RUSSIA
RELIGION NEWS|
|
|
The governor of Saratov province, Eduard Rossel, is confident that Patriarch Alexis II of Moscow and all-Rus will take part in the ceremonies on the occasion of the opening of a memorial church consecrated to the holy tsarist passion bearers on the spot where the family of the last Russian emperor, Nicholas II, was shot in July 1918.
"Russkaia liniia" reports, citing "UralPolit.ru," that at a briefing on 27 May Rossel reported that he was able to learn personally yesterday from the patriarch about the state of his health, and he is convinced that Alexis II has recovered.
It is reported that the head of RPTsMP is planning to make his second visit to Ekaterinburg diocese since September 2000 in the middle of July, when an event devoted to the 85th anniversary from the day of the bloody treatment of the royal family will be conducted. The patriarch plans to perform the ritual of consecration of the Church-on-the-Blood, and he also will visit a number of other places on the map of Sverdlovsk provinces connected with the fate of the Romanov family and Orthodoxy in Russia. After the hospitalization of Alexis II his visit to Ekaterinburg was placed in doubt and today Eduard Rossell considered it necessary to wish the patriarch health publicly. (tr. by PDS, posted 28 May 2003)
Russia Religion News Current News Items
The Russian Orthodox church has declared 2003 the year of St. Serafim of Sarov. The 100th anniversary of "the last saint" has become one of the most significant cultural events for all Russia. Kursk has the most direct connection with this historical figure since the saint was a native of Solovinyi territory. The day of the canonization of Serafim of Sarov in the church calendar is 1 August. On that day a procession of the cross will be conducted in the Diveevo church where the basic celebrations devoted to the saint will be conducted. Patriarch Alexis II of all-Rus and Russian President Vladimir Putin have promised to attend. And a procession of 1,000 kilometers will begin 8 June in Kursk. All who wish may join it. Applications have already arrived from various cities of Russia, Kemorovo, Irkutsk, Vladivostok.
For Kurskites who will not be able to take part in the multi-kilometer procession of the cross the Kursk diocese offered an "abbreviated version" of the procession; a two-day march began in the morning of 17 May at the church of the Sign. It went about to the main churches and monasteries of the city and ended on Sunday at the central square. At a press conference preceding this event Fr Anatoly recalled that earlier a procession of the cross had preceded the all-night vigil on Red Square in the city. To the suggestion of reviving the tradition the bishop said in amazement: "I should conduct a service while looking at Lenin!" A legitimate observation, but it should be recalled that only a few years ago it seemed to priests unimaginable that a procession of the cross would be conducted along the street bearing the name of the leader of the revolution. Today few give it any attention, "Sovtest Online" notes.
Nobody intends to rename the central street, but there has been the thought on the part of municipal authorities to name one of the nearby streets in honor of the Kursk saint. But Mayor Sergei Maltsev does not support that idea, noting that it is impossible to place Lenin, Ufimtsev, and Serafim of Sarov on a par, and the ecclesiastical authorities absolutely agree with this. Although the head of the city promised to try to get the next submarine to be built to have the name of the saint, in honor of the "Kursk."
Provincial authorities also have not forgotten about religious matters. On 5 June in the little town of Svoboda, on the route to the Koren hermitage, a cross will be erected. In the longer term, they will put up a monument on the spot where, according to legend, hunters found an icon of the Mother of God. (tr. by PDS, posted 27 May 2003)
Russia Religion News Current News Items
Yesterday evening the illumination for St. Catherine's church in St. Petersburg was turned on. The plan for the conduct of the illumination work was developed by "Lenenergo" on order from the Italian A.E.M. company for the time of the celebration of the 300th anniversary of the city, "Interfax" was told at the consulate general of Italy in St. Petersburg.
The
church of St. Catherine on Nevsky Prospect was built in the northern capital
during 1762 to 1783 for Jesuits according to the design of architect Jan
Vallen Delamont and it was completed by Antonio Rinaldi. At that time it
was the largest Catholic church in Russia.
The building contains the sarcophagus of the last Polish king, Stanislav August Poniatovsky, whose remains were sent to Poland in the 1930s. Here also is buried the French general [Jean] Moreau, who fought on the side of the Russians against Napoleon.
The church was closed to parishioners in 1938. It suffered great damage from a fire in 1984. Only in 1992 was the building returned to believers. (tr. by PDS, posted 27 May 2003)
Russia Religion News Current News Items
The Vatican sent a request to RPTsMP to recognize the spiritual needs of 500,000 Russian Catholics, who "numerically do not pose a threat to Orthodoxy," Zenit.org reports.
The Vatican's secretary for relations with states, Archbishop Jean-Louis Tauran, made this request public on Sunday in an interview with the Italian newspaper Il Corriere della Sera, in which he commented on the accusation of proselytism made by the Moscow patriarchate against Rome.
"Such an attitude saddens me very much," Archbishop Tauran stated. "First of all because we have a large common tradition with the Orthodox church, and because I personally have been a witness to the desire, or rather the earnest attempt by John Paul II to try to do something for overcoming the schism that has divided our churches for centuries."
Archbishop Tauran thinks, in particular, that the current situation is complicated because the leaders of RPTsMP actually consider the Catholic church a "church of foreigners."
Nevertheless, Catholic structures like the Mogilev archdiocese, founded in 1773, and the dioceses of Tiraspol and Vladivostok have existed on the territory of Russia for a long time.
Catholics in Russia are Russian citizens and not foreigners, and thus they have the right to pastoral nurture just like all Catholics scattered about the whole world. As also do all Orthodox Christians in Russia and any other place on the planet, the archbishop declared.
Responding to the accusation of proselytism, Archbishop Tauran said that in general the word itself means "to win over followers of another religion using perfidious and deceitful methods." On the contrary, as the archbishop stressed in his interview, the pastoral activity of the pope and Catholic bishops display an example "of the great respect that the Catholic church has for Russian Orthodoxy." "I think that the time has come to recognize the right and obligation of the pope to be concerned for children of the Catholic church in Russia and to create in the country its own ordinary structures. In order to achieve this it is necessary to conclude an agreement between the two churches relative to the territory on which history has brought them to one another. This could help overcome the psychology of the 'besieged fortress,' which prevents the Orthodox church, which suffered so much in the years of communism, from presenting to Europe and the world its great spiritual riches," Archbishop Tauran concluded. (tr. by PDS, posted 27 May 2003)
Zenit article: "Russian Orthodox Urged to Respect Catholics' Spiritual Needs, Archbishop Tauran "Saddened" by Allegations of Proselytism"
RUSSIA CONTINUES TO URGE DEEPENING POLITICAL DIALOGUE WITH VATICAN
Mir religii, 27 May 2003
The head of the Federation Council Committee on International Affairs, Mikhail Margelov, today said that Russia continues to advocate political dialogue with the Vatican. As already reported, the delegation he is heading which is in Rome met with representatives of the Vatican. The state secretary of the Holy See, Archbishop Jean-Louis Tauran, and his deputy, Petro Tarolin, participated in conversations with the Russian side.
As RIA Novosti reports, the Russian senator discussed with the Vatican diplomats the idea of calling an international conference for maintaining the status quo of the holy places of Jerusalem, which the committee he heads has moved toward initiating. The goal of the conference is to call attention on the part of a broad spectrum of the international public to the problem of the status quo of the religious shrines "in the circumstances of the drawn-out Israeli-Palestinian conflict." The place for conducting the international forum could be, in the senator's opinion, Geneva.
Margelov declared after the meeting that "Russia values highly the role of the Vatican in the business of strengthening peace" and is prepared to cooperate in such spheres as combating international terrorism, maintaining security, disarmament, stabilizing crises, as well as in humanitarian, social, cultural, and scientific areas. "Our course with respect to the Vatican is unchanged. We have advocated the deepening of the political dialogue," the senator said. (tr. by PDS, posted 27 May 2003)
Russia Religion News Current News Items
In Belorussia Christians of Evangelical Faith ("Pentecostals") requested the removal from the curriculum of national public education the textbook for the eleventh grade "Man in the world of culture" class. As a reporter for "Rosbalt" was told at the Union of Christians of Evangelical Faith (SkhVE), this request was sent by the leadership of the organization to the Ministry of Education of Belarus because the textbook places "Pentecostals" in the same category as sects known for their destructive activity like "Great White Brotherhood" and "Aum Shinrikyo." The textbook was published in 2002 under the editorship of Yury Kharin. The information about "Pentecostals" is contained in the section "Nontradional religious associations and sects," written by T.M. Alpeeva.
SKhVE noted in its appeal that inclusion of such statements in the textook, printed in 147,200,000 copies, forms an extremely negative image of protestant believers in society. This, along with a "company of lies and slanders carried in several state news media," has led to "desecration of churches and threats of physical violence against ministers and their familes have been heard and children of believing parents have been insulted." Representatives of SKhVE think that "this textbook will make its own contribution to future incitement of interreligious hostility in the country."
The Ministry of Education of Belarus, according to SKhVE information, does not intend to remove the textbook from the sphere of national school education. The answer of the ministry says that the author of the material used the term "sect" as a "scientific theoretical term and not as one containing value characteristics," and it does not signify antisocial tendencies in the activity of "Pentecostals." In addition, the response of the workers of the Ministry of Education says that when the textbook is republished, "appropriate changes will be made in the contents of the topic of the spiritual potential of religion." (tr. by PDS, posted 27 May 2003)
Russia Religion News Current News Items
According to information at NG, a new centralized Jewish religious organization will be created in Russia. The creation of the new association of Jewish communities was announced during a three-day conference of rabbis of Russia beginning today in Moscow at the Memorial synagogue on Poklonnaia hill. The conference deals with "Education as one of the paths to self-identity. Family, school, community." The initiators for holding the conference and for the corresponding creation of the new organization are the Congress of Jewish Religious Communities and Organizations of Russia (KEROOR0, the Russian Jewish Congress (REK) and the Eurasian Jewish Congress (EAEK).
The new organization has good chances of success. It attempts to unite Orthodox communities that are not members for various reasons of the Federation of Jewish Communities (FEOR), a structure competing with KEROOR, or who are dissatisfied with its leadership. The current number of these communities is estimated by various experts at from 40 to 100, while the total number of communities registered with the Ministry of Justice is 270.
One undoubted advantage of the new structure will be that it is not implicated in the "war of compromise materials" which FEOR and KEROOR conducted between themselves in 2000-2001 and which substantially discredited both of these organizations in the eyes of the public.
We recall that there exist in Russia three basic forms of Judaism: Orthodox, Progressive (or Reform), and Conservative. Hasidism, that is represented in Russia by FEOR headed by Berl Lazar, is one of the wings of the Orthodox form.
NG requests comments on the creation of the new organization from the leaders of KEROOR and FEOR as well as the president of REK, Evgeny Satanovsky.
Adolf Shaevich, chief rabbi of Russia (KEROOR): "The new organization is called to strengthen the position of the Orthodox form of Judaism. KEROOR already united bot the Orthodox and modern Reform forms. But today the time has come for a more serious consideration of the Orthodox form that is traditional for Russia, and we hoped to unite these organizations of the Orthodox form that already cooperate with us in its own executive structure. We do not intend to dream up something new. There simply will appear within the structure of KEROOR a single Orthodox group that does not not depend on anybody. It will carry out its own tasks without competing with or conflicting with anybody. However existing practice shows that many communities have transferred from FEOR to KEROOR and therefore I cannot say that this will not happen in the future. But under not circumstances do we intend to entice or agitate."
To the question of who will head the new organizations and what it will be called Shaevich said it was difficult to answer, stating that this will be discussed with the rabbis who attend. He noted only that the organizers do not intend to choose yet another chief rabbi of Russia.
Berl Lazar, the chief rabbi of Russia (FEOR), spoke negatively about the creation of the new organization. In an interview with NG he stated that "in the Russian language an enormous number of synonyms exist. Any organization can call itself what it wants, but that does not change its essence. I would advise this organization to seek not a new name but a new path of work."
Evgeny Satanovsky, president of the Russian Jewish Congress: "The present conference of Russian rabbis in Moscow should bring clarity to the questions of relations among the various Orthodox Jewish congregation. A new resolution of the problem will be found, which will permit us to get out of the crisis that divides the religious Jewish community of Russia. I hope that in the near future the questions of the personal conflict among the leaders of KEROOR and FEOR will disappear forever from television screens and newspaper pages. These questions are no more interesting and important than the subject of the struggle for the patriarchy among Orthodox hierarchs or the conflict among various muftis." (tr. by PDS, posted 27 May 2003)
Russia Religion News Current News Items