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How Russian Orthodox Church Feels Today In Russia

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Tania:
I have been searching through many websites, trying to gain some understanding of how today, the Russian Orthodox Church in Russia, feels today on a number of issues, includes the Russian Revolution, etc. I have also been searching for websites to see how various other Orthodox Churches feel, but have not found many. For me it is very slow going due my own specific health issues, but I want to really try to understand from every perspective how each part of the society in Russia, and outside Russia came to feel about the Russian Revolution. I know the Russian Orthodox Church outside of Russia, may have a different perspective than that of the Church in Russia. I think for those who are not Russian Orthodox it is even more perplexing in trying to understand.

When Communism took Russia, [and other eastern block countries] Religion till Stalin came to power was banned, and your life meant nothing. Countless lives of church officials, workers, priests and nuns were murdered on the spot, or sent to Siberia to die terrible deaths. When WWII came to Russia, and Hitler advanced into Russia and broke the treaty with Stalin, Stalin realized he needed The Russian Orthodox Church, it's priests, nuns, and all of those who had not been murdered, to revitalize, and renew faith if you will, so all of Russia would join en mass, and overthrow the Nazis. It worked, but then again, the church still was not given any real freedoms, and neither were the people of Russia.

Historical value has been given from every point, from notable persons, to that of people from outside Russia, who wanted to shine light on historical points they thought the public should know. But I think the Russian Church in Russia has never [or at least I have not found anything to date] shared their thoughts or feelings, as I found on this particular website. Today, while searching the Internet, I found this recent posting from the Website:http://www.russia-hc.ru/eng/index.cfm, authored by: the parish of Moscow's St Mitrophan of Voronezh Church and the Church of the Annunciation of the Most Holy Theotokos in Petrovsky Park. I was certainly surprised of all they delved into on the website, and what they shared in full. I can see why from outside Russia, controversy would ensue on some of these statements. Still, many have had their viewpoints open and shared globally. I now understand how much religion was for the Russian people in terms of their daily intake, and their mainstay of every home of those religiously oriented.

I have gained much insight from the many offerings posted from our many readers, and still there is so much to absorb. It's not to say I agree with many statements, or how perspectives are looked at, but it allows one a variance of understandings, and of how people come to feel the way they do.

If any should see other websites on the Russian Orthodox Church from Russia, or Orthodox Churches outside of Russia, expressing their feelings on the Russian Revolution, I would like to view them, preferably in English. I believe there also have been Russian Church Leaders who escaped from Russia sharing their stories, feelings. I have found very few websites to date. These websites to me especially, would be very important to read.

Thank you for any assist you can share. I am very appreciative.

Tatiana+

pookiepie:
I don't know much about the ROC (I'm part of ROCOR) but it sounds unlikley that Stalin revitalized the church only to get rid of the Nazi's. Like you said, the church still was not given any real freedoms, and neither were the people of Russia, so it sounds like there was something else going on.

pookiepie:
For those of you who are familiar with this, what do you think about this? Should it happen or not?

For those of you who aren't, here's a little info although I'll say right now, I don't know much about the situation. After the revolution, some people felt that the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) had become corrupt (ties with the KGB, communism, etc…) so they were given permission to break off and continue the true faith. This church became known as the Russina Orthodox Church Outside Russia (ROCOR). Now that communism is over, we should come back. The thought is right, we should join, but we don't know for sure if the ROC has renounced it's past. That's my only issue. It is a known fact that the currect head of the ROC, the Moscow patriarch (MP), is an ex- KGB member. He has already apologized. However, some argue that there's no such thing as an ex-KGB.

Tania:
Are you Russian Orthodox ?
What more do you know about these churches inside outside Russia ?

Tatiana+

David_Pritchard:
[size=14]Senior MP hails possible Russian Orthodox churches' reunification 19:16 | 13/ 05/ 2006
  
 MOSCOW, May 13 (RIA Novosti) - The reunification of the Russian Orthodox Church and the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia would be an event of tremendous importance, a senior member of the Russian lower chamber of parliament said Saturday.

"This would be a great event," said Natalia Narochnitskaya, deputy head of the State Duma's international committee and president of the Historical Perspective Foundation, a non-governmental organization. "The Russian people have risen to this historic challenge."

The ROCOR approved a resolution at its All-Diaspora Council Friday to reunify with the Moscow Patriarchate, the move that lays the groundwork for a canonical decision on the matter. According to the resolution, the ROCOR could be a self-governed branch within the Moscow Patriarchate, similar to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.

Narochnitskaya said the resolution was the Council's main outcome.

"The Church, as Corpus Christi, will be united, even though as an institution it will have some organizational specifics," she said, adding that it was not important how long the process might take.

Revolutions in 1917 and the ensuing Civil War in Russia caused a split in the Russian Orthodox Church in the 1920s, when some top clergy in exile refused to be subordinated to Church leaders who allegedly collaborated with the Communists.

Narochnitskaya said it was extremely important for a nation to reach internal accord and end a schism. She said reunification would help Russia bolster its spiritual linchpin, which holds everything together, turning a territory with natural resources into a state and an agglomeration of people into a nation.

"We have made a spiritual effort, crucial for Russia's further existence," she said.

Narochnitskaya said the ROC's membership in the World Council of Churches, a liberal ecumenical movement that brings together more than 340 churches, denominations, and fellowships in more than 100 countries, was not an obstacle to the Orthodox Church's reunification.

She dismissed some of ROCOR officials' criticism of the ROC for contacts with the state throughout the Soviet era, saying it was impossible to live in a state without interacting with it.

Norochnitskaya said the ROC, on the contrary, helped people in the former Soviet Union preserve their faith.

"We have always been grateful to them [ROC clergy], as they preserved in love and faith the Russia we have lost," the MP said.

She said joining together modern Russia and a Russia remembered and preserved by Russian emigrants was an objective facing the present generation.[/size]

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