Abstract
“The West” continues to be a subject of suspicion for many Orthodox church leaders from Russia—a somewhat surprising carryover from Soviet times to this day. In numerous statements and documents on the mission of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC), its leading hierarchs—Patriarch Kirill, Archbishop Hilarion, Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin, and others—identify their main opponent as “aggressive Western liberalism and secularism.” They claim that this opponent’s principal aim is to expel religion, in general, and the Orthodox Church, in particular, from society and to diminish the influence of religion on people’s behavior and life. An antithetical opposition is framed between “liberalism and secularism” on the one hand, and “morality and traditional values” on the other. The “enemy” is associated with an overriding antireligious tendency in Western societies that dates back to the French revolution and whose influence has continued to be felt in Russian society.
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Notes
To date, there has been little scholarly study of the image of the West among average Soviet citizens in the 1960s and 1970s. For an analysis of the press, see William Peter van den Bercken, Het beeld van het Westen in de Sovjet pers (Groningen: Wolters-Noordhoff, 1980). The Khrushchev era brought a certain opening, and a break with the old stereotypes of socialism and capitalism. However, the basic contours of that conceptual framework remained in place. A recent analysis of movies of the time is Anne E. Gorsuch, “From Iron Curtain to Silver Screen. Imagining the West in the Khrushchev Era,” in György Péteri (ed.), Imagining the West in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union (Pittsburg: University of Pittsburg Press, 2010), pp. 153–171. Gorsuch’s study also suggests that there was even a certain regression in the following period, when differences with the “decadent” West were emphasized more than before.
In this sense, morality (нравственность in Russian) was often contrasted with human rights, the latter being seen as a Western concept based on external legalism and even libertinism. For a more thorough analysis, see Alfons Brining, “‘Freedom’ vs. ‘Morality’—On Orthodox Anti-Westernism and Human Rights,” in Evert van der Zweerde (eds.), Orthodox Christianity and Human Rights (Leuven: Peeters, 2011), pp. 122–148.
For further details, see Dimitry V. Pospielovsky, The Russian Church under the Soviet Regime 1917–1982 (New York: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1984), vol. II, pp. 327–364.
The current Patriarch Kirill, before starting his dazzling career as rector of the Leningrad Theological Academy and bishop, was Nikodim’s personal secretary from 1970 onward. See Jane Ellis, The Russian Orthodox Church. A Contemporary History (Keston College: Croom Helm, 1986), p. 204. Generally on the so-called Nikodimovcy (“the Nikodimians”) in the present ROC hierarchy, see Н иколай М итрохин, Р усская П равославная Ц ерков. Современное с остояние и а ктуальные п роблемы (Nikolai Mitrokhin, The Russian Orthodox Church. Present State and Current Problems) (Moscow: Biblioteka Zhurnala Neprikosnovennyi Zapas, 2004), pp. 177–181. One should mention (as Mitrokhin does), first, that these former disciples of Nikodim are not a completely homogenous group, but often divided among themselves, and, second, the term “nikodimovcy” is often used pejoratively by their ecclesiastical adversaries. Nevertheless, what unites these circles at least superficially is a certain openness toward the ecumenical movement (and to Roman Catholicism in particular), a strong concern with developments in society and culture outside the church, and their veneration of Nikodim. For the latter, see the contributions of a number of higher clerics collected in Митрополит Крутицкий и Коломенский Ювеналий, Ч еловек церкви. К 20-летию со дня к ончины и 70-летию со дня р ождения Высокопреосвященнейшего м итрополита Л енинградского и Н овгородского Никодима, П атриаршего Экзарха Западной Европы (1929–1978) (Mocквa: изд. Papитeт, 1999) (Metropolitan Yuvenaliy of Krutitsy and Kolomna, A Man of the Church. On the 20th Anniversary of the Death and the 70th Birthday of His Holiness Metropolitan Nikodim of Leningrad and Novgorod, Patriarchal Exarch of Western Europe [Moscow: Raritet, 1999]).
William C. Fletcher, Religion and Soviet Foreign Policy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1973).
Examples from Fletcher, Religion and Soviet Foreign Policy, pp. 130f., 136–139. See also the statement of the Moscow Patriarchate on the Afghanistan invasion in ZhMP no. 5 (1980), 4f., also published in P. Hauptmann and G. Stricker (eds.), Die russische orthodoxe Kirche. Dokumente ihrer Geschichte (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1988), no. 371, p. 919f.
There is no systematic study so far of the CPC activities between 1958 and its dissolution shortly after 1990. Founded by West German theologians and the Czech theologian Jozef L. Hromadka in 1958, the organization soon came under Soviet influence through financial support, and by a majority of delegates from the Warsaw Pact countries. Nevertheless, the forum enjoyed credibility during the first decade of its existence, due to its effective inner structure and the personal reputation of Hromadka. Only after the events of 1968 in Prague, when Hromadka reluctantly stepped down, followed by Metropolitan Nikodim, the Christian Peace Conference was met with increasing distrust. See Wolfgang Lienemann, Frieden: Vom ‘gerechten Krieg’ zum ‘gerechten Frieden,’ Bensheimer Hefte no. 92 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2000), pp. 143–146; see also Fletcher, Religion and Soviet Foreign Policy, pp. 39–56.
William C. Fletcher, A Study in Survival. The Church in Russia 1927–1943 (London: SPCK, 1965), p. 29f.
With this, Sergii tried to link his declaration with the considerably less loyal documents that had been issued by his predecessors. See Protoierei Vladyslav Tsypin, Istoriia Russkoj Cerkvi, 1917–1997 gg. (Archpriest Vladyslav Tsypin, History of the Russian Church, 1917–1997) (Moscow: Izdatel’stvo Spaso-Preobrazhenskogo Monastyria, 1997), p. 161.
Cf. ZhMP no. 3 (1960), 33–35; also Hauptmann and Stricker, Dokumente (as n. 13), no. 323, pp. 812f. The speech drew severe criticism, and eventually led to the removal of Metropolitan Nikolai (Jarushevich), by then head of the Church Department for External Relations and the author of the text, from his duties. Cf. Arkhimandrit Avgustin (Nikitin), Tserkov plennaia. Mitropolit Nikodim i ego vremia (The church in captivity. Metropolitan Nikodim and his time) (Moscow: Izdatel’stvo S. Peterburgskogo Universiteta, 2008), pp. 51–54. On patriotic motives in the ROC since World War II, see also the overview by Kathy Rousselet, “Die Russische Kirche in der Sowjetunion und ihren Nachfolgestaaten,” in Die Geschichte des Christentums, vol. 13 (Freiburg: Herder, 2002), pp. 393–395.
Heiko Overmeyer, Frieden im Spannungsfeld zwischen Theologie und Politik. Die Friedensthematik in den bilateralen theologischen Gesprächen von Arnoldshain und Sagorsk (Frankfurt am Main: Otto Lembeck, 2005).
Metropolitan Nikodim, “The Russian Orthodox Church and the Ecumenical Movement”—The English version is published in Constantin G. Patelos (ed.), The Orthodox Churches in the Ecumenical Movement: Documents and Statements 1902–1975 (Geneva: WCC 1978), pp. 266–279.
See Georges Florovsky, “The Doctrine of the Church and the Ecumenical Problem,” The Ecumenical Review 2:2 (1950), 151–161. On Florovsky,
see Andrew Blane (ed.), Georges Florovsky. Russian Intellectual—Orthodox Churchman (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1993).
See R. Uertz, “Die Auseinandersetzung der katholischen Sozialethik mit dem Marxismus und Kommunismus als moderner ldeologie,” in I. Gabriel and C. Bystricky (eds.), Kommunismus im Rückblick. Ökumenischen Perspektiven aus Ost und West (1989–2009) (Ostfildern: Matthias Grünewald, 2010), pp. 117–136.
Cf. Paul Tillich, Christentum und soziale Gestaltung. Friihe Schriften zum religiösen Sozialismus (Stuttgart: Evangelisches Verlagswerk, 1962 = Gesammelte Werke, vol. 2). Particularly interesting in this context is another quotation from Tillich, where he praises “the prophetical spirit of self-criticism” that led Pope John XXIII to the reforms of the II Vatican Council: “Ausserdem hat Johannes XXIII. gezeigt, dass die Kirche nicht nur die Brüder erreichen kann, die sich von ihr losgesagt haben, sondern auch diejenigen, die niemals der Kirche angehört haben, die Feinde der Kirche und des Christentums. Auf Grund meiner Erfahrungen im Religiösen Sozialismus fühle ich mich ihm verwandt. Uns ist die prophetische Selbstkritik gemeinsam, die der Wahrheit offen ist, die die Kirche verloren hat und fir die heute säkulare und antireligiöse Bewegungen in einen Kampf eintreten, der gegen die Kirche gerichtet ist.”
Paul Tillich, Vorlesungen über die Geschichte des christlichen Denkens, Teil II: Aspekte des Protestantismus im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert, Ergänzungs- und Nachlassbände zu den Gesammelten Werken von Paul Tillich, vol. 2 (Stuttgart: Evangelisches Verlagswerk, 1967), p. 196.
See the explorations of Julia Oswalt, Kirchliche Gemeinde und Bauernbefreiung. Soziales Reformdenken in der orthodoxen Gemeindegeistlichkeit Russlands in der Ara Alexanders II. (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1975).
See Wallace L. Daniel, “Father Aleksandr Men’ and the Struggle to Recover Russia’s Heritage,” Demokratizatsiya 17:1 (2009), 73–92. Also on http://www.demokratizatsiya.org/issues/winter%202009/daniel.html.
See Sergei Zhuk, “Religion, ‘Westernization’ and Youth in the ‘Closed City’ of Soviet Ukraine, 1964–84,” The Russian Review 67:4 (2008), 661–679.
Ibid., p. 403. For an analysis of religious policy of the perestroika era, see Jane Ellis, “Some Reflections about Religious Policy under Kharchev,” in Sabrina Petra Ramet (ed.), Religious Policy in the Soviet Union (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), pp. 84–104.
A good overview of the crisis of the 1990s in Russia is given by Martin McCauley, “From Perestroika towards a New Order, 1985–1995,” in Gregory Freeze (ed.), Russia—A History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), pp. 383–421.
Andrei Kuraev, “Prava cheloveka i pravoslavie,” Nezavisimaia Gazeta (March 5, 1992), quoted after Rousselet, Die Russische Orthodoxe Kirche, p. 417. For a detailed description of the inner development of the ROC during this period, see Christopher Selbach, “The Orthodox Church in Post-Communist Russia and her Perception of the West: A Search for a Self in the Face of the Other,” Zeitschrift für Religionswissenschaft 10 (2002), 131–173.
Bases of the Social Concept, no. I.1-I.4. This is only one of many places where the will to interact with the secular world is expressed in recent documents. For a thorough analysis, see Alexander Agadjanian, “Breakthrough to Modernity, Apologia for Traditionalism: The Russian Orthodox View of Society and Culture in Comparative Perspective,” Religion, State &r Society 31:4 (2003), 327–346.
See Jutta Scherrer, Kulturologie. Russland auf der Suche nach einer zivilisatorischen Identität (Essener Kulturwissenschaftliche Vorträge, vol. 13) (Göttingen: Wallstein Verlag, 2003); Marlène Laruelle, “La discipline de la culturologie: un nouveau “prêt-àpenser” pour la Russie?” Diogène 204:4 (2003), 25–45. See also Brüning, “Freedom’ vs. Morality,’” p. 139ff.
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Brüning, A. (2014). Morality and Patriotism: Continuity and Change in Russian Orthodox Occidentalism since the Soviet Era. In: Krawchuk, A., Bremer, T. (eds) Eastern Orthodox Encounters of Identity and Otherness. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137377388_3
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