| Among the best known of the evangelizing saints are the two brothers Cyril (ca. 826–69) and Methodios (815–85), apostles to the Slavs. Sons of aristocratic parents from Thessalonica, they used their education in philosophy and diplomacy to great advantage when they responded to the request of Prince Rastislav for missionaries to come and teach his people in their native language. It was Cyril who, in preparation for this new work, invented the Glagolitic alphabet, which is the basis for what is today called “Old Church Slavonic.” The Eastern Orthodox model of using the vernacular tongue to evangelize was firmly established by these two missionaries who translated the Bible and patristic and liturgical texts into the language understood by the people. This crucial principle is regrettably still not fully supported or practiced as Eastern Orthodoxy expands beyond the borders of traditionally Orthodox Christian countries. Another of the most significant mileposts in Eastern Orthodox evangelism is dated 988 with the baptism of the Rus. Inspired by his Christian grandmother, Prince Vladimir sent emissaries to explore various religions. They reported that when they were in Constantinople at the Divine Liturgy in Hagia Sophia they “knew not whether they were in heaven or earth” (Russian Chronicle). It has remained a testimony to the power of the liturgy and the beauty of church services to move the hearts and minds of the hearers. Even though catechism may have been poorly done or many (as in the case of the Rus) were compelled to be baptized by those in authority, a true evangelism of the Russian peoples began which would have an immense flowering and effect. It was this blessed foundation that sustained persecuted Christians during the bitter seventy-year reign of godless communism and which began to publicly flower again in 1988 with the millennium celebrations of the baptism of Kievan Rus. Other mileposts in Eastern Orthodox evangelism include the work of St. Stephen of Perm (1340–96) among the Zyrian people of Siberia. Notable were his convictions that Russian culture and Slavic language were not a crucial part of authentic Orthodox evangelism. He was also another great proponent of the power of liturgy and the beauty of church culture for evangelizing non-Christians. The Russian missions to Siberia, Korea, Japan, and Alaska beginning in the late 1700s and continuing through the 1917–18 Russian Revolution reflect in each region the Eastern Orthodox commitment to avoid religious syncretism and yet not confuse Orthodoxy with ethnic culture. St. Herman of Alaska (1756–1837) is considered a model of evangelism by ascetical example. Innocent of Alaska (1797–1878) is also another example of a great missionary who contextualized Orthodoxy while respecting the local customs of the people to whom he ministered and advocated the use of the vernacular. |
| About Pages Проекты «Правмира» Raising Orthodox Children to Orthodox Adulthood The Daily Website on How to be an Orthodox Christian Today Twitter Telegram Parler RSS Donate Are You a True Christian? Navigation Vladimir’s 1,000 Year Legacy Gives Russia Hope for the Future Source: Sputnik Speaking at a liturgy dedicated to the 1,000th anniversary of the death of Vladimir the Great, known for introducing Christianity to Kievan Rus, Russian Orthodox Church Patriarch Kirill explained that the most pressing message of Vladimir " s legacy is the need to save contemporary humanity from the idolatry of our time. Natalya Mihailova 02 August 2015 Photo: Sputnik/Sergey Pyatakov Speaking at the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow before worshipers and representatives of over a dozen representatives of Eastern Orthodoxy from around the world, Kirill noted that Vladimir made the decision to abandon paganism and convert to Christianity in line with the prevailing mood among his people. “[Vladimir] received baptism from the emissaries of the Church of Constantinople in Korsun, present-day Sevastopol,” Kirill explained. “It was not possible for him to make such a profound turn, not only in his own soul, but also for many of his people, as a mere frivolity. His relationship to others, to the people, had changed, and around him the people themselves also began to change. This was probably the only case in our history where the recognition of the prince came from the depths of the peoples’ own lives. Who were the pagan gods of the Kiev pantheon? They were the man-made symbols of human passions and human turmoil.” The patriarch noted that “the Christian ideal, with time, and not without difficulty, entered the lives of our people. We called ourselves ‘Holy Rus’ because the most sublime, authentic, unfading ideal of human life was the ideal of holiness.” Kirill expounded that a thousand years after Vladimir’s death, humanity once again stands at the threshold of a spiritual choice. “Contemporary humanity creates idols far more terrible than those of the Kievan Perun, and we see how the world has been engulfed by crime, war, as if human life is worth nothing in our enlightened age.” |
| Archive Пн The Serbian Patriarch pointed to the escalating intolerance of the Ukrainian authorities towards the Ukrainian Orthodox Church 27 February 2024 year 22:34 In response to the message of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Rus " in which His Holiness shared his alarm over the consideration in the first reading of the discriminatory draft bill No. 8371 by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, His Holiness Patriarch Porfirije of Serbia suggested that this draft law " serves a hidden purpose - to completely prevent the Ukrainian Orthodox Church from further fulfilling its centuries-old salvific mission among the heirs of ancient Kievan Rus " . " " Being sincerely alarmed by the escalating intolerance of the Ukrainian authorities towards the only canonical Church in Ukraine, we are particularly concerned about their intention to give this lawlessness legitimacy through the adoption of discriminatory laws, " the Serbian Patriarch emphasised. - " Therefore, always and everywhere, according to the opportunities available to us, we bear witness to the suffering of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, appealing to all the representatives of the international community who use their power to prevent this injustice. The highest archpastoral authorities of Our Holy Church do not cease to call upon Our faithful people to pray for the Ukrainian Orthodox brethren and, if possible, to provide material and non-material assistance to those who have suffered damage in the conditions of hostilities and as a result of persecution by the godless authorities. " " We rely only on the Lord and pray to Him that He may remember, through the prayerful intercession of Our Most Holy Lady, the Mother of God, the suffering people of Ukraine and grant them speedy deliverance from all the calamities that have befallen them, " His Holiness Patriarch Porphyrios emphasised. He assured that the Serbian Church will continue to " pray fervently for the long-suffering Ukrainian Orthodox Church and will continue to provide its hierarchy, clergy and faithful with every other kind of support that would help them to overcome all the trials they are currently experiencing " . |
| The patriarch noted that many people today have consciously rejected the ideal of holiness in favor of the “worship the ideals of self-gratification, consumerism, selfishness,” adding that others have been cast adrift and accept whatever “falls on them from the colossal information flow, no longer able to distinguish between good and evil.” But Kirill also voiced his hopes for the future. “If we do not let our history, our culture, which emerged from this ideal, and which absorbed this ideal, turn back to those same idols, then we will have hope for the future –for the building of a peaceful, fair, equitable life, in the center of which is the immortal ideal of holiness, of human goodness, reason, generosity, love and hope.” “Kneeling down before the memory of Prince Vladimir, we ask him to be with us, to enlighten our people, to help our youth realize the feats of all those who created Holy Rus and those who are ready to strive for this Rus in our time, and to struggle first and foremost with the sin which is inside all of us,” the patriarch concluded. Celebrations Across Russia and the Orthodox World The thousand year repose of Prince Vladimir is being celebrated on a national scale in Russia, and throughout the Orthodox world. In Russia the day serves as a double celebration, the festivities also devoted to the Christianization of Russia. The culmination of the two-day observance is taking place Tuesday in Moscow, when together with foreign bishops of the Orthodox Church, the Russian Orthodox Church remembers the life and works of Prince Vladimir. The Kremlin is also set to hold a gala reception for Church representatives hosted by President Vladimir Putin. In its turn, the Moscow Patriarchate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which remains Ukraine’s largest religious organization, is holding its own divine liturgy to Vladimir at the Kiev-Pechersk Monetary, headed by Metropolitan of Kiev and All Ukraine Onufry. Unfortunately, Ukrainian officials decided not to attend the event. For his part, President Petro Poroshenko and his wife attended a separate celebration at the St. Vladimir Cathedral of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kiev Patriarchate, which is unrecognized by the world Orthodox community. Following the Maidan coup d’état last year, relations between the Moscow and Kievan patriarchates have declined considerably, with the Russian-aligned Church outraged over UOC Patriarch Filaret’s comments urging the US and Europe to provide Kiev with assistance for its military campaign against independence and autonomy supporters in eastern Ukraine. |
| Accept The site uses cookies to help show you the most up-to-date information. By continuing to use the site, you consent to the use of your Metadata and cookies. Cookie policy The Serbian Patriarch pointed to the escalating intolerance of the Ukrainian authorities towards the Ukrainian Orthodox Church DECR Communication Service, 27.02.2024. In response to the message of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Rus " in which His Holiness shared his alarm over the consideration in the first reading of the discriminatory draft bill No. 8371 by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, His Holiness Patriarch Porfirije of Serbia suggested that this draft law " serves a hidden purpose - to completely prevent the Ukrainian Orthodox Church from further fulfilling its centuries-old salvific mission among the heirs of ancient Kievan Rus " . " " Being sincerely alarmed by the escalating intolerance of the Ukrainian authorities towards the only canonical Church in Ukraine, we are particularly concerned about their intention to give this lawlessness legitimacy through the adoption of discriminatory laws, " the Serbian Patriarch emphasised. - " Therefore, always and everywhere, according to the opportunities available to us, we bear witness to the suffering of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, appealing to all the representatives of the international community who use their power to prevent this injustice. The highest archpastoral authorities of Our Holy Church do not cease to call upon Our faithful people to pray for the Ukrainian Orthodox brethren and, if possible, to provide material and non-material assistance to those who have suffered damage in the conditions of hostilities and as a result of persecution by the godless authorities. " " We rely only on the Lord and pray to Him that He may remember, through the prayerful intercession of Our Most Holy Lady, the Mother of God, the suffering people of Ukraine and grant them speedy deliverance from all the calamities that have befallen them, " His Holiness Patriarch Porphyrios emphasised. He assured that the Serbian Church will continue to " pray fervently for the long-suffering Ukrainian Orthodox Church and will continue to provide its hierarchy, clergy and faithful with every other kind of support that would help them to overcome all the trials they are currently experiencing " . |
| Metropolitan HIlarion of Eastern America and New York: War always leads to more war Source: ROCOR Epistle of the Council of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia. We, the hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, having convened a regular session of the Council of Bishops in the God-preserved city of San Francisco, hereby mark an important spiritual event in Church history. It was here, where by God’s will, the oldest cathedra of the Russian Church Abroad was established, and which is now the last hierarchal cathedra according to the world clock, once occupied by St John, Archbishop of Shanghai and then of San Francisco. We celebrate the 20 th anniversary of his glorification this year . Here also lie the holy relics of St John, here thousands and thousands of pilgrims gather. During these days, the All-Diaspora Russian Orthodox Youth Conference is convening, in which our hierarchs are also participating. Marking this anniversary on Sunday , June16/29, during Divine Liturgy at the Cathedral of the Mother of God “Joy of All Who Sorrow,” the nominee of the Council of Bishops, Archimandrite Nicholas (Olhovsky), was consecrated to the episcopacy as Vicar of the Eastern American Diocese, with the title of Bishop of Manhattan. The Council of Bishops congratulates His Grace Bishop Nicholas and wishes him Divine aid in his archpastoral service to the Holy Church, and asks the God-loving flock to remember the new Bishop Nicholas in their prayers. St John, the wonderful miracle-worker and Righteous saint of God was fated to become the first glorified Russian saint who shone outside of the borders of Russia, outside the borders of our Fatherland. The Lord manifested through him miracles of healing, here the love-filled heart of St John prayed for us with utter empathy, rejecting no one. The descendant of the southern Russian noble family of the Maximoviches, which had already given Rus a holy hierarch, Metropolitan John of Tobolsk, Vladyka John of Shanghai and San Francisco never forgot his earthly homeland—Kievan Rus. In his childhood and youth, he more than once visited Dormition of the Mother of God Lavra of Svyatogorsk, where in our days, almost within its very walls, blood is spilt by those who die in internecine war. |
| The Russian side in this historic debate, in turn, places the emphasis on state succession. The Vladimir and Muscovite principalities were able to preserve this, eventually creating the centralized Russian state with its capital in Moscow. Meanwhile, Kiev lost its statehood for many centuries. An independent state on Ukrainian soil did not emerge again until 1991. Vladimir in Moscow: Lying, sitting and standing The political and historical battles over the new monument were not limited to statements of officials, but predictably spread to social networks. Those who supported Poroshenko emphasized that the prince of Kiev’s ties to the current capital of Russia were tenuous at best. " What does Prince Vladimir have to do with Moscow? " wondered Facebook user Mikhail V. Petrov. He also cited another popular argument of supporters of Rus-Ukraine: The coat of arms of Vladimir depicted a trident, which is the modern emblem of Ukraine. Those who do not agree with the Ukrainian president, like, for example, Facebook user Valentyna Volkova, point out that Vladimir called himself Prince of All Russia, not mentioning Ukraine, which is a more recent term. Others, like Alex Korobov, said that originally Vladimir was a prince in Novgorod (which is difficult to somehow connect with present-day Ukraine), and only later ruled in Kiev. However, some chose to adopt a more humorous interpretation – Facebook user Andrei Lukachev made a tongue-in-cheek comment to the effect that the statue of Vladimir had completed a Moscow trio along with Russian President Vladimir Putin and founder of the USSR Vladimir Lenin. " As the saying goes, we now have a lying Vladimir, a sitting Vladimir and a standing Vladimir in the center of Moscow! Like it or not, but Vladimir is the fate of Russia, " wrote Lukachev. Prince Vladimir is honored by the Russian Orthodox Church as a saint and described as equal to the apostles for his special efforts in spreading the Christian faith. The prince, who ruled at the end of the 10th century in Kiev, and before that in Novgorod, is widely revered in Russia. During his reign, the ancient Russian state, Kievan Rus, significantly strengthened, expanded and adopted Byzantine Christianity as the state religion. |
| Orthodox Christians want to keep spiritual ties with Russia Vasily Anisimov Moscow: Most Orthodox Christians in Ukraine want to retain their spiritual ties with Russia, a spokesman for the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate said. “The Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate has 12,000 parishes, 250 monasteries and its own media. These are structures that should influence public opinion, at least on important spiritual issues,” Vasily Anisimov said Wednesday. “If we, while preaching, forget about Holy Rus, our unity, common past, common longing for the future, then this should be a subject of public discussions and not only talk inside the church,” Anisimov said in an interview with the Russian government daily Rossiyskaya Gazeta to be published Thursday. Kievan Rus, a medieval state that comprised some parts of modern-day Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, was baptised by Prince Vladimir in the year 988. The canonical Ukrainian and Belarusian Orthodox Churches are subordinate to the Russian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate. The once united Ukrainian Orthodox Church split in the 1990s, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, into supporters of the Moscow Patriarchate and people who sought an independent national church. The canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate is recognised around the world, whereas the other churches, including the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kiev Patriarchate, are not. Speaking about the current situation in Ukraine, which has been in political turmoil since its legitimate President Viktor Yanukovich was ousted in a violent uprising in February, Anisimov said the new political elite in the country “promotes European integration, the new ‘civilisational choice of Ukraine. “He lamented that this apparently meant the elite wanted to “abandon the common spiritual and historical space where we have lived more than one century together with Russians and Belarussians. “Anti-government protests in Ukraine started in November 2013 when the country’s authorities refused to sign an association agreement with the European Union at a Vilnius summit, choosing closer ties with Russia instead. Commenting on calls by some politicians to have an independent Ukrainian church, Anisimov said the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate is independent: it is autonomous in its administrative actions but enjoys spiritual ties with the Russian Orthodox Church. |
| Third, wherever Russian state and civic organizations promote Russian culture and language abroad, the Church will also seek to tack on its religious agenda. While the state promotes the national interests of the Russian Federation, the Russian Orthodox Church will promote the larger cultural identity it sees itself as having inherited from Kievan Rus. For example, the Church sees the conflict in Ukraine as a civil war within the Russian World. From this perspective, it cannot be resolved by splitting up this community, thereby isolating Ukraine from Russia and destroying the unity of the Russky mir, or by permitting the forcible Ukrainianization of the predominantly Orthodox and Russian-speaking regions of Ukraine, which would result in the destruction of the Russky mir within Ukraine. The only permanent solution is for the Ukrainian government to admit the pluricultural nature of Ukrainian society and, in effect, recognize Ukraine as part of the Russky mir . From the Church " s perspective, this is the only way to achieve reconciliation among the Ukrainian people and harmony within the Russky mir . Oddly enough, many moderate Ukrainian nationalists also ascribe to the notion that some sort of symbiotic cultural connection exists between Russia and Ukraine. The typical pro-Maidan Ukrainian intellectual believes that Putin is out to undermine Ukrainian democracy first and foremost because he fears it spreading to Russia. But they predict the inevitable resumption of fraternal ties with Russia, after the freedom-loving, pro-European values of the Maidan succeed in overturning Putin " s authoritarian regime in Russia. 33 It is hard not to see the similarity between their aspirations for close ties with Russia and those of Patriarch Kirill, only under a completely different set of cultural assumptions. In conclusion, what impact will the rise of the Russky mir have on Russia " s relations with other nations? I anticipate three responses. In countries where the concept of Holy Rus has no historical context, there will be a tendency to fall back on the Cold War context they are most familiar with, as U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton did when she warned of efforts to " re-Sovietize the region. " " It " s going to be called customs union, it will be called Eurasian Union and all of that, " she said, " but let " s make no mistake about it. We know what the goal is and we are trying to figure out effective ways to slow down or prevent it. " 34 |
| On December 3 through 7, Patriarch Kirill is expected to visit Paris and Zurich PARIS, December 3./TASS/. Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia arrived in Paris on his first pastoral visit as the Russian Orthodox Church’s head to consecrate the new cathedral of the Russian Orthodox diocese of Chersonesus in France’s capital, to pray with Russian and French Orthodox believers and hold talks with state officials. Photo: Press-service of the Patriarchate of the ROC/TASS archive “I am delighted to arrive in France to pray with my congregation,” Patriarch Kirill said at Le Bourget Airport. He was welcomed by Russia’s Ambassador to France Alexander Orlov, Permanent Representative to UNESCO Alexander Kuznetsov and clergymen of the diocese of Chersonesus. Consecration of the Holy Trinity Cathedral “The coming consecration of the Holy Trinity Cathedral of the diocese of Chersonesus will become a milestone both in the Orthodox presence in France and in humanitarian relations between the Russians and French,” said Priest Alexander Volkov, the patriarch’s press secretary. On Sunday morning, the Russian Orthodox Church’s head is due to consecrate the new Holy Trinity Cathedral, which is an architectural dominance at the Russian Orthodox Spiritual and Cultural Center opened on October 19. The center comprises an exhibition hall, a Russian-French school and a building for the diocese authorities with a concert hall and living premises. Volkov said that the consecration of the Holy Trinity Cathedral and the first divine liturgy officiated by the Russian patriarch in it “is a landmark event both for the diocese of Chersonesus and for Russian Orthodox Church’s all foreign parishes,” which laity had been increasing recently. Diocese of Chersonesus The Russian Orthodox diocese of Chersonesus was named after the city of Korsun. That was the name Ancient Rus gave to Chersonesos Taurica in Crimea, where Saint Prince Vladimir the Great was baptized. Afterwards, he converted Kievan Rus to Christianity. |
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