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Yesterday in Moscow the presentation of the True Party of Russia was held, which was created at the founding congress on 15 September. The True Party replaced the Islamic Party of Russia, which the ministry of Justice recently refused to reregister. According to law, it is forbidden to use religious terms in the names of parties. However, both the abbreviation, IPR, and the leader of both parties are the very same. Indeed, the core of the political program is identical--the rules of Islam.
The chief active person at the presentation was Muhammed [Magomet] Radzhabov, the leader of the True Party and the head of the unregistered Islamic Party. He said that he occupies the highest posts in both organizations on the principle of continuity.
"According to the Quran there are two parties, the party of Satan and the party of Allah. We have created 'Hezbollah,' the party of Allah that goes along the constructive path," he declared. "Our main goal, besides participation in politics, is to reeducate mistaken Muslims whom destructive forces use for discrediting Islam."
IPR has no relationship whatsover to the Lebanese terrorist organization "Hezbollah." After all, in the opinion of leaders of IPR, Muslims and terrorists are not one and the same. Thus the program of the party rejects extremism. The leaders of the party are especially punctilious in their relations with Arab money. "The True Party of Russia cannot permit itself to take a single cent of unjust money, since any money must be earned," Radzhabov declared. "But foreign funds that give financial help to Muslims continually approach us. We do not cooperate with them now, but we are prepared to tell them in the future which needy people they should send money to.
Radzhabov is a native of Dagestan, a resident of Buinaksk, where in 1999 Chechen forces conducted one of the most horrible terrorist acts. He is a former banker, the head of the Dagestan commercial bank "Mesed," and, according to Izvestiia's information, is still the principal financial support of both parties. He said that the Islamic Party of Russia comprises 1.5 million persons, and the True Party, for now about 20,000. IPR stands for patriotic positions, defending the interests of Russia, but religion is its fundamental value.
"Any ideology devised by humanity is imperfect. Thus to be an atheist is the height of stupidity," Radzhabov thinks. "We have a secular party. The only condition for joining is that a person not descredit the ideology of the party."
Radzhabov thinks that one of the main achievements of his political activity is the multiconfessional nature of the party he has created. "In the outlying parts of the country, half of the people who have been founders of divisions of IPR are Orthodox who declare themselves close to the values of Islam. Whoever wants to go along the path of Allah can join the Islamic Party and people of another confession can join the True Party. God is truth and therefore IPR is a divine party. (tr. by PDS, posted 21 September 2002)
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In justifying their actions the Vatican and especially Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz and other Catholic clerics continually claim that Catholicism supposedly is "one of the historic religions of Russia." In a statement for the press Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz says that "Catholics had dioceses in Russia in the eighteenth century before and during Catherine II's reign." He speaks of a concordat between the Vatican and Russia, signed in 1847 (but for some reason he forgets about the severing of this concordat after the Polish uprising of the 1860s under Pius IX during the reign of Alexander II). He speaks about the Vladivostok diocese in the 1920s that existed, to be sure, purely nominally.
Actually a multitude of Catholics have lived in the historic space of our state in the past centuries: residents of the Polish kingdom, Lithuania, and Germans who lived compactly on the Volga. The tolerant Russian state did nothing to interfere with their religious quests (including creation of diocesan and other structures).
Of course, it would be possible to speak of the historic continuity of the structures of the Catholic church if the present borders of the Russian federation coincided with the borders of the Russian empire. But is Poland really Russian territory? Is not Lithuania really an independent state? Has there really been since the time of Stalin a perceptible settlement of Germans on the Volga who profess Catholicism? Finally, are those churches which our tolerant fatherland permitted and often helped to be built for the Polish rebels who were exiled to Siberia really surrounded by a multitude of descendants of those Polish Catholics? Of course not.
Now fantastic information about the number of Catholics on the territory of Russia is being introduced. Just a few years back in official communication for the press the number 50 to 60 thousand was being used. However for some foreign news media the information is being given (either by the Vatican or corresponding structures of the Catholic church in Russia) that now in Russia there supposedly are 1,300,000 Catholics. Obviously recognizing that it is very hard to explain how to get 1,300,000 from 50,000, recently at his press conferences Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz has begun referring to the figure of 600,000 persons. Nevertheless even this growth in five or six years to ten times the number is unrealistic. According to data of the Ministry of Justice of RF, on 1 January of this year 267 Catholic parishes were registered. If we divide 600,000 by the number of parishes, then one gets the average of more than 2200 parishioners per parish. Can you show me where in Russia there are such Catholic parishes?
If one just dips into this it is possible to understand how much of this is mythological and what really were the actual limits of the distribution of Russian Catholicism, not Polish within the borders of the Russian state, nor German, nor Lithuanian, but really Russian. I want to introduce two documents. One is the resolution of the holy prelate Filaret from 1857 in connection with the request at the time (or plea, the word used by Filaret himself) by Moscow Catholics for opening a department of Catholic theology in Moscow University: "The ancient capital, the city of the sacred coronation and annointing of the pious sovereign, the concentration of the purely Russian population and the preserve of the ancient shrines that have served the cause of the church and state all demand care about preserving here in full force the Russian and Orthodox population and prevention of an unnecessary strengthening of foreigners and a foreign faith. Roman Catholics of all classes who live in Moscow constitute 578 males. From this it is not hard to draw the conclusion about how few students they will provide the university. And consequently how little need there is for a theological department for the teachings of the Roman church."
On the basis of this resolution, the Holy Governing Synod considered it inappropriate to introduce into Moscow University the teaching of the Law of God of the Roman Catholic church.
And so I call attention to the number: 578 Roman Catholic males in the second Russian capital in 1857.
The other evidence comes from the years of the beginning of Russia's troubles at the beginning of the twentieth century, when with the fall of the Russian state there arose ideas of active proselytising activity by Roman Catholicisn (under the Provisional Government of Kerensky). In P. Nikolaev's book "The Eastern Question" the following is reported about the number of Russian Catholics at the beginning of the twentieth century: "As regards the number of Catholics in Russia during the prewar and prerevolutionary period, it is difficult to determine it. The only thing that can be said is that there were about 200 conscientious Catholics, not counting those who had converted to Catholicism in various parts of the empire who were prompted to this by formal causes, most often marriage with Catholics."
And so, "about two hundred" Russian Catholic of the Latin rite at the beginning of the twentieth century. These are the "historic roots" of Roman Catholicism in Russia.
Let’s attend a bit more to history, but now in another perspective. It is useful to recall how the Roman Catholic church dealt with the October revolution. Because now, at the time of the creation of the diocesan structures in Russia, the Vatican often appeals to how much Catholics supposedly suffered under the soviet regime and that now they simply are restoring historic justice. I will cite the words of the German Dominican Bauer: "Bolshevism slaughtered priests, desecrated churches and shrines, and dissolved monasteries, but was not this really the religious mission of religionless bolshevism, that it condemned to destruction the bearers of schismatic (in his terminology, Orthodox) thought? It made, so to speak, a 'clean slate' and thus gave the opportunity for spiritual re-creation." That is really the interpretation of the providence of God coupled with the activity of the Tambov Cheka; it is the manifestation of Christian love in its Vatican interpretation.
It is no secret that every time cataclysms and disorders have arisen in the history of the Russian state the Vatican has tried to use such situations for penetration into Russia. Thus it happens that on one hand there are kind smiles and conversations about Christian love and suggestions of unification, while on the other hand there is the seizure of person after person and soul after soul from the Russian Orthodox church.
The question naturally arises: what can the Roman Catholic church now bring to the Russian land?
But first, several facts. The Catholic Archbishop of Westminster, Cardinal Murphy O'Connor, the head of the Catholic church of England, said in 2000 literally the following: "In today's Britain Christianity has been practically conquered." According to official statistics, in the period from 1989 to 1999 the Catholic church of England lost 490,000 parishioners. In France, where around seventy percent of the residents consider themselves Catholics, churches also are emptying and the clergy is aging. From 1990 to 2000 the number of Catholic pastors declined by 12,000. In Germany, for the Catholic church as well as the protestant church, their status as a public legal corporation has been strengthened. They are given many social functions and a special tax is collected for the benefit of the churches. But even here the Catholic church is experiencing acute problems. Thus, in 1992, 190,000 left the Catholic church.
Italy is the bulwark of Roman Catholicism. Nevertheless there in the past 25 years the number of clergymen has decreased from 260,000 to 210,000, more than 2000 priests a year.
All is not well either with the moral character of Catholic clerics. Periodically scandals break out which deliver a serious blow to the image of the contemporary Catholic clergy. It was not in vain that the above mentioned Murphy O'Connor spoke of the need to make the Catholic church the most secure place for children. In 1995-1996 twenty-one Catholic priests in England and Wales were condemned for lewd behavior with children. Such court cases have made no less an impression in France. And there is no need to go into the recent sex scandal in USA connected with debauched cardinals--the whole world is up on this.
It would seem that it would be better for the Vatican "to take a look at itself," and to give attention to these and other Catholic countries. Wouldn't it be more productive to think about a new Christianization and evangelization of Europe? And couldn't it learn from the Russian Orthodox church, which after decades of frightful persecution has been opening all these new cathedrals and churches, monasteries and church educational institutions, and today is not suffering any lack of young people who are being drawn into pastoral or monastic vocations?
But instead of coming to our martyr church to understand how it has revived and even helping in its regeneration, the Vatican has done exactly the opposite. It has founded in our country its own dioceses in order to increase its "soul-snatching" influence on the citizens of Russia.
The ambiguity and inconsistency of the position of the contemporary Vatican are obvious, which was the first to use the term "sister church" with respect to the Orthodox church. Even now the Vatican says that it recognizes all the sacraments of the Orthodox church and calls our bishops bishops and our baptism baptism. But if you admit that all necessary grace is effective within our church then why interfere with it by conducting your own mission in the place where it has born the cross for a thousand years? After all it is clear that if churches of five confessions are standing on one street, this is not the approach of the christianization of Russia but it is the very same situation that has arisen in a number of countries of western Europe. (tr. by PDS, posted 20 September 2002)
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Yesterday at midday a military helicopter circled over Rostov-on-Don for a whole hour with five Orthodox priests of the church of the Most Holy Healing Mother of God. Flying around the city the priests poured out onto it "blessed prayer for saving the Orthodox people from Catholic proselytism and for the salvation of Russia."
A month ago a military helicopter with a priest on board flew over Rostov to prevent the expansion of Catholicism to the east. At that time it was Fr Vadim Tsarev, the rector of the church of the Most Holy Healing Mother of God, who rose into the air with a prayer for the banishment of the competitors from the banks of the Don. He said that the fervent August prayers resulted in the watery elements bypassing the Orthodox Don at the same time that the very sinful Kuban and Stavropol were inundated by floods.
This time the commander of the eighth air division was in the helicopter for the sacred work while journalists were strictly forbidden to board. The most experienced flier among the priests was Fr Vadim, who had graduated from an aeronautical institute and served almost twenty years ago a hitch in the soviet air force before flying was such a solemn event. In his well-trained seminary voice he explained to the K-D reporter the main purpose of the event: saving Orthodox people from the attack of Catholic proselytism and the salvation of Russia, because adherents of the Vatican had recently opened their own parishes within Orthodox territory without the permission of the Moscow patriarchate. With the blessing of Archbishop Panteleimon of Rostov and Novocherkask the five holy fathers took off in the helicopter from the military air base of the North Caucasus military district and during the course of an hour made a circle over the Iveria convent and the Starocherkask monastery, the church of the Presentation, the cathedral church of the Nativity of the Mother of God in Rostov, the church in Obukhov, the church of the Midfeast in Gnilovskaia, and the church of the Most Holy Healing Mother of God. They took on the flight the icon of the Holy Mother of God and the icon of St. Dimitry of Rostov that had been presented by Alexis II to the Don capital at the last Day of the City. During the flight the fathers delivered anti-Catholic prayers and read an akathist. At the same time, according to the priests, the prayers were especially fervent because during the flight the fathers experienced special stress and great risk.
To the K-D reporter's question whether this action was connected with the announcement on 10 September by the Russian foreign ministry that the rector of the Rostov Catholic church of the Last Supper, Eduard Mackiewicz, was a persona non grata along with four of his colleagues, Fr Vadim answered: "We prayed very fervently for this." During the preflight solemn prayer service ("for blessing on the air transport and for the divinely protected Russia") the holy fathers expressed confidence that now "the heterodox will not intrude into Orthodox souls."
The K-D reporter sought comment at the Rostov parish of the Last Supper. There it was reported that at the present moment all Catholic priests were attending a conference in Saratov. Regarding the Orthodox flight they answered that it was not especially troublesome to them. According to employees of the mission, it makes no sense to talk about some kind of "Catholic proselytism" since Catholics constitute only one in a hundred residents in Russia while Muslims constitute one in three, Buddhists one in twenty, and Baptists one in eighty. (tr. by PDS, posted 20 September 2002)
ALEXIS II CALLS VATICAN TO CEASE POLICY OF "PRESSURE AND UNILATERAL
DECISIONS"
Slovo, 20 September 2002
The head of the Russian Orthodox church, Patriarch Alexis II of Moscow and all-Rus, thinks that if the Vatican really wishes to improve relations with the Orthodox church, then it should renounce the policy of "pressure and unilateral decisions," the Associated Press reports. In an interview with the Italian magazine Famiglia Cristiana, Alexis II said that the Vatican acts as if "neither the church nor Orthodox culture exist in Russia," and it is employing a "strategy of expansion."
Alexis II made no mention of the possibility of a meeting with the pope in the interview. Tension between the Vatican and Moscow grew after the pope's visits to several countries of CIS and the decision of the Vatican regarding Catholic dioceses in Russia. According to Vatican information, in Russia at the present time, around 600,000 persons hold to the Roman Catholic religion while 144 million Russian consider themselves Orthodox. (tr. by PDS, posted 20 September 2002)
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The presidential administration does not intend to help Russian Catholics in their conflict with RPTs and MID. Yesterday the last hope for believers of the western Christian church was taken away by the first deputy head of chief of staff for domestic policies of the Russian presidential administration, Sergei Abramov, commenting on the recent refusal by MID to issue a visa to two priests of the Vatican. "What happened is by no means an attack by authorities on the Catholic confession," the high ranking official reported. "I can say this precisely, since I deal with the question. In the past year the passport and visa regime in Russia has become generally more strict, and this does not pertain to Catholics and Catholic priests only." Distress for Catholics also was evoked yesterday by the vice chairman of the Department of External Church Relations of the Moscow patriarchate, Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin. Fr Vsevolod commented on the situation with a story about how Russian priests abroad also sometimes are denied visas, just as Russian tourists do not always get permission to enter a foreign country. "And nobody links this with the policy of the state," he noted. To be sure, Fr Vsevolod hastened to state that "RPTs does not have anything to do with the refusal of the Russian government to grant visas to individual Catholic priests."
In recent months more than one Catholic priests has been denied entry into Russia. This happened to Bishop Jerzy Mazur, who has served for many years as the ordinary of the diocese of St. Joseph in Irkutsk, to and the rector of the parish in Vladimir, Fr Stephano Caprio, and to he rector of the parish in Yaroslavl, Fr. Stanislaw Krainiak, and to the Sakhalin priest Fr Jaroslaw Wisniewski. As recently as 10 September 2002 the Rector of the parish in Rostov-on-Don, Fr Edward Mackiewicz, was not able to return to Russia because of visa problems.
The Russian authorities give assurances that they are completely in control of the situation. "Whereas the first three cases were in principle justified on the part of the authorities, the propriety of the action of those who denied entry to the two other Catholic priests is now being verified," Sergei Abramov. But representatives of the Vatican in Russia are sure that the reasons for the "visa conflict" are caused by the hostile attitude of Orthodox government workers. "Recently a widespread anti-Catholic campaign has unfolded in the country," Metropolitan Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz affirms. "Demonstrations and pickets, prohibition on construction of churches, acts of vandalism and desecration of houses of worship, and the creation of a mythological image of the 'Catholic enemy,' like in the soviet years, when all Catholics were branded Vatican spies. And now a systematic expulsion of foreign priests from the country has begun." The latter is especially painful for parishioners of Catholic churches. After all, in the course of 80 years, during the persecutions, the Catholic church in Russia to not have the possibility of training pastors since all seminaries were closed. So that parishes have been nurtured in the main by pastors from abroad." (tr. by PDS, posted 17 September 2002)
See RFE/RL report, "Russian Catholic Church Continues to Rile Orthodox Officials," by Valentina Mite.
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For a majority of managers no problems with sectarians arise. There are not so many of them among the employees of their companies and those that are there are not supposed to manifest their religious convictions at work. But still in some companies there is concern about the appearance of sectarians. It is enough that any mention of a religious sect in connection with the name of a company affects its image badly. When "Vimm-Bill-Dann" began to be connected in the press with the Mormon sect, the management had to make an explanation. As the chairman of the board of directors of "Vimm-Bill-Dann," David Yakobashvili, said in an interview with "Vedomosti," the reason for the flurry in the newspapers was that one of the top managers of the company shared the religious principles of the Mormons. The leadership of the company had to investigate this case. "I called him to my office and said 'Can you change your religion?' He answered, ‘No. Can you change yours?' I said, 'No,'" Yakobashvili explained. According to him, this manager was an honest and intelligent person who did nothing bad. He did not conduct any missionary activity within the walls of the company. "So how can you say anything about that?" Yakobashvili concluded.
As "Vedomosti" was told at the Department of Public and Religious Associations of the Ministry of Justice of RF, on 1 July 2002 almost 21,000 religious organizations were permitted by law in our country. The most well known and influential of them are "Jehovah's Witnesses" and "Church of Scientology." According to various sources, each of them comprises almost 100,000 members.
Representatives of the religious movements themselves note that they are treated tolerantly in society. The director of media projects of the Moscow representation of the Church of Christ, Mikhail Getmanov, said that he had not heard of the manifestation of intolerance toward the members of his organization in any companies. According to his count, the Church of Christ includes more than 3,000 Muscovites. Yulia Azbenova, who is responsible for relations with the public of the Hubbard Humanitarian Center ("Church of Scientology") also does not know of any complaints by managers about Scientologist employees.
Nevertheless specialists think that employees who are members of sects make their enterprises one of the risk groups. The director of the St. Peterburg Agency for the Study and Prevention of Embezzlement, Igor Chumarin, thinks that a member of a sect almost always will try to spread the influence of his "religion" on associates. "He will act more vigorously if that task is assigned to him or if he is influential in an organization that has its own commercial interests with regard to the enterprise," Chumarin says.
Within Scientology, for example, a theory of management has been developed and it is taught in classes. It is quite logical to expect that a manager who is a follower of Hubbard will want to get his subordinates to go to these classes. The more so since, like any theory that proposes "simple" solutions to complex problems, Hubbard's "administrative technology" has acquired a rather large number of proponents even among upper management. For example, the general director of the "Imperiia-T" company (that makes children's clothing), Vladimir Turov, does not hide his sympathies for Scientology. He views Hubbard's administrative technology as a collection of instruments that help one do business. "If I have a problem come up regarding employment, then I get out Hubbard's book and read how one should compose the advertisement, what should be written there, and how one should conduct the interview. The classic texts contain the same thing but everything is vague and impractical," Turov explains.
Nevertheless, Scientology has always been treated with great distrust, for instance, in Germany. In order to get work in a public or state organization in Bavaria, it is necessary to fill out a form in which it is asked whether the job seeker maintains relations with any such organizations that use the Hubbard technology and whether he has attended classes in his methods recently. Distrust towards Scientology is explained primarily by the fact that its founder never hid the way his religion represents a commercial enterprise and the members are supposed to be engaged in activity making money for him.
A sectarian also can become the cause of complications in relations within the collective. The general director of the "First of June" construction firm, Dmitry Filipchuk, said that about two years ago one of his subordinates, the head of the supply department , joined some sect. Before that time, according to Filipchuk, he was a "normal guy." "It all began with conversations," Filipchuk says. "No matter what was being talked about, he began turning everything toward God. Later he began to try to persuade us that we were all living improperly. In general, he turned from conversation to active agitation." In the end other employees simply stopped talking with him and he quit the company." Evidently, he simply got upset that his associates did not take him seriously," Filipchuk concludes.
Exposure of a risk group is not a necessary basis for dismissal, Chumarin notes. There is no legal basis for this. Besides, sectarians can be quite benign and useful for the company. However when such people show up the company can take precautions and not permit the possible negative consequences of religious fanaticism.
The adherence of a person to a sect can be determined by several typical signs: a portrait of the spiritual leader that the adherent of a sect always carries; a special diet or rituals; wish not to provide personal photographs; a document rejecting blood transfusion in the passport (a distinctive of the "Jehovah’s Witnesses"); clothing that is characteristic of the faith, or a way of talking or accessories (scarves, etc). According to an advisor of the director of the "Temenos" Institute for Psychological Consultation, Andrei Serov, sectarians usually are people with low self-esteem and frustrated ambitions. Fellowship within the sect compensates them for what they lack in life: respect and friendship.
A manager must pay attention to such things as attempts within the walls of the enterprise to get people to join the sect, periodic absence of an employee on certain days of the week (as a rule, supposedly for illness), display in the workplace of sectarian tracts or invitations to "seminars," stories about "very good" institutions for children, etc.
If it is impossible to dismiss a sectarian or to reeducate him, it remains to establish boundaries which would keep him from engaging at work in activity that has nothing to do with his occupation. In Serov’s opinion, managers can get good results from sectarians if the work is organized correctly. In the 1990s, in the Petrograd district Petersburg there was a restaurant called "Tete- a-Tete." There were two cooks there, one who left work with full packages of "bad" vegetables and the other who did not have them. The latter was a Mormon who religiously observed all commandments of his faith, including "thou shalt not steal." It seems that the restaurant owner valued this cook more. (tr. by PDS, posted 15 September 2002)
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Once again religion has become hostage to political interests. On Monday another Catholic priest was expelled from Russia, Polish citizen Jaroslaw Wisniewski, who has served recently in Catholic parishes of Sakhalin and has a valid permit for residence in the Russian federation. This happened against the backdrop of the still continuing uproar over denial of an entry visa for the Dalai Lama, whose supporters yesterday held their third protest demonstration in front of the building of the Russian foreign ministry.
Jaroslaw Wisniewski was detained in the Khabarovsk airport on Monday, 9 September, after returning from a trip to Japan. Border patrol workers informed the priest that he was forbidden entry into Russia without any kind of explanation. On the same day, a representative of the Vatican in RF, Archbishop Giorgio Zur, had a conversation at MID, although representatives of the foreign ministry declared that it did not have any information about what happened.
Jaroslaw Wisniewski became the fourth Catholic priest to be denied entry into Russia. Since April of this year, after the next round in the conflict between the Moscow patriarchate and the Vatican over the founding of Catholic dioceses in Russia, the rector of the Catholic parish in Vladimir, Stephano Caprio, the head of the Irkutsk Catholic diocese, Jerzy Mazur, and the rector of the parish in Yaroslavl, Stanislav Krainiak, were expelled from the country. Krainiak was denied an extension of his visa at the beginning of August by MID. In all cases representatives of MID cited legislation according to which foreign citizens may be denied entry into Russia "if this is necessary for purposes of preserving the security of the state."
It is quite obvious that Moscow has thus actively involved itself in the conflict between RPTs and the Vatican, which has been transformed from an interchurch conflict into a political one. To be sure, the government has tried to smooth over its role in this conflict. Alexander Voloshin even received the head of Russia Catholic, Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz, and expressed the idea to the effect that it would be good for the Moscow patriarchate and Vatican to be reconciled as soon as possible. But the incident involving Jaroslaw Wisniewski has put an end to that attempt.
The Dalai Lama apparently also has become a "threat to the security" of the Russian state. He planned to visit three Russian republics--Buriatia, Tuva, and Kalmykia. In August MID refused to issue an entry visa to him. Yesterday there was a demonstration in support of the Dalai Lama in front of the foreign ministry building, which was organized by activists of the Moscow division of the "Yabloko" party, in which representatives of the leading Buddhist organizations of Moscow participated. The third Buddhist demonstration at the MID building went without incident, in contrast to the two previous ones, which were unsanctioned and whose participants were arrested by police.
Representatives of MID did not hide the fact that they would not admit the Dalai Lama into Russia in order not to complicate relations with the leadership of PRC. It is noteworthy that the denial of an entry visa for the Buddhist leader was announced literally several days before the visit of Prime Minister Mikhail Kasianov to Beijing. Evidently Moscow decided to make a gift to the Chinese leadership in this way; literally a month before this the Russia authorities seemed to have nothing against the Dalai Lama's visit.
This leads to a rather unsettling conclusion: religion is being treated as one of the instruments for settling foreign and domestic political problems. It goes without saying that such an exploitation of the religious factor will cause enormous harm to the image of Russia as a democratic state and it discredits the course of approach to the West that the president has declared. Religion should not be diverted into the channel of the current political situation simply because it will change very quickly.
Wherever religion comes into contact with politics there should be maximum publicity. If the state refuses entry to the Dalai Lama, then it is necessary to talk openly about the reasons for the denial. And the same applies to the Catholic priests. An honest argument in favor of the prohibition on their presence in Russia is necessary. Even if it were a wrong position, that nevertheless would be better than a surreptitious religious game. (tr. by PDS, posted 13 September 2002)
RUSSIAN BORDER OFFICIALS CONTINUE TO COMBAT CATHOLICISM
by Kirill Vasilenko, Maksim Gladky
Vremia novostei, 11 September 2002
The list of Catholic priests who have been denied entry into Russia was lengthened recently with two new names. Fr Jaroslaw Wisniewski, a Polish citizen who had served in parishes of Sakhalin province (in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, Korsakov, Kholmsk, and Aniv) was detained at the Khabarovsk airport. Officials of the border service kept Fr Jaroslaw at the airport for a night and then sent him on the next flight to Japan, where the representative of the western church had incautiously gone for a short vacation. Yesterday evening bad luck struck the rector of the parish in Rostov-on-Don, Fr Edward Mackiewicz. He was returning to his parishioners from Poland through Belarus. At the border his visa was cancelled, although it was valid until December of this year.
Russian border officials have been practicing this manner of combating Catholic clergy since April 2002. It was then that Fr Stephano Caprio (Vladimir) and Bishop Jerzy Mazur (Irkutsk) were expelled from Russia. In August Fr Stanislaw Krainiak, who had served in Yaroslavl, was deprived of his visa without explanation of the reasons.
Recently the authorities have been trying to displace the responsibility onto the priests themselves, accusing them of provocations. For example, workers at the Commission for Relations with Religious Organizations of the government of Khabarovsk territory maintained that Fr Jaroslaw flew to Russia specifically to create a scandal. "Wisniewski knew about the cancellation of his visa and the attempt to enter the territory of Russia without a legal basis for it was more like a provocation," the secretary of the commission on religious relations for the government of the territory, Mikhail Svishchev, declared. However such accusations have been denied by the representation of the Holy See in Moscow. As a reporter for the "Vremia novostei" newspaper was told, the priest had not received any official warnings. Besides, the right to reside and work in Russia was given to him not by the visa but by a permit for residence valid to 2005. Incidentally, the Vatican is especially upset that very few foreign priests have been given such a document and only those who have obtained one have the right to open new parishes in our country.
Receipt of a permit for residence in Russia is not only very difficult for representatives of western Christian churches. Even in those cases where they manage to get the documents, the foreigners must give up the right of freedom of travel. Before every departure abroad the priest must get a permission stamp from OVIR.
As in the three preceding cases, the representative of the Holy See in Russia, Archbishop Giorgio Zur, delivered yesterday a note of protest to the Russian foreign ministry. And he again did not receive an intelligible explanation. Jaroslaw Wisniewski was expelled because he is on the list of persons who are forbidden entry into Russia, diplomats told His Eminence. "Any state may refuse an entry visa to any person without explaining the reasons," the Russian foreign ministry stated in a declaration. (tr. by PDS, posted 13 September 2002)
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