| Question: That is, the Church has foreign property? Metropolitan Hilarion: This is not foreign property of the Moscow Patriarchate, but structures of the Russian Church located abroad. Each of our ecclesial structures located abroad has the status of a legal entity recognized by the state and possessing ownership. Question: Why, since 2010, has there been a fragmentation of diocese? Why has it been necessary to increase the number of diocese? Metropolitan Hilarion: This process was initiated by His Holiness, Patriarch Kirill, and is connected with the fact that the church revival that has being going on over the past twenty-five years has embraced all major cities and towns, but has not always reached the hinterlands. Priests lacked the strength to work in remote areas and bishops lacked the opportunity to monitor this work properly because we have a vast country with enormous territory. Until recently, we had dioceses in which the distance from one parish to another could take five hours to cover by plane. Bishops could not cope with such territories. Therefore, as a rule, a bishop could have a complete picture of what was going on in his cathedral city and in other major cities of his diocese; but as for what was going on in the provinces, the view was often far from complete and exhaustive. The creation of new diocesan centers also gives new impetus to the Church’s missionary work, because there will be a bishop where there previously had not been one. His diocese will include parishes that were previously rarely visited by bishops, if ever. There is the impulse to create new churches. The created dioceses are united into a metropolia, and he who had previously headed this now aggregated diocese becomes, as a rule, a metropolitan. Every new diocesan bishop is independent. His diocese is an ecclesial structure subordinate to the Patriarch and the Holy Synod. The Metropolitan coordinates the activities of the bishops of the metropolia and interacts with the local secular authorities. Every metropolia has a council to which all bishops belong. All of this work is aimed at giving a second wind to the Church’s missionary work. |
| 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 Navigation Missionary work Prison Ministry: A Service to Others 01 November 2018 Anna Dapper Discussing the Main Reasons for Loss of Faith 08 October 2018 Sergey Khudiev What I Learned About Faith While Thinking I Had Cancer This Week 25 September 2018 Natasha Crain “Weeping Icons? Get Serious…” 21 August 2018 Fr. Bill Olnhausen “Plunging In” with the Good News 07 July 2018 Fr. George Tsahakis Catholic Priests Introduce the Street Counseling with Atheists 25 May 2018 pravmir_com_team In Poland’s many localities priestly “shifts for non-believers” have begun What a Priest Sees Where People Die: Miraculous Stories about Cancer 14 April 2018 natalya_mihailova Some Missionary Notes 15 August 2017 Archpriest Andrew Phillips “A Pastor Does Not Demand Rights, He Only Has Duties” 02 June 2017 Metropolitan Ephrem of Tripoli, al-Koura and Dependencies Love People, Be Courageous, and Work Hard 25 August 2016 Protodeacon Peter Danilchick Previous 1 … 8 9 10 11 12 Next News 30 September His Holiness Patriarch Kirill Contracted the Coronavirus 4th Plenary Session between ROC and Coptic Church Held 29 September His Beatitude Metropolitan Tikhon Calls for Prayer for Those Facing Hurricanes Ian and Fiona 28 September Patriarch Kirill: The Church Prays for the Fraternal Strife to End as Soon as Possible Besides intellectual instruction, young people also need prayer, Patriarch Daniel says as new academic year begins 27 September The Synodal Residence in New York hosts the Council of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia Voluntary Blood Donation Takes Place in Churches in Serbia 26 September The work of the Church in society is quiet, but full of hope and love, says the Director of Lumina Publications 25 September Epistle of the Council of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia 23 September “The models par excellence are the great hesychast saints,” says Romanian Orthodox Bishop of Oradea Commentary All commentary Other media The Word of the Day How to Deal with Sin Ramblings of a Redneck Priest Party Etiquette Praying in the Rain Humility By Accident More RSS About Contact Us Donate Pravmir.ru © 2008-2024 Pravmir.com Developed by Hamburg Church Studio Design by — |
| The legacy of Saint Sergius to Russia and the Orthodox Church is immeasurable. His direct disciples founded nearly thirty monastic centers in northern Russia around which lands were settled and developed. Between 1400 and 1600, some 250 monasteries were established either through the direct or indirect inspiration of Saint Sergius. The mystical spiritual life of the Russian Church, as well as the interrelation between the Church and the socio-political life of the Russian nation in later times, were rooted in the person and work of the illustrious and exceptionally beloved Saint Sergius of Radonezh. Saint Stephen of Perm A contemporary and friend of Saint Sergius, Saint Stephen of Perm (1340–1396), was a learned bishop who undertook missionary work among the Zyrian tribes living just west of the Ural Mountains. Saint Stephen created an alphabet for the Zyrian language, and translated numerous Church writings into this language. Thus he continued the Byzantine tradition of fostering Church life in the vernacular in new regions, and he laid the spiritual foundations for the future missionary work of the Russian Church among the Siberian tribes, and later in China, Japan, and Alaska. Saint Andrei Rublev Saint Andrei Rublev (d.c. 1430), the greatest Russian iconographer and perhaps the greatest iconographer in Orthodox history, did his marvelous work at the end of the 14th and the beginning of the 15th centuries. He was a monk of the Holy Trinity Monastery founded by Saint Sergius of Radonezh. Much influenced by the illustrious Byzantine iconographer Theophanes the Greek, Saint Andrei worked together with his friend Daniel the Black. Rublev’s most famous work is the icon of the Holy Trinity, painted for the iconostasis of the new church built at his monastery. This profoundly moving icon depicts, in a perfect harmony of colors and lines, the Three Angels who visited Abraham and Sarah ( Gen 18 ). During this same period there was a renaissance of Church art in the Byzantine Empire, with many famous frescoes and mosaics coming from this time. The Serbs |
| Unfortunately, at that time the Russian nation was being scourged by new ideologies, which had slipped even into Orthodox ecclesiastical books, perhaps not fortuitously. St. Maximos began his work of writing, translating, correcting, and exegesis. At the same time, his genuine Orthodox way of life soon came to attract the Grand Prince and the Metropolitan, as well as the Russian people and numerous eminent and distinguished people, who recognized in him a sagacious monk with the ability to resolve, by the power of God and his wise teachings and counsels, the multifarious problems pertaining to people of all social classes and walks of life. Thus, he began his advisory work chiefly before the Russian ruler and the Metropolitan, who directed matters relating to the State and the Church, respectively. We should also note that St. Maximos was the first to initiate the Russian people into ancient Greek philosophy and literature, thanks to his many years of profound studies at Western universities. Moreover, he was the first to introduce the art of printing into Russia, owing to his close ties with the renowned Italian typographer and savant, Aldus Manutius. Generally speaking, St. Maximos the Enlightener and Equal-to-the-Apostles acted resourcefully and wisely, taking care to educate a multitude of people, who subsequently continued his colossal work of enlightening Russia in Orthodox Christianity, for the salvation of the people and the glory and joy of the Church of Christ. These cultural activities of the Saint underscore his manifold acts of beneficence, showing him forth not only as a missionary worker, but also as a civilizer of the Russian people, who at that time were in a state of illiteracy and ignorance. St. Maximos’ missionary activities lasted eight years. He bore a heavy cross, however, with his work on behalf of the Faith; or rather, the Devil, the enemy of the truth, attempted to destroy St. Maximos’ work, though the Evil One ultimately failed in this regard, since the “grain of wheat fell on good ground and sprang up, and bore fruit a hundredfold” (cf. St. Luke 8:8). |
| Apostolicity If the Orthodox Church through Her Local Churches is to fulfil Her worldwide missionary role, then Her members must put their Faith before their native cultures and languages. The Church converts to a new Faith through the tools of the local language and local culture. Only when conversion has taken place are the local culture and even aspects of its language modified. To understand missionary work primarily, or even secondarily, as conversion to an alien and foreign language and culture is merely to repeat the error of Non-Orthodox missionaries. They, primarily and secondarily, have attempted to introduce Western values, prejudices, dress, education, languages and habits, into the Americas, Africa and Asia, or more recently into the Ukraine and Iraq. They have always been a conscious or unconscious integral part of Western colonisation, of self-defensive and self-justifying Westernisation. True Christian missionaries do not do this, but adapt their own values, prejudices, dress, education, languages and habits to the local population. Only what is spiritual does not change. What is merely human does change. It is no good putting a language, into which the Gospel and Church services have already been translated, higher than Christ. It is no good saying that only Greek, Slavonic and Latin may be used in Church services. All these languages are languages of translation, for our Lord spoke in Aramaic. To do otherwise would be to deny the value of the missionary work of the Apostles, of St Thomas in India, of St Nina in Georgia, of Sts Cyril and Methodius among the Slavs, of St Stephen of Perm among the Zyrians. It would be to reject all of Arab and Romanian-speaking Orthodoxy, let alone all the missionary endeavours of the last centuries, in Siberia, the Far East, Western Europe, the Americas and Australasia. It would be to renounce the Apostolicity of the Church, to become anti-missionaries. The contemporary translations into liturgical English, more or less complete now, are a missionary key here. For as English is the world language, spoken and studied by billions, Orthodox liturgical translations can now be made not just into Albanian, Welsh, Catalan and Danish, as they have been in recent decades, but also into Mandarin, Hindi, Bangla, Yoruba, Nepalese, Mayan, Punjabi, Tagalog, Lao, Zulu and a thousand other languages beside. |
| Assembly of Orthodox missionaries from various countries takes place in Greece Piraeus, December 8, 2014 Early in December an international assembly of (The Orthodox Mission Network) took place in Piraeus (Greece). Participants from Greece, Russia, Serbia, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Nigeria, Cameroon and Mozambique shared their experience and discussed the today’s challenges of the external mission of Orthodoxy. The representatives of the Patriarchate of Alexandria, Metropolitan Alexander of Nigeria, Metropolitan Gregory of Cameroon, and Bishop John of Mozambique gave an account of the spreading of Orthodoxy in their countries. Deacon Georgiy Maximov participated at the assembly as representative of the Synodal Missionary Department of the Russian Orthodox Church. Deacon Georgiy shared the experience of the present-day missionary work of the Russian Church representatives in Asian countries. The main subject of discussion was the issue of inculturation of the mission – the principles and permissible limits in the attempts to express Orthodoxy, taking into account the realities of culture and mentality of non-Orthodox peoples. The discussion started with a report by Prof. A.N. Papathanasiou who expressed the opinion that the mission’s problem was its lack of Orthodox African theology and Orthodox African culture at the present time. In his view, missionaries should make a kind of synthesis between the Gospel and a local culture. Metropolitan Alexander stressed that a missionary should not impose his national identity along with preaching of the Gospel, but “should incarnate the Gospel in the body of a local culture and philosophy.” The Greek representatives touched upon the following issues: the possibility new forms of monastic life in Africa; the possibility of using other substances for serving a Liturgy; polygamy in the African society and others. Deacon Georgiy Maximov accentuated that emergence of Orthodox culture among the peoples of Africa and Asia should be a natural process, coming from the peoples themselves, and should not be imposed artificially by “white” missionaries. Inculturation as inclusion of those elements of the national culture that do not contradict the Gospel is acceptable and advisable, however there cannot be some sort of specifically “African”, or “Asian” theology, because the Truth, preached by the Orthodox Church, is universal. It is also unacceptable to impose your own national and cultural identity on converts because it is alien to them, nor to abandon (under the pretext of inculturation) the basics of our theology, moral and liturgical life of the Orthodox Church. In his turn, Metropolitan Alexander pointed out that it was not a question of change of the Orthodox theology, but of finding ways to express this theology in categories that are close to the mind-sets of these peoples. |
| On November 29, 1840, after the death of his wife, Father John was tonsured a monk with the name Innocent by St Philaret, the Metropolitan of Moscow, in honor of St Innocent of Irkutsk. On December 15, Archimandrite Innocent was consecrated Bishop of Kamchatka, the Kurile and Aleutian Islands. On April 21, 1850 Bishop Innocent was elevated to the rank of archbishop. By the Providence of God on January 5, 1868, St Innocent succeeded Metropolitan Philaret on the Moscow cathedra. Through the Holy Synod, Metropolitan Innocent consolidated the secular missionary efforts of the Russian Church (already in 1839 he had proposed a project for improving the organization of missionary service). Under the care of Metropolitan Innocent a Missionary Society was created, and the Protection monastery was reorganized for missionary work. In 1870 the Japanese Orthodox Spiritual Mission headed by Archimandrite Nicholas Kasatkin (afterwards Saint Nicholas of Japan, (February 3) was set up, to whom St innocent had shared much of his own spiritual experience. The guidance by St Innocent of the Moscow diocese was also fruitful, by his efforts, the church of the Protection of the Most Holy Theotokos was built up into the Moscow Spiritual Academy. St Innocent fell asleep in the Lord on March 31, 1879, on Holy Saturday, and was buried at the Holy Spirit Church of the Trinity-St Sergius Lavra. On October 6, 1977, St Innocent was glorified by the Russian Orthodox Church. His memory is celebrated three times during the year: on March 31, the day of his blessed repose, on October 5 (Synaxis of the Moscow Hierarchs), and on October 6, the day of his glorification. Troparion — Tone 4 O Holy Father Innocent/In obedience to the will of God/You accepted dangers and tribulations/Bringing many peoples to the knowledge of truth./You showed us the way,/Now by your prayers help lead us into the Kingdom of Heaven. Troparion — Tone 4 You evangelized the northern people of America and Asia,/proclaiming the Gospel of Christ to the natives in their own tongues./Holy Hierarch Father Innocent,/enlightener of Alaska and all America,/your ways were ordered by the Lord!/Pray to Him for the salvation of our souls in His heavenly Kingdom! Kontakion — Tone 2 |
| The grace of truth has shone forth upon us; the mysteries darkly prefigured in the times of old have now been openly fulfilled. For behold, the Church is clothed in a beauty that surpasses all things earthly, through the icon of the incarnate Christ that was foreshadowed by the ark of testimony [ Ex 25.22 ]. This is the safeguard of the Orthodox Faith; for if we hold fast to the icon of the Savior whom we worship, we shall not go astray.?.?.?. Saints Cyril and Methodius-“Evangelizers of the Slavs and Equal to the Apostles” In the middle of the ninth century, Saint Prince Rastislav (r. 846–870), the ruler of the Slav state of Moravia (now in the Czech Republic), sent a request to Byzantium asking for missionaries to bring the Christian Faith to his people in their own language. Frankish missionaries using Latin had already been at work in his land, but he realized that the Faith would be much more meaningful to his people if they could have the Scriptures and the liturgical services in their native tongue. He also wanted to strengthen the alliance his nation had recently formed with Byzantium, against possible encroachment by the Frankish Holy Roman Empire directly to the west of his realm. In response to Prince Rastislav’s request, Emperor Michael III (r. 842–867) and Patriarch Saint Photius the Great of Constantinople sent two devout and well-educated brothers named Constantine and Methodius as missionaries to Moravia. From an aristocratic family, these brothers had grown up in Thessalonica, where many Slavs lived, from whom they learned the Slavic language. They even had already done some preliminary work in trying to develop an alphabet for that language. And they had previous diplomatic and missionary experience. So they were ideal candidates for the mission to the Slavs. Before arriving in Moravia in 863, Constantine had finished developing the first alphabet for the Slavic language. Called Glagolitic, it had highly unusual characters, unlike those of any other language. In Moravia the brothers used this alphabet in translating Church books into the Slavic language, which came to be known as Old Church Slavonic. They taught the alphabet and literacy, introduced the use of Slavonic in the Church services, and began training men for the diaconate and priesthood as the first step in raising up a native clergy for the Moravian Church. |
| М.Р. Салахов Евфимий Александрович Малов и миссионерская деятельность «Братства святителя Гурия» во второй половине XIX в. Источник Евфимий Александрович Малов известен в истории как талантливый миссионер, ученый и церковный деятель. Он оставил после себя многочисленные дневники, печатные издания и переводы на тему противомусульманской полемики. В своих трудах Малов описывал развитие миссионерского дела, имперскую политику в Казанской губернии в прошлом и критиковал процессы, свидетелем и современником которых был. E.A. Malov is well-known as a talented missionary, scientist and church leader. He had left numerous diaries, publications and translations on the topic of anti-islamic dispute. In his papers Malov described the development of missionary work, imperial politics in Kazan province in the past. He criticised the processes he had witnessed and been a contemporary of. Besided, he can also be called a historian of missionary work. Значительные преобразования в России во второй половине XIX и начале ХХ в. отразились на всех аспектах жизни страны. Перемены коснулись экономических, культурных, идеологических и духовных сфер общества. Шло дальнейшее продолжение интеграции нерусских народов как в культурно-языковой, так и религиозной сфере. Развитая инфраструктура Русской православной церкви (РПЦ) активно использовалась государством для продвижения важных социальных и полицейско-охранительных проектов. Важным направлением взаимодействия государства и православной церкви становилась реализация политики по христианизации религиозных меньшинств. Казанская епархия на рубеже веков была многонациональной. Так, численность населения Казанской губернии в это время составляла более 1650 тыс., из них русских – около 700 тыс. чел. Все остальное население было «инородческим», и татары занимали здесь первое по численности место, т.е. 452 тыс. чел. (из них более 400 тыс. исповедовали ислам и лишь 40 тыс. считались принадлежащими к православной церкви) 1 . Большая часть «инородцев» (как старокрещеных, так и новокрещеных) не понимала самой сути православия, не знала русского языка и свое участие в церковной службе ограничивала лишь одной обрядовой стороной. Данные обстоятельства приводили к сознательным массовым переходам в ислам . Этому способствовали также изжившие себя старые административные методы борьбы с отступничеством, усилившаяся пропаганда исламистов, подъем национального самосознания и другие явления. Необходимо было искать иной выход из создавшегося положения. |
| They do not need to adapt to our culture, for they already belong to it. On the one hand, they find here a kindred cultural and spiritual space, but on the other, they need to adapt as well. As far as refugees are concerned, we seek to create conditions for them to survive and to go through the winter so that their children may not fall ill, that they may have enough food and a roof over their heads. Here, too, the Church maintains cooperation with the state, especially with regard to the frontier regions in which our dioceses are directly involved in aid to refugees. But first and foremost, the state can help materially while the Church spiritually. In this connection, there is another important point to make. Every migration involves psychological stress. And along with our task to help people master the Russian language (if they do not know it) and familiarize themselves with our culture (if they are not familiar with it), we should also help them to overcome this stress, which develops because of the change in their living conditions, when some may find themselves in not quite a favourable or comfortable milieu. To prevent all this from generating conflict situations in which those who have come to our country may be pushed out to a path leading to crime, it is necessary that the Church and the state should undertake serious joint work. And this work is being carried out. You have cited examples of cooperation between the Federal Migration Service and the Synodal Department for Church-State Relations. The work with immigrants, among other things, is a direct responsibility of this department. But we really should involve in it all the healthy forces of our society, just as all the healthy forces of the Church are involved in this work. The Synodal Department alone cannot do this work as it includes both spiritual and material support for millions-strong groups of people coming to Russia from various countries. Ms Bazhan: Let me cite as an example the Synodal Department responsible for missionary concerns, which work under the guidance of Metropolitan Ioann (Popov). In Belgorod, there is an adaptation and information center for immigrants, which works, along with others, with people from Ukraine. In addition, there is the Stavropol Region. Through cooperation between our office in that region and the Metropolia of Stavropol, the region has become a participant in the state-run program for promoting the volunteer resettlement of our compatriots who live abroad. At present, our compatriots, including Ukrainian citizens, have already filed about one thousand applications for participation in this program. The state program is a direct state mechanism not only for adaptation but also full integration, including documenting the compatriots who wish to become Russian citizens. |
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