http://www.stetson.edu/~psteeves/relnews/0404a.html#06

Easter interview with patriarch
PATRIARCH ALEKSII II: A TIME WHEN OPPORTUNITIES ARE OPENING
An interview with Patriarch Aleksii II, head of the Russian Orthodox Church
Trud, 9 April, 2004
Patriarch Aleksii II has headed the Russian Orthodox Church for almost one-fifth of his lifetime. It has been his fate to lead the Church out of the "Soviet ghetto." Here he describes the current stage of the Church's development, and discusses the priorities of the Church in Russia today.

Question: You have been the Patriarch for almost one-fifth of your lifetime. It has been your fate to lead the Church out of the "Soviet ghetto." How would you describe the current stage of the Church's development? What are the priority issues at present?

Patriarch Aleksii II: A great deal has been done in recent years. Thousands of churches and hundreds of monasteries have been restored; dozens of theological colleges have resumed their activities. But the present is not only a time of achievements and completed things. To a large extent, it is also a time when opportunities are opening up. And the Church is using those opportunities to witness to the world of the eternal verities of the New Testament, to promote the moral rebirth of the peoples of our country and neighboring countries, to work for peace and harmony in society.

Among our priority objectives are strengthening the partnership between the state and the Church, creating a system of cooperation between the Church and the political authorities, based on appropriate laws and agreements. We would like to believe that cooperation between Church and state at all levels will be independent of political circumstances or the personal qualities of Church and state leaders.

I consider it no less important to develop the educational and awareness activities of the Church. A new system of theological education is currently being developed, taking into account both the rich experience of pre-revolutionary Russia and the achievements of modern science.

The question of teaching the basics of religion in secular schools is also important. Until recently, state educational institutions had no alternative to the materialist, agnostic outlook shaped in the Soviet era, when religious faith could only be discussed from a Marxist standpoint. Then Marxism was replaced in school syllabi by a skeptical "equal distance" from all religions. Obviously, this contradicts the world view of children who are believers, and their parents. And many parts of society are interested in overcoming this burdensome legacy of the atheist system of education.

It is essential to develop cooperation among different religious faiths. At present, an exceptionally high level of dialogue has been achieved in Russia between the traditional faiths. This has enabled the CIS Inter-Faith Council to be established, at the Second Inter-Faith Forum that took place in early March. It would be difficult to exaggerate the importance of joint efforts by the leaders of the traditional faiths to promote peace and harmony across post-Soviet territory. Nowadays, when in many countries religious diversity is used as a pretext for division or even violence, in Russia and its neighbors this diversity is becoming a significant factor in drawing different peoples closer together.

Question: Some of the secular media consider last year's dismissals and appointments among the senior clergy to be "a real personnel revolution." Do you agree with this definition? What are the original causes and aims of these personnel changes?

Patriarch Aleksii II: Such evaluations of the personnel decisions of the Church have appeared earlier. People who are ill- informed about the Church sometimes start projecting the relations which are typical for secular politics or business onto the Church.

However, the way of revolutions, including cadre ones, is alien to the Church. These or those changes in the structure of church leadership in the centre and in eparchies have been always done for the church's good. The situation in Russia and the rest of the world changes very quickly, and that's why the priorities of the church activity can be changed too. So, the work of a person, who occupies this or that post in the church management, can demand some new personal and professional qualities.

Question: What ways do you see for overcoming of the Orthodox schism in Ukraine?

Patriarch Aleksii II: The schism in the Ukrainian Orthodox Church causes us serious anxiety. The church schism inflicts sufferings on the faithful and people. We hope that those, who separated from the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, will return and the church unity and peace will be restored in Ukraine. The Orthodox Church has always waited for its lost children and been ready to embrace them as a mother.

Question: It is considered that the present relations between Church and state are practically the most favorable ones in the Church's history. How can you explain the fact that the questions concerning passing of churches and lands to the Church and relaxation of tax burden are so difficult to resolve?

Patriarch Aleksii II: The case is that all these problems touch upon the lives and interests of many people. You see, the change of the order to taxation exerts some influence on the state budget. The same thing concerns the Church property, which was seized by the Soviet authorities. These buildings changed their owners for several times under the Soviet regime, residential areas and industrial enterprises appeared on these lands. That's why the settlement of the situation with taxation and specification of the status of lands, which are being used by the Church, demands a lot of efforts from each side, compromise and can't be achieved for one day. The present mechanisms of the dialogue between the Church and state allow us to place hopes on overcoming of troubles, which will be acceptable for both sides.

Question: How would you estimate the role of President Putin in the mental recovery of Russian society, strengthening of positions of the Orthodox Church and of opportunities for activities of other traditional faiths? What do you speak about with the head of the state during your meetings with him?

Patriarch Aleksii II: The president carries out the consistent policy of revival and strengthening of Russian state. It is very good that the positions of the Russian Orthodox Church meet his understanding concerning different socially significant questions.

Basically, we discuss different aspects of the relations between the Church and state, problems of revival of church life, prospects of inter-faith cooperation and questions concerning moral well-being of citizens of our country at our meetings.

Question: The present stratification of our society is too obvious. Do you agree that, to a considerable degree, it was caused by the dangerous devaluation of moral values in the sphere of Russian business? Are there many examples of inclination of successful businessmen for the Chursh and for charity?

Patriarch Aleksii II: The stratification of society into the poor and the rich has always existed and, probably, will remain until doomsday. St. John Chrysostom answered as follows when he was asked about the causes of social inequality: "God gave his blessings to us unequally, in order that we could help each other." In other words, social inequality can and should be the cause for virtue and moral growth, not for opposition, violence and suffering. A lot of businessmen and well-to-do people considered the wealth which was given by God to them as the cause for virtue and moral growth. The existence of many orphan children, elderly and sick people and fulfillment of some church charitable programs would be impossible without generous charitable, sometimes secret, aid of these people.

The Church is sure that the economy and business undertakings can't be brought to "the pure mathematics"; they can't be deprived of the moral dimension. A lot of representatives of Russian business class draw this conclusion today. The Code of Moral Principles and Rules in Management, which had been adopted by the World Russian People's Council in February 2004, was considered with some interest in business circles of Russia. Some entrepreneurs said that they were ready to follow the regulations of this document in their activity. I'm sure that others will join them in future and it will approach the revival of traditions of Russian private entrepreneurship, which were lost some time ago.

Question: Can the Church, and the increase in the numbers of believers, have any influence on the crime situation? What is your attitude to the death penalty for major crimes?

Patriarch Aleksii II: Contemporary crime has various causes, including economic, social, political ones. It is obvious to us, as Christians, that the sinful damage to a soul is the basis of any crime. Our Church together with the state and society has always striven to vanquish crime. The special task of the Church is exerting moral influence on people, because only strengthening of high values and ideals can stop violence, theft and untruth.

Believers assess their thoughts from the position of eternal reference points. They see God's image in every other person, and believes that no secular acquisitions can justify the destructive influence exerted on a criminal by the crime. It is impossible to base one's personal happiness on the sufferings and pain of other people.

The Church contributes to preventing crime and pays attention to those our citizens, who took false steps and are imprisoned.

The history of the Orthodox Church is full of examples of self- sacrificing social, enlightening and pastoral service to prisoners. As for the death penalty, one should remember that the Orthodox tradition doesn't consider the revenge as the main purpose of penalty. It sees the main purpose in a criminal's correction. We know that there is no ban against death penalties as a preventive punishment of heinous crimes in the Holy Scripture. However, a critical attitude toward this kind of penalty was born in the Christian society. For example, it was expressed in the custom of the Church's interceding for someone condemned to death. Although the Church lets the state to reach the final decision, it welcomes the steps of the secular authorities in commutation of the sentence, which would bring a criminal to repentance and rule out the possibility of judicial error. The inevitability of the penalty for major crimes in combination with their prevention becomes a more efficient means in fighting evil than a simple toughening of the penalty.

Question: You have said in one of your recent speeches that the next High-Ranking Clergymen's Council would take place in October of 2004. If it is so, tell us, please, about the problems, which will be discussed by the Council?

Patriarch Aleksii II: The meeting of the Holy Synod in Moscow on March 25 decided that the next Senior Clergymen's Council would take place on October 3-8. It is planned to sum up the activity of the Russian Church for last four years and to draw up plans for the nearest future. Questions concerning the relations between the Church and state and inter-Christian relations will be discussed too. Moreover, we will discuss about overcoming of the schism of Russian Orthodoxy and restoration of unity with the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad. We hope also to discuss the vital questions of church-building - for example, the creation of a church court. (tr. by Gregory Malyutin; from WPS monitoring service)

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Jehovah's Witnesses case threatens every religion
WITNESSING RELIGIOUS REPRESSION
by Lawrence A. Uzzell
Moscow Times, 5 April 2004
Some religions are widely admired even by people who do not share their doctrines. The Jehovah's Witnesses are not among them. For precisely this reason they provide an excellent test of a country's commitment to religious freedom. The March 26 Moscow court decision banning the Witnesses' activities in the capital is a long-term threat to every religion in Russia that takes its own beliefs seriously.

The Jehovah's Witnesses call themselves "Christian" but deny core Christian doctrines such as the Trinity. They have repeatedly predicted that the world is about to end. They discourage their members from reading religious or even nonreligious writings other than those of their own faith and put them under extreme pressure to engage in personal missionary work. A few years ago, using the Witnesses' own figures, I calculated that each of their active members in Russia was contributing an average of 216 hours of missionary service per year. I also concluded that it took the denomination 1,878 hours of missionary work to achieve just one conversion, contrary to their opponents' hysterical image of "zombies" cloning themselves via mass brainwashing.

Nevertheless, the Jehovah's Witnesses are perfectly legal in every country that meets minimal standards of religious freedom. Even France, at the height of its "cult scare" four years ago, produced a court ruling that the Witnesses are not a "menace to public order" and may therefore enjoy tax exemptions.

The recent Moscow court decision is significant for three reasons. First, it goes beyond previous repressive steps such as denying official registration to a religious organization. Without registration a religious body has no corporate right to rent buildings or to publish religious literature, but it can still conduct regular, publicly announced worship services in its members' homes. The Jehovah's Witnesses, however, will probably soon become the first national religious organization to have one of its local branches explicitly "banned" under the terms of the 1997 law that re-established state control over religious life. The court decision will not take legal effect until the Witnesses' appeal is decided, but their chances of winning on appeal do not look good.

That ban will deny the Witnesses' right to any form of collective religious activity, such as open worship services even in private homes. It may also breathe new life into the 1997 law, which despite its harsh provisions has been largely moribund in practice. If that law were strictly enforced, any religious organization founded later than the mid-1980s -- when Russia was still under totalitarian atheist rule -- would lose most of its legal rights. That would be the equivalent of suppressing every newspaper or political party founded since the dawn of glasnost.

The court ruling's second key feature is that the prosecution's reasoning could be used against almost any religion. While the judge's detailed opinion is not expected until mid-April, the public prosecutors' office for Moscow's northern administrative district argued in seeking the ban that the Jehovah's Witnesses incite inter-religious conflict. As evidence, municipal prosecutors noted that the Witnesses' publications claim that their religion is true and that others are false and argued that the Witnesses require their members to take part in so many activities "that no time is left for fulfilling family obligations, useful labor, family communication, recreation together and self-improvement."

You can easily imagine how atheist authorities might use this precedent against other believers. Any Christian body claiming to be the sole true heir of the early Church -- as nearly all used to and as the Orthodox Church still does -- could be convicted of inciting religious hatred. Truth claims by religious believers, unlike those by adherents of secular ideologies, would be illegal. Similarly, Orthodox monastic life would not long survive the Soviet-style assumption that religious activities are irrelevant to "useful labor" or "self-improvement."

Such reasoning will not soon be used against the Orthodox because the great majority of ethnic Russians still identify themselves as Orthodox -- but majorities are fickle. Only 3 to 4 percent of Russians seriously practice Orthodoxy; within a few generations they may find themselves as isolated as are serious Lutherans in Sweden, but without legal guarantees of religious freedom.

Thirdly, the case illustrates the secular authorities' tactics of "divide and rule." The prominent rabbi Berl Lazar made a carefully hedged comment that, "as regards confession of faith proper, that is, the relationship of a person with the Almighty, there cannot and should not be any restrictions of freedom. But as regards relationships among people, the law has the right to say its piece." Most other leaders of mainstream religions in Russia also failed to speak up for the Jehovah's Witnesses, making it more likely that when they in turn face repression, nobody will speak up for them.

Ironically, the Witnesses have also been guilty of selective commitment to religious freedom. Some years ago I visited Irkutsk, which has an artificially high concentration of Witnesses because Stalin exiled so many to Siberia. In Irkutsk the Witnesses are beneficiaries rather than victims of religious discrimination, enjoying free grants of land and other privileges denied Old Believers and many Protestants. They told me that church-state relations there are excellent.

Irkutsk is an extreme case. Several other regions have found the golden mean between that extreme and the one now triumphant in Moscow. John Burns, the Witnesses' lawyer, told me in a March 31 interview that until now "we have actually won most of our local court cases": Tatarstan, Lipetsk, Chelyabinsk, Nizhny Novgorod. But he warned that "Moscow sets the tone for the whole country." He is not optimistic about the future. (posted 7 April 2004)

Lawrence Uzzell is president of International Religious Freedom Watch. He contributed this comment to The Moscow Times.

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Persecution of Jehovah's Witnesses
CONDEMNATION OF THE WITNESSES.
Religious activity of Jehovah's Witnesses forbidden by Moscow court after six-years-long investigation. Yet another distinction between the new Russia and stalinist USSR obliterated.
by Alexander Soldatov
Moskovskie novosti, 2 April 2004
In the religious organization of Jehovah's Witnesses there exists "the formation of idealistic views that contrast with those that are accepted in our state and society." By which court and when, do you think, was this sentence issued? A soviet court, operating on the "uniquely true" doctrine?

Almost. It was 1998. The Liubertsi court of Moscow province deprived a Jehovah's Witness mother of the right to bring up her only child. At that very moment, when the Liubertsi judge was determining the fate of people with the tongue-twister "idealistic views," which they did not understand, at the opposite end of Moscow, in the Golovin court, the hearing of the historic case for the liquidation of Jehovists and a prohibition of any of their sectarian activity on Muscovite territory was beginning.

In the Golovin court there was no naive child and fanatical mother, "foisting upon" him views "that contrast with those that are accepted." In addition, there was not a single victim or casualty. There were the abstract "interests of state," being defended by the prosecutor of the Northern Administrative District (SAO) of Moscow. And there was a faith that supposedly was incompatible with these interests.

Another quote: "In order to oppose destructive activity and to support public order and security it is necessary to liquidate the association in order to protect citizens and the state." That was the first anti-Jehovist document of the Third Reich (1933), which hated Jehovists no less than Jews. This formulation is not particularly different from the plaintiff's demand of the SAO prosecutor who addressed the Golovin court 65 years later.

The trial went on for a long and torturous time, almost six years. The court deferentially heard the "testimonies" of Orthodox priests that any other doctrine is heresy, which incites strife and destroys the state. Experts with computers calculated the proportion of "light" and "dark" terms in the Jehovists' magazines. One or another word, as luck would have it, turned out to balance out and the court again hit a dead end.

The prosecutor sometimes brought to court witnesses--their own, not Jehovah's. In the main they were retirees who willingly narrated dramatic stories of their lives. Many of them were single mothers who worked their whole life for the soviet regime and thus received a pittance for a pension. Minor children, which was all that remained for them of their former dreams, began to live their own lives, leaving the parental home for some reason. In their solitude the old women blamed an incorrect religious choice by those children who were young long before. In the course of cross examination it became clear that the children, who were already thirty years old, still were concerned for their parents and helped them. But earlier they had always been with them. And now, there's work, these church gatherings, and also he even "married one of the Jehovists."

The almost ten-page sentence of the Golovin court is filled with identical stories of witnesses in which there is not a single sign of "destruction of the family," "interreligious strife," or "encouragement of suicide." In 2001 the court acknowledged that it had worked two years in vain and it rejected the irrational proofs of the prosecutor. The Jehovists celebrated their victory, but it turned out not to be final.

The initiators of an anti-Jehovist campaign by 2001 had somewhat run out of steam and lost their supporters. The "Committee for the Salvation of Youth from Totalitarian Sects," which thundered in the middle of the 1990s, seemed to have disappeared altogether. While the trial against the Witnesses was going on, the religious landscape of Russia changed enormously. The newly appearing societies of "nontraditional confessions"--which were full of enthusiasm and danger for RPTs--either disappeared (like "Aum Sinrikyo," and the "White Brotherhood") of they became "respectable" and benign (like the Krishnaites and Mormons). The period of the religious boom came to an end under the "late" Yeltsin; the majority of the population of Russia "got used" to religion, the number of congregations stabilized, and the social preconditions for religious radicalism (including "nontraditional") almost disappeared.

However the prosecutor of SAO was not reconciled to its defeat; the question remained of the protection of the honor of the regiment. And, fortunately, at this time the supreme state authority also became concerned about such honor and began to construct "the vertical" with the support of the power structures [siloviki]. And then the Moscow City Court overturned the vindicating sentence and sent the case back for a new review in the same Golovin court, but with a different judge, Vera Dubinskaia. Prosecutor Tatiana Kondratieva formulated her charges against the Jehovists in a counterterrorist spirit. They were accused of incitement of religious strife through the distribution of extremist literature, the destruction of the family through rejection of a traditional lifestyle, enticement of minors into the congregation, and foisting upon their followers refusal of medical care which could lead to their deaths. In general, the short-sighted Witnesses were artificially increasing the mortality rate among their followers.

The new judge began to conduct the case with a clearly "prosecutorial bias." New expert studies were begun with a corps of experts who were sympathetic to Orthodoxy and practically all the petitions of the defense were denied. It came to the point where almost before the pronouncement of sentence Dubinskaia refused to listen to precedents including the decision to rehabilitate Jehovists in post-Nazi German and the decision of the European Court on Human Rights that protected the rights of Witnesses. Finally, on 26 March, came the crushing sentence: the Moscow organization of Jehovah's Witnesses is subject to liquidation and its activity is forbidden. This has happened only two times for a religious organization in the Russian federation: the first was the verdict against Aum Sinrikyo in 1994, shortly after the gas attack in the Tokyo subway.

The leader of Russian Jehovists, Vasily Kalin, concluded: "Nothing has changed. They convicted us for the very same thing that they convicted us under Hitler and Stalin."

The persecution of Jehovah's Witnesses is considered in the West as a perfect indicator of the state of affairs regarding human rights and religious tolerance. The treatment of Jehovists shows clearly the degree of totalitarianism of a society and state. The social principles of the Witnesses bring them into sharp conflict with ideologized regimes, and, on the contrary, permit them to get along well in conditions of developed democracy.

In the first place, Jehovists never participate in war in any form and they will not serve in the army or bear arms. Second, Witnesses do not swear allegiance to anyone, do not take oaths, do not honor state symbols, and do not observe official holidays. Third, they refuse blood transfusions, taking biblical phrases literally that say the soul is in the blood. Medical treatment is a completely personal affair, especially in a country which has abandoned free medicine. Russian laws permit compulsory treatment only with a court's decision. It is especially difficult to trust the sincerity of the prosecutor's concerns for the health of Jehovists in a country where millions of people who desire treatment are deprived of such an opportunity.

A representative of the U.S. State Department, Richard Boucher, has already officially expressed the concern of the American authorities with regard to the persecution of Witnesses in Russia. What lies behind such concern? Lists of thousands of names of Jehovists, including infants, who were thrown into stalinist labor camps and brezhnevite psychiatric institutions. And they include, incidentally, Vasily Kalin; at four years of age he was sent into Siberian exile. And now it is desired to deprive these people of legal entity status.

The literature of the Jehovists, especially their significant magazine "Watchtower," contains many criticisms of "historic Christianity" and predictions of the imminent change of "the current system of things." More than that--alas--the literature affirms that only the faith of the Witnesses is the "unique, true faith." The court read this criticism and did not agree with the true faith of the Jehovists and ruled that they incite strife. The court was shown the Orthodox catechism in which the very same ("unique, true") is said of the faith of Orthodox believers; it was shown Orthodox pamphlets and magazines which contain a multitude of accusations (rather sharp) against "western heretics," Catholics and protestants, and against their own Old Believer neighbors. Two religious studies experts told the court that the conviction of the exclusive truthfulness of one's own faith is an inseparable feature of any religion, wherever it exists. Finally, the court was presented a legal argument: if the affirmation of one's own religious exclusivity and the criticism of other faiths is incitement of strife, then why would the law permit the existence of religion at all?

This is the philosophical and juridical question of universal historical important that was before the Golovin court. But its position remained untroubled: what is permitted to Orthodox believers is not permitted to Jehovists.

Attorneys for the Moscow Jehovah's Witnesses organization immediately appealed the decision of the Golovin court to the Moscow City Court. The Moscow City Court is known as one of the most politically attuned in Russia and thus its decision in this case will show the contemporary direction of the confessional policy of Russian authorities. In any event this case will have international repercussions. The Jehovists will get the opportunity to earn respected political refugee status in the West, and Russia will be threatened with a new Jackson-Vanik amendment, in a second, improved, and supplemented edition. (tr. by PDS, posted 3 April 2004)

Posted on the Portal-credo.ru site, 2 April 2004

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Voters oppose Jehovah's Witnesses in their city
JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES REFUSED LAND PARCEL IN SOSNOVYI BOR
Portal-credo.ru, 3 April 2004
Residents of a city of nuclear workers, Sosnovyi Bor in Leningrad province, told Jehovah's Witnesses "No!" The religious organization was refused a parcel of land for construction of their center, a "Portal-credo.ru" correspondent reports.

The corresponding order was signed by the mayor of the nuclear city Valery Nekrasov. It is based on the results of a city referendum conducted at the same time as the presidential election in Russia. Ninety percent of residents of Sosnovyi Bor opposed the construction of the house of worship.

This is the result of a years-long conflict between the religious organization and the public. A similar referendum was conducted in Sosnovyi Bor in 2001. It revealed a negative attitude toward Jehovah's Witnesses on the part of the majority of citizens, but it was not considered valid since it did not reach the fifty percent cut-off bar.

We recall that there are several centers of Jehovah's Witnesses in St. Petersburg and its environs. The largest of them is the Administrative Center for Russia and CIS Countries that is located in the health resort area of Solnechnyi on seven hectares on the Finnish Gulf. This complex coordinates the activity of more than 140,000 adherents of the denomination in 1,200 assemblies on the territory of ten of the former republics of the Soviet Union. (tr. by PDS, posted 3 April 2004)

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Teaching history of religion in schools
MINISTER OF EDUCATION: HISTORY OF RELIGION SHOULD BE REQUIRED SUBJECT IN SCHOOLS
Mir religii, 2 April 2004
The study of the history of religion in the schools should be required for all, Russian Minister of Education and Science Andrei Fursenko said today in a live broadcast from radio station "Echo of Moscow." "A person cannot know or not know history on an elective basis. This should be a required subject," the minister said. Talk about how supplementary classes would create an overload for school children are "somewhat speculative," Fursenko thinks.

At the same time the minister stressed that we should not be talking only about teaching fundamentals of Orthodox culture; it is necessary to teach the history of religion in a culturological way. "I am not talking about teaching only the history of Christianity. It is necessary to teach the history of religion," Fursenko added. In addition, he noted that Christianity has played a very important role in Russia and "the influence that it has had should be reflected in the teaching of history." Fursenko is sure that the history of religion definitely must be represented in the teaching of the humanities. "The history of religion is an essential part of the history of humanity, and a very important part," Fursenko stressed. "The educated person who goes out into the world should know history."

A. Fursenko reported that in this matter he has managed to find complete mutual understanding with Patriarch Alexis II, who, according to the minister, "also has not said that Orthodoxy should be taught as law." (tr. by PDS, posted 2 April 2004)

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION WILL INTRODUCE RELIGIOUS SUBJECTS INTO SECONDARY SCHOOL CURRICULUM
Religiia i SMI, 1 April 2004

The Ministry of Education and Science of Russia will introduce religious subjects into the secondary school curriculum, the head of this ministry, Andrei Fursenko, said on Wednesday. As reported on the web site of the "Echo of Moscow" radio station, the minister expressed his opinion that education should not be turned "into an exclusively pragmatic process." In addition Fursenko noted that teaching religion in schools must be done in a culturological way, adding that "Orthodoxy has lain at the base of the creation of Russia and this must be understood."

The former minister of education, Vladimir Filippov, stated approximately a month ago that the question "whether to admit Orthodoxy into the schools or not" has already been decided, but the introduction of an "Orthodox component" in the secondary education should be "soft." He added that it is proposed for religious subjects to be introduced into school curricula in accordance with the desires of the component elements of the federation. They can independently work out the textbooks on fundamentals of Orthodoxy.

Attempts to introduce religious subjects into the curriculum of general education schools was taken up long ago. Thus in autumn of 2002 the Ministry of Education sent a letter to the provinces with sample contents of a course titled "Fundamentals of Orthodox Culture." Government workers and the news media subjected this initiative to criticism and representatives of others religions and confessions also spoke out against introducing the subject into the curriculum of the schools. The ministry then explained that the subject will be studied in the schools exclusively as an elective. (tr. by PDS, posted 2 April 2004)

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Russian Justice Ministry asks for church membership rolls
MINISTRY DEMAND IRKS NON-ORTHODOX CHURCHES
by Vladimir Kovalev
St. Petersburg Times, 2 April 2004
A Justice Ministry letter demanding that churches provide lists of their congregations to the ministry last month caused panic among priests across the country.

The ministry has now said that the letter was sent out by mistake, but representatives of churches other than the dominant Russian Orthodox Church said they were scared the government may be planning to restore the Soviet practice of religious persecution.

"The letters requesting lists of believers were sent to a range of churches [across the country]," Igor Nikitin, head of the St. Petersburg-based Association of Christian Churches in Russia said Tuesday in a telephone interview.

"The situation, as you may understand, is quite delicate," he said. "The Constitution guarantees freedom of belief, so the letter could be considered as an attempt by the state to intrude on people's private lives.

"Freedom of worship is a specific indicator of democracy and if [the authorities] try to interfere in [citizens'] private lives it would set a bad precedent."

"[Priests] are very concerned about this and are very scared," he said.

Yury Vdovin, deputy head of the St. Petersburg branch of the international human rights organization Citizen's Watch, said the Justice Ministry might want to use the lists so that it can bolster the position of the Orthodox Church.

"It could be an attempt to register believers and use the data base of people who would be asked to recant faiths other than the Orthodox Church or pressure them to join the Orthodox Church," Vdovin said Thursday in a telephone interview.

The Justice Ministry's department for religious matters and public organizations could not be reached for comment.

Andrei Diriyenko, a minister with the Church of Christ in Yaroslavl, said a group of clergymen met the ministry officials Wednesday and were offered an apology.

"We've been told the letters were sent by some young girl who had just started working at the ministry and did not have enough working experience," he said Thursday in a telephone interview. "They said there are no plans to do anything like this and that this was just a professional mistake."

"The meeting was very pleasant for us," he said.

Vdovin said the ministry's apology sounded awkward.

"This looks like a fogged apology for their boorishness and incompetence in law and for an attempt to create special preferences for the Orthodox Church," he said. "The incident suggests that the government is trying to thrust a specific religion on people."

The Education Ministry plans to introduce religious lessons in schools across the country, Echo Moskvy reported Wednesday.

Education Minister Andrei Fursenko said religion will be taught as a cultural matter because "Orthodoxy was the basis of the creation of the Russian state and this should be understood."

Former education minister Vladimir Filippov said in February that the question of "whether Orthodoxy should be taught into schools or not" had already been decided and that teaching it would be "soft."

The latest moves to introduce religious lessons in schools are not the first. In autumn 2002 the Education Ministry attempted to create a federal program for schools to teach religious matters, but the plan was dropped after strident criticism from government officials, the media and representatives of non-Orthodox faiths operating in the country, Lenta.ru reported Wednesday.

Meanwhile, in St. Petersburg the Orthodox Church has faced a setback in promoting itself. Petersburg Television, or Channel 5, which will relaunch itself under a new format on Monday, has abolished a regular program of Orthodox news called Vestnik Pravoslaviya.

"This program, which was created with the blessing of Metropolitan of St. Petersburg and Ladoga Vladimir, was broadcast every Saturday morning," Interfax cited the church's press service as saying Thursday. "However, now, starting in April, the new management of the channel decided to replace the only Orthodox program with a Polish cartoon."

The press service quoted a letter sent to the St. Petersburg Diocese that says "the format for TRK Petersburg has been set. Because at the moment it could not be changed or corrected, it is impossible to decide the question of extending the license agreement in a positive way."

Over 70 percent of St. Petersburg's about 5 millions residents describe themselves as Orthodox believers, according to the diocese. There are 293 Orthodox parishes, each regularly visited by more than 1,000 people.

"The brand of the channel changed completely and practically all the programs that were broadcast, not only Vestnik Pravoslaviya, are gone," Interfax quoted an unnamed source at Channel 5 as saying Thursday. "We are not against Orthodoxy, there are other channels in the information field [of this city] where this and other programs can find a second life."

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Balaban,

That was a lot of posting.

Since notice of new postings on Stetson's very useful Russian news monitoring service are available as a free e-mail notification service, it's not uncommon that those here who are interested are already appraised of them.

Many years,

Neil