← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Petr
Thread ID: 20589 | Posts: 10 | Started: 2005-10-09
2005-10-09 20:04 | User Profile
Protestantism in Russia is not an entirely new phenomenon - Solzhenitsyn describes the persecution of Baptists in his[I] Archipelago Gulag[/I], and how they were a distinctive, hard-working group in the camps.
I also noticed that Russian Protestant churches are practising tithing, and seem to be in a relatively good economic state. Their independence from Western funding could also mean that they aren't importing Western liberalism either...
Perhaps Western Protestants would also be mightier, both spiritually and even materially, if they relied on their own God-given strength instead of state-leviathan's subsidies?
[url]http://www.fsumonitor.com/stories/100705Russia.shtml[/url]
[FONT=Arial] [SIZE=5]Window on Eurasia:[B] Patriarchate Wants 'Traditional' Faiths to Have Special Legal Status[/B][/SIZE]
Paul Goble [/B] Tartu, October 7 - The Moscow Patriarchate is pressing the Russian government to formalize in law its relations with the country's four so-called "traditional" religions to promote closer cooperation between them and the state "in proportion to their numbers," according to a senior Russian Orthodox hierarch.
Such a step would give additional privileges to the Russian Orthodox Church relative to the other three but almost certainly would at the same time lead to even greater discrimination against the followers of other faiths, including the increasingly numerous Protestant Christian denominations.
In an interview published in the September-October issue of the Paris journal "Diplomatie," Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad, who heads the Patriarchate's External Affairs Department, said that "it would be useful to define" via legislation the special status of the country's "traditional" faiths.
Such a definition, Kirill said, exists in other countries and would allow the Russian government and the leaders of these religious communities to cooperate in various in various social spheres proportionally to the number of believers who belong to this or that traditional religion."
And he added that in his view, "if the government does publicly declare its special relationship with the four traditional religions of our country" via legislation, such a step would in no way lead to "anything bad or threatening to the freedom of people of other faiths" ([url]http://mospat.ru/index.php?page=27808[/url]).
But if he does not see any problems with either the current situation or that step, Bishop Sergei Ryakhovskiy, the leader of Russia's Evangelical Protestants, certainly does, a view he made clear in an interview published in Moscow's "Gazeta" newspaper on Wednesday ([url]http://www.portal-credo.ru/site/print.php?act=monitor&id=6978[/url] ).
Bishop Ryakhovskiy, who gained new prominence last week when President Vladimir Putin named him to the Social Chamber, was asked by the newspaper to discuss the problems Protestants now face, in large measure because the authorities still call them a "sect" because they are not one of the country's "traditional" religions.
In the bishop's opinion, "whenever officials at whatever level begin to interfere in religious affairs, it becomes clear that [they do not have any] conception" about religion or the ways in which most governments around the world deal with faithful in their countries. [B] If Russian officials did have any knowledge in this area, Ryakhovskiy continued, they would know that "the weight of Protestants in the world is enormous," that Protestants in Russia contribute to their country in a variety of ways, and that "persecuting Protestantism in Russia has no future."[/B]
But because they don't know about any of this, they often act on their prejudices. Sometimes, they are tolerant, but often -- and the bishop cites recent problems in Nizhnevartovsk as an example -- they attempt to dictate which religions are acceptable and which ones are not and even to make [their] cities 'pure' in a religious sense."
[B][U]Many Russian officials, often under the influence of the Orthodox Church, are clearly disturbed by the explosive growth of Protestantism across Russia.[/U] At present, the bishop said, there are some 5,000 legally registered Protestant congregations and perhaps as many as 15,000 unregistered ones - far more than the 11,500 Orthodox parishes.
Moreover, while many of the Orthodox churches have relatively few congregants, the Protestant churches in the Russian Federation have on average 300 to 400 members, the bishop continued. And unlike many other faiths, Russia's Protestants do not receive money from abroad, despite the charges of the Russian Orthodox Church.[/B]
[B]"Major Western funds, Catholic and Protestant, give money not to us," the bishop said, "but to the Orthodox Church. We Russian Protestants depend on our own Russian contributors" who generally contribute ten percent of their incomes to their churches. As a result, he said, most Protestant congregations are in good shape financially.[/B]
Unfortunately, they and their members often find themselves subject to discrimination. One indication of that sad reality, he said, is that many government officials have to hide the fact that they are Protestants to keep their jobs.. Indeed, 'to become a Protestant in Russia today is to deny oneself [the possibility of] a career."
Despite that, the bishop continued, Russian Protestants have not developed "the complexes" that oppressed religious groups often do. Instead, he stressed, members of various Protestant denominations are trying to reach out to other faiths, including the Russian Orthodox Church.
A current example of this approach, the bishop said, involves Protestant efforts to start up annual prayer breakfasts in Russia similar to those now held in the United States and other Western countries that bring together religious leaders and government officials from all levels.
"We would joyously place this initiative in the hands of the Orthodox Church so long of course as they would agree not strike us off the list of invitees. We are convinced that such prayer sessions will become a tradition in Russia. ... And we pray that those who [now discriminate against us] will change for the better."
Unfortunately for Russia's Protestants and for Russian religious life more generally, the Patriarchate's proposal to enshrine in law its own special status and that of the three other "traditional" religions if adopted would likely increase the likelihood of discrimination against those left out of this charmed circle. [/FONT]
2005-10-10 01:11 | User Profile
Today at our Orthodox church in Seattle we have the next in an "adult education" series, which for the next six weeks is co-taught by our priest and the protestant husband of a recent convert from a (black) Methodist church. I don't believe he has converted, but he is a regular attendee. The husband is a high school teacher and has a line on quite a bit of protestant teaching material, so today's class, on faith, was almost straight protestantism, with lots of Bible quotes--fairly generic Christianity, though they focused on Faith (in the protestant sense of dauntless intellectual belief) and its (protestant opposite) Emotional Fear, without distinguishing Respect, Honor, or the like from Timidity and Cowardice. The class included a video clip, quite slickly done, of a small drama about a black family who had moved from the ghetto. The little 5 year old girl was afraid of bullets coming through her window and couldn't sleep, despite the upscale neighborhood, so her father gave her an invisible cloak he had received (wink-wink) from a fairy, that protected him from bullets. In the second scene the father, who pulls up in a van from his blue collar job, is greated by his daughter. However at that moment a man with a gun walks up and demands his money back--there is some misunderstanding about the van and the husband's work that is not very clear--and the daughter, who has faith in the fairy cloak, takes the bullet. In any event, it turns out a miracle has occured and
Thus, the approximate message about Faith is: 1. Faith is a pious fraud and the authority figures who present it (enlightened adults) know that, however 2. if you trust authority figures with the simplicity of a child and accept what they say at face value 3. magical miracles will in fact happen that even the fraudsters don't expect, and the bad guys *really* don't expect. I do not believe I have ever heard anything quite like this--especially the focus on mind-control of personal intellect as the keystone of faith--in Orthodoxy. Miraculous salvation stories are a dime a dozen in any Christian tradition, but this protestant one is very characteristic--you can see that in American society in general, a strong tendency to believe that mental self-control is the key to invulnerabilty. Less crassly and more genuinely, this kind of christian belief is portrayed in Gods and Generals, in the character of Stonewall Jackson.
In any event, in a Eurasian context (and African and South American contexts) it is unclear what protestantism will become. It is clearly an important underpinning of the market society, and "liberalism" in its more capitalistic aspects. It also has more than a little affinity to Islam and Judaism, but in ways different from Orthodoxy. Howver, in America, which is a very protestant country, Orthodoxy and Protestantism live side by side and intermix, to the extent that some people see "orthodox Christians" in all three varieties common in America: Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox. --- ### Macrobius *2005-10-10 01:13* | [User Profile](/od/user/1680) Fixing one sentence: "the daughter, who has faith in the fairy cloak, takes the bullet. In any event, it turns out a miracle has occured and she has no bullet wound at all" --- ### madrussian *2005-10-10 01:21* | [User Profile](/od/user/15) I met a baptist in the US who was a baptist back in the Soviet Union. He was just as zhidophilic/philosemitic as a run-of-the-mill American baptist. There's something in their theology that generates these characters. --- ### Macrobius *2005-10-10 01:39* | [User Profile](/od/user/1680) Madrussian, as far as I can tell, the sects split on the Jewish question and politics in exactly the same way. The Christian Right has a neo/paleo split, with the touchstone issue being support for zionism. The Christian Left, fwiw, is turning slowly pro-Muslim. In any event, going back to the right wing, for that reason I predict the majority of the Christian right will continue to support the dominance of neos in politics, Israel, and become increasingly pro-immigration, at least as long as the immigrants continue to be protestants and don't gore any neo shibboleths. They're in for a penny, in for a shekel on this one. --- ### Petr *2005-10-10 08:46* | [User Profile](/od/user/1012) [COLOR=Purple][FONT=Arial][B][I] - "I met a baptist in the US who was a baptist back in the Soviet Union. He was just as zhidophilic/philosemitic as a run-of-the-mill American baptist."[/I][/B][/FONT][/COLOR] What were his other social attitudes? Many Western fundamentalists can be very conservative, with this sentimental philosemitism as their almost only deficiency. Petr --- ### Petr *2005-10-10 08:56* | [User Profile](/od/user/1012) [COLOR=DarkRed][FONT=Arial][B][I] - "In any event, going back to the right wing, for that reason I predict the majority of the Christian right will continue to support the dominance of neos in politics, Israel, and become increasingly pro-immigration, at least as long as the immigrants continue to be protestants and don't gore any neo shibboleths. They're in for a penny, in for a shekel on this one."[/I][/B][/FONT][/COLOR] I think the [B]leaders[/B] like Robertson or Falwell are "in it for a penny" - what we've got to do is to cut off their influence on [B]rank-and-file [/B] Protestants, who aren't happy at all of seeing their neighborhoods flooded with invading illegals who also take their jobs. Grassroots organizing is what matters on the long run, not palace intrigues among the leadership. It's a [I]self-fulfilling prophecy [/I] to say that "fundies aren't never going to change their ways." It assumes that they are mindless lemmings, totally under the control of their leaders, and just like other people (or if not more), they can sense when someone is despising them. If that someone is an outsider, all the worse. They are [B]not[/B] going to react kindly to people who essentially say: "hey dumb fundies, we know that you are almost incapable of independent thinking, but please consider our WN/paleoconservative viewpoint as well." Petr --- ### Texas Dissident *2005-10-10 15:21* | [User Profile](/od/user/1) [QUOTE=Macrobius]The class included a video clip, quite slickly done, of a small drama about a black family who had moved from the ghetto. The little 5 year old girl was afraid of bullets coming through her window and couldn't sleep, despite the upscale neighborhood, so her father gave her an invisible cloak he had received (wink-wink) from a fairy, that protected him from bullets. In the second scene the father, who pulls up in a van from his blue collar job, is greated by his daughter. However at that moment a man with a gun walks up and demands his money back--there is some misunderstanding about the van and the husband's work that is not very clear--and the daughter, who has faith in the fairy cloak, takes the bullet. In any event, it turns out a miracle has occured and she has no bullet wound at all. That is actually an exact outtake from the movie _Crash_. The girl receives no bullet wound because the shooter is firing blanks, literally. > Thus, the approximate message about Faith is: 1. Faith is a pious fraud and the authority figures who present it (enlightened adults) know that, however 2. if you trust authority figures with the simplicity of a child and accept what they say at face value 3. magical miracles will in fact happen that even the fraudsters don't expect, and the bad guys *really* don't expect. I do not believe I have ever heard anything quite like this--especially the focus on mind-control of personal intellect as the keystone of faith--in Orthodoxy. Miraculous salvation stories are a dime a dozen in any Christian tradition, but this protestant one is very characteristic--you can see that in American society in general, a strong tendency to believe that mental self-control is the key to invulnerabilty. Less crassly and more genuinely, this kind of christian belief is portrayed in Gods and Generals, in the character of Stonewall Jackson. And I thought the message of that film was totally un-Christian and related to Karma and Buddhism (one of the principal characters claims to be such at some point in the film). In fact, I was left wondering if the director was a Buddhist himself. Go figure. --- ### Angeleyes *2005-10-10 20:26* | [User Profile](/od/user/1513) [QUOTE=Texas Dissident] And I thought the message of that film was totally un-Christian and related to Karma and Buddhism (one of the principal characters claims to be such at some point in the film). In fact, I was left director was a Buddhist himself. [/QUOTE]Did you mean* Crash, *or Gods and Generals when you say "that film?" I found *Crash* to be enjoyably cynical, if a bit heavy on the new age-ish content, and I admit to being a bit tired of the Don Cheedle 24/7 craze that Hollywood has embarked upon. *Gods and Generals* was too long, a mini series in any case IIRC, though there was some good stuff to be found in the film. I liked the book a lot better. AE --- ### Texas Dissident *2005-10-10 20:36* | [User Profile](/od/user/1) [QUOTE=Angeleyes]Did you mean Crash, or Gods and Generals when you say "that film?" Sorry I wasn't clear, AE. Definitely 'Crash', not 'Gods and Generals'. > I found Crash to be enjoyable, if a bit too new age-ish, and I am a bit tired of the Don Cheedle 24/7 craze that Hollywood has embarked upon. I think Cheedle is bucking to become Hollywood's 'serious negro actor and political/social issues voice', a post currently occupied by Sam Jackson and prior to him, Danny Glover. Like yourself I am sure, all of those guys rub me the wrong way. Nevertheless, Cheedle aside, I agree with you. 'Crash' was an enjoyable film. I just saw eastern notions of karma as one its major underlying themes and simply commented as much in response to the post above my intial one. I thought 'Gods and Generals' was an outstanding film, and greatly enjoyed the portrayal of Stonewall Jackson. ---