa requirements are a huge inconvenience, he said.
One of highest ranking clerics in the Catholic church, Father Stanislav Opiela, general secretary of the Russian Catholic Bishops' Conference, has twice been refused a visa by the Foreign Ministry and is now stranded in Warsaw.
Opiela, a Polish Jesuit who had been living and working in Russia for over eight years, said in a telephone interview from Warsaw that his inability to return to his Moscow home this summer had disrupted the work of Catholic college he heads and upset plans to launch a religious magazine.
He declined to speculate on the reasons for the refusals, adding he did not know what the future would hold.
"I would like to be optimistic but it has been going on so long that it is becoming less and less clear what is going to happen," Opiela said.
A Catholic administrator in Moscow said Opiela's predicament was linked to the fact that Opiela's post as general secretary of the Bishops' Conference did not legally exist. The bishops' conference has no legal standing because two of its four bishops are foreigners.
An official with the Foreign Ministry's Department of Arriving Foreigners declined to comment on Opiela's rejections.
With the approaching Dec. 31 deadline and the requirement that nonregistered groups be "liquidated," the next few months are shaping up to be a crucial test period of Russia's commitment to religious freedom and tolerance.
The U.S. government, for one, is planning to keep a close eye on the situation.
In a telephone interview from Washington, Steven McFarland, executive director of the government's Commission on International Religious Freedom, said, "We're looking at early spring" to issue an assessment of the situation in Russia.
McFarland, said the commission, which can recommend possible sanctions to the president, is hoping "international financing and aid will provide a significant degree of leverage, as well as Russia's desire to be regarded as a civilized nation." (posted 5 December 2000)
JEWS in the western Russian city of Kursk are living in a state of fear after the newly-elected governor said it was time to rid Russia of Jewish "filth", and an official of the outgoing administration was beaten up by thugs shouting anti-Semitic slogans.
The remarks by the communist governor, Alexander Mikhailov, have provoked a political storm in Russia and aroused fears among Jewish leaders of a re-emergence of Soviet-style official anti-Semitism. There has also been dismay at the Kremlin's silence on the issue. Vladimir Putin has made no attempt to distance himself from Mr Mikhailov, who claimed the President actively supported his campaign and was an ally in his crusade against the "world Jewish conspiracy".
The scandal first broke when the new governor said in a newspaper interview that the election marked a victory for ethnic Russians over Jews, and showed Russia was beginning to "liberate itself from all the filth that has piled up over the last 10 years". He said he had defeated not only the outgoing governor Alexander Rutskoi, who has a Jewish mother, but also Mr Rutskoi's backer, Boris Berezovsky, the businessman who is of Jewish descent, and the Russian Jewish Congress.
The remarks have shocked Russia's Jews who are inured to low-level bigotry but unused to open displays of anti-Semitism by people in government. Jews here have enjoyed a decade of religious freedom and civil rights long denied them by the Soviet communist regime. But many feel the new tolerance is only skin deep. Recently a Jewish school was raided by neo-Nazi vandals in the town of Ryazan, east of Moscow. Jewish cemeteries have been desecrated from Kursk to Nizhny Novgorod.
Mr Mikhailov's interview created outrage, with Mr Rutskoi threatening to sue for libel. A group of MPs in the Duma called on President Putin to sack the errant governor and even ban the Communist Party for inciting racial hatred. The communist leader, Gennady Zyuganov, called the governor's remarks "ill-considered" and told him he would be better off trying to solve the region's many economic problems. Mr Mikhailov was forced to issue a grovelling apology, saying he respected people "regardless of their nationality".
The new governor's tirade has already succeeded in sowing panic among Kursk's Jews. Shortly after the election, a gang of youths claiming to be supporters of Mr Mikhailov attacked the local Jewish community centre, banging on the windows, shouting anti-Semitic slogans and jamming a log against the door.
"Jews here are worried, especially the older ones, the Holocaust survivors," said Igor Bukhman, a local Jewish leader. "It's one thing to hear anti-Semitic comments in a shop or a bus queue, but when the governor starts talking like that then of course you get scared." Jewish confidence in Kursk was shaken by another incident last week with anti-Semitic overtones when Mr Rutskoi's deputy, Sergei Maksachov, was beaten up in the Kursk regional government building as he was handing in his resignation.
Mr Maksachov, who says his father is Jewish, claims he was kicked, beaten and peppered with anti-Semitic insults in a three-hour ordeal by a group of assailants led by a man claiming to be Kursk's new deputy governor. He was later taken to hospital with concussion and spinal injuries. The alleged attackers have been arrested, but Mr Mikhailov has denied that any of them occupied any post in his administration. (from Johnson's Russia List; posted 4 December 2000)
Before he became an apostle, Matthew was a tax collector. So in a way it was a return to Matthew's roots this week when he was officially named the patron saint of the tax police by Patriarch Alexy II.
In doing so, the patriarch was serving two ends - one missionary, the other pragmatic.
By tradition and mentality, if not by law, the Russian Orthodox Church is a state church, and in recent years it has sought to bring the government back to its fold. It has done so through an ad hoc arrangement of personal contacts and bilateral agreements, whether with ministries, government agencies or even presidents.
Armed forces agencies, with their often-demoralized servicemen, are in particular seen as prodigal sons. And patron saints play an obviously useful role in helping those of Orthodox background find the church welcoming.
Patron saints are often assigned in ways that also show the church's hyper-awareness of the secular world. Not so long ago the patriarch appointed St. Barbara the patron saint of the Strategic Missile Forces - as it happens, the decree establishing the force was signed, by the atheist Nikita Khrushchev, on St. Barbara's Day. St. Tatyana is the patron of students, meanwhile, because Empress Elizabeth founded Moscow State University on St. Tatyana's Day in 1755.
But the Russian Orthodox Church has a far more complicated relationship with the tax authorities than it does with, say, students or rocket-forces officers.
In the past decade, the church has emerged as a major player on the business field, with an annual turnover believed to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars. And even as it claims a moral leadership role in society, the church has been notoriously nontransparent and tight-lipped about its money. Tax breaks meant to subsidize the rebuilding of churches and chapels seem to be more helpful to the numerous private businesses, and corruption cases that have sprung up along the way.
So Apostle Matthew may be helpful not just as a divine intercessor, but also as an earthly friendly liaison.
There is nothing wrong with preaching gospels to taxmen. But we think the church's mission will be much stronger if it also reveals its budget and pays taxes where it must by law. "Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's," Matthew quotes Jesus as saying. (Matthew 22:21).
The state could help by granting clear and equal tax breaks to all religions; by setting up multi-confessional chaplains for the armed forces; and by legally codifying its relations with the church, and ditching the politics of personal friendships and vague agreements. (posted 3 December 2000)
TAX CODE FROM MATTHEW
Federal tax police have received a heavenly protector.
by Natalia Filatova,
Segodnia, 30 November 2000
Yesterday Patriarch Alexis II of Moscow and all-Rus blessed a curious initiative: to consider the apostle St. Matthew the heavenly protector of the Russian tax police. This is the first time in modern history when a saint was officially "designated" by the church to serve as guardian for a state structure. And the fact that the first to receive a heavenly protector were the tax police or, to use biblical language, publicans gives this event a certain piquancy.
The point is that those who collected taxes for the treasury of the Roman empire in ancient Judea were called publicans and, to put it mildly, were disliked. They were considered traitors and fellowship with them was considered a sin and abomination. It is not for nothing that Russian words derived from "publican" (mytar -- mytarstvo, mykatsia) mean "homeless," "wandering," and "outcast." Jesus acknowledged the possibility of a publican's getting to paradise, stressing thereby that one who repents in the end is worthy of God's mercy, provided that it is full repentance. However, contemporary publicans collect taxes for their own fatherland, which naturally removes from them the "biblical suspicions." Of course, if the Federal Service of Tax Police (FSNP) is to get a holy protector then it should be the apostle Matthew since by his profession the evangelist was a publican and is usually represented with account books or a bag of gold. Once he heard Christ's preaching Matthew threw the taxes he had collected into the dust and leaving all he followed Jesus; in contemporary language, "he had committed white collar crime."
How did this "high designation" come about? Here is what Segodnia was told by a member of the FSNP press service, Yury Tretiakov: "The cooperation of the tax police and the Orthodox church began a full year ago when the patriarch conducted a prayer service at the opening of a memorial to those who had perished on duty as tax police. After the prayer service, the patriarch and FSNP director Viacheslav Soltaganov signed a declaration about mutual activity between the tax police and RPTs. Since the church of saints Kosma and Maian actually is located on FSNP land, we actively participated in its renovation and restoration. And St. Matthew was named our protector without any pressure on our part. This is not some tribute to a fad and we are not about to elevate heavenly protection into a cult. It is simply that now tax police will have one more holiday, 29 November, the day of the apostle St. Matthew."
The mutuality of the desire to strengthen FSNP with a patron saint was confirmed by the head of the communications service of the Moscow patriarchate, Viktor Malukhin: "This was a joint initiative, but formally the tax collectors were supposed to make a request to the patriarch. As a rule, patrons of a profession are persons who in their secular life practiced that profession which they are going to serve as guardians. But it often happens that the saint who becomes the patron is the one whose commemoration day is the holiday of the profession. Rocket and artillery forces consider their patron to be St. Barbara the Great Martyr since 19 November, the Day of Rocket and Artillery Forces, is the day of St. Barbara. As regards the negative attitude toward publicans in biblical tradition, this has a historical basis. But in the case of FSNP, it is a situation which falls under Christ's command: "Render to God what is God's and to Caesar what is Caesar's."
In Orthodox tradition there are a few patrons of professions and they were confirmed long ago. For centuries the apostle Andrew has been the guardian of fishermen and St. Nichilas, of sailors. Frol and Lavr look out for peasants and Zosima and Savvaty, for beekeepers. The question of designating patron saints in accordance with profession has never been raised in Orthodoxy. In this regard Catholicism is somewhat more active. Recently John Paul II declared St. Thomas More the patron of politicians and earlier Catholic patron saints were announced by list. Bookkeepers got the same St. Matthew, journalists, Francis, taxi drivers, Fiakr, dentists, Apollonius, dieticians, Martha, motorcyclists (in light of the danger of the occupation) the Most Holy Mother of God herself.
Now the papal council is reviewing three candidates to be patron of the Internet. Inspired by these example and the experience of the tax collectors, our workers in all areas of the national economy may petition for assigning them a heavenly mediator.
And further. At the time of the prayer service the patriarch declared the church of Kosma and Damian in Pokrovka the church of FSNP. The minister of that church acknowledged to Segodnia: "Our parish is small and we know the parishioners by sight. But it was only at the prayer service that we learned that many of them work for the tax police." That's pleasant to hear. (tr. by PDS, posted 3 December 2000)
CHURCH OFFERS POLICE A SAINT
by Alice Lagnado
The Times, 4 December 2000
THE Russian Orthodox Church has given the feared tax police their own patron saint in what some suspect is an elaborate stunt to keep the taxman from its own door.
The police, a group of Kalashnikov-wielding men in ski masks who storm the offices of companies suspected of tax evasion, may require some divine intervention, for they are the most unpopular men in Russia. Their usual method of collecting unpaid taxes is to march into an office, demand to see financial records and remove large amounts of cash.
Government officials have been accused of sending the tax police to any organisation they wish to intimidate.
The head of the Church, Patriarch Aleksy II, said that the Apostle Matthew, who gave up collecting taxes when he met Jesus, would inspire police "to serve the fatherland". A spokesman for the force said he hoped the saint would help officers to "get closer to God".
Copyright 2000 Times Newspapers Ltd. (posted 4 December 2000)
Agence France Presse, 1 December 2000
Russian Jews criticised President Vladimir Putin on Friday for not speaking out against the rise of anti-Semitism in the country.
"The indifference of the government, the parliament and above all the president, the defender of the constitution, in the face of a rise in antisemitism is the prelude to an outbreak of very fascist attacks," said a leading member of Russia's Jewish community. "The president has the moral and political duty to make a stand and to condemn antisemitic acts," Alexander Osovtsev added.
He said a similar indifference had led to the rise of the Nazis in Germany in the 1930s, adding: "what we are living through now is beginning to resemble the bad old days in Germany."
Leading Russian lawyer Genri Reznik, a member of the Russian Congress of Jews, appealed to Putin on Friday to end his silence and speak out against anti-Semites.
A Jewish school in Ryazan, southeast of Moscow, was recently vandalised by anti-Semitic thugs following similar outrages in the central Russian city of Nizhny-Novgorod and Birobizhan in the country's far east.
Anti-Semitic literature is freely available in book stores across Russia.
The president of Russia's Jewish congress is exiled independent media magnate Vladimir Gusinsky, who is currently wanted by the Russian justice department on fraud charges.
A prominent critic of the Kremlin, Gusinsky's supporters have hinted that the Russian authorities have launched a witch-hunt against him and fellow media tycoon Boris Berezovsky, in part motivated by their common Jewish origins. (posted 1 December 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/.