The head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, of
Moscow and All Russia, is reflecting on matters eternal and personal
during the Great Lent
On the inferno, belated repentance and sinful obstructions
– Your Holiness, could you please tell us where truth should be looked for these days, and who has the monopoly on truth?
– Let us try to look into this together. To me it is very clear that
to live in harmony with truth in general, to live in harmony with one’s
own truth, and to judge other people proceeding from on one’s own
understanding of what truth is are three very different matters. Not
every human idea of what is right and proper is the ultimate verity. It
cannot be absolute. But is it a matter of taste then? How would you like
your tea – with sugar or lemon? Each of us selects what he or she likes
the most, what a particular person considers correct. If we are to
follow this line of thought to the logical end, it will have to be
admitted that there are no such notions as good and evil, but only a
plurality of opinions and views…
– You have turned to the philosophical aspect of the issue
right away, but my question was about very down-to-earth matters, about
what truth means for you personally.
– I will certainly tell you, but first let us be finished with the
previous question. Of course, the absolute truth does exist. It is the
Law of God. God gave us, humans, freedom and the feeling of morality,
which is embodied in consciousness. But both can be used in different
ways. It is important to realize: without God the absolute truth is
impossible. Nor is there a different understanding of justice. In the
modern world this word is often uttered thoughtlessly. Abusing the weak
is wrong. So is theft. But where is this proclaimed? What if my truth
denies yours? Say, I am strong and for this sole reason I can hurt
anyone else and lay hands on anything that may come my way. Do you see
my point? By denying the divine truth we ruin the world. This is not
even a mistake but the deepest tragedy of philosophical liberalism.
Please do not confuse it with economic or political liberalism – these
are superstructural ideas, while philosophical liberalism is
fundamental. It is focused on personal freedom as on absolute truth.The
freedom of each single individual should not be in conflict with
civilization in general.
And now about some very earthly matters. Quite often we mention the
risk of freedom being turned into arbitrariness. This may be possible,
if there is no safeguard, if there is no yardstick of truth. But when
there is the divine truth, the human understanding of truth can be
compared with it. This gives us the right to say: “Stop it. It is
wrong.” It is the law of morality that makes us feel the pangs of
remorse.
– Not all of us.
– True, conscience can be drowned in wine. Each can persuade oneself
that many others are still worse wrong-doers. Ways of self-destruction
are many. This takes us to the theme of the religious way of life. The
very future of civilization depends on it. Neither more nor less. An
atheistic picture of the world is not viable, because it ruins the
basics: the absolute, including the absolute morality. Then the system
of law and people-to-people relations start crumbling down…
The one who is unable to tell good from evil is morally ill. The
divine law is clear and easy to understand. It was written down under
Moses, but people had been trying to follow it much earlier. Wrote
Apostle Paul: “Gentiles that have not the law by nature do what the law
requires.” God made the moral law part and parcel of the human nature.
Even at the dawn of civilization, in the pagan days and in other
historical eras humans never doubted what is good and what is bad.
– But that by no means relieved them of repentance…
– That’s an entirely different matter. It is a question of how the
divine law is transformed into reality and of the way human beings live
on Earth.
– Can one be too late for repentance?
– In the 7th century A.D. St. Isaac the Syrian expressed
an excellent thought: belated repentance is the inferno. When the
ultimate end is reached, when there is no way out, the person does not
believe, but at the same knows what lies in store for him. Faith implies
strenuous internal work for accepting a certain fact or phenomenon,
while knowledge does not require that. Knowledge actualizes the subject
matter of faith. Figuratively speaking, you can see this or that object
and you can even touch it. What I am saying is this: the inferno will be
the actualized internal catastrophe of a person who has not undergone
repentance. Our earthly existence is a chance given to us to repent. It
is a matter of time… The one who exists within a system of self-control
is really fortunate. But some lack this quality for various reasons and
due to different circumstances. Such as the upbringing, or environment,
or the inability to focus on one’s own self…
But it is never too late to repent. We remember very well that the
villain, crucified on Mont Calvary on the Savior’s right hand side, at
the last moment of his life repented in keeping with his faith, and was
forgiven and allowed to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. It is extremely
important to ensure repentance should not be turned into some lifeless,
formalistic ritual. Such situations do occur in our daily routine once
in a while. Some priests are in the habit of reading out a list of sins
to those who have come to Confession. To an extent this happens because
many still have no idea what real repentance is. So even the most pious
people, in particular, very old women, can be heard saying: I’ve sinned,
I’ve sinned, I’ve sinned… Even though the priest may mention sins they
have never heard of and by no means could have committed them even in
the most terrible nightmare.
– Just in case…
– Not exactly. They are expected to confess. So they confess. It’s a
ritual. Although in reality repentance is a great and intricate internal
effort, self-analysis, impartial glance at one’s own self, face to face
with one’s own conscience. When a person comes to Confession, he or she
just completes this work and is held accountable to God. And this is
very important for retaining the relationship with God. The sin is the
sole obstruction that can impair this connection. Neither some rational
doubts, nor something else, but the sin. An unrepented sin is like a
wall of ferroconcrete God’s grace is unable to get through. In response
to our repentance God’s grace heals us and we are granted the
forgiveness of our sins. Do you know what repentance is like to me? The
one who has lost this ability is like a piano player who no longer has
ear for music. In principle, it may be possible to perform a music piece
using the notes only, but the impression will be terrible. Repentance
is like continuous self-tuning, an opportunity to take a critical look
at one’s actions and to avoid mistakes. The one who stops repenting also
stops developing and perfecting oneself. Figuratively speaking, such a
person loses the ability to hear and begins to feel utter confusion
about the sounds, noises, bombastic words and rhetoric, which sometimes
have disastrous effects on our life. In religious tradition repentance
involves very specific action. In Christianity it is the sacrament of
confession, which helps a human being to develop the ability to repent,
to keep one’s finger on the pulse and to control one’s moral condition.
On the Deluge, a disrupted career, and a rat in the bed…
– You keep talking about the human nature in very general
terms, while I am hoping to hear something about the man in front of me.
About Patriarch Kirill’s doubts…
– I have doubts about many things but one – the existence of God. I
have never had any doubts about that. Possibly, I did have some
questions in my younger years. I used to read a lot then. My father had
an excellent library. Whenever he had a spare penny, he would spend it
on books. By the age of fifteen I had become familiar with works by
Berdyayev, Frank and Florensky. I was brought up on the books of some
thinkers whose names would be discovered by most of our fellow
countrymen much later, during the perestroika years. Those books
prompted me to reconsider again and again everything that had been
shaped by religious education at home. When I was fifteen, I left the
home of my parents to have joined a geological party in Leningrad. Also I
attended high school evening classes for factory and office workers. I
wished to get the real taste of life and to put myself to test. The
books I had read before and the people I chanced to meet then helped me
through the most dramatic and risky period of adolescence…
Doubts, you say? Of course, I have doubts. If the ability to take a
critical look at the reality is lost – and this always involves doubts –
there emerges the risk of committing many mistakes. But without that it
is hard to move forward.
– Don’t you feel this sort of impairment?
– I am not in the position to judge.
– You’ve mentioned conscience and the need for living in
harmony with it. At a time when money and careers have become the chief
benchmarks in life this sounds utopian. It’s like a beautiful bow on a
fashion monger’s dress – desirable but not very necessary.
– According to the Old Testament, God exterminated whole peoples who
were reluctant to follow His commandments… One day God even punished the
human race with the Deluge, because the growth of evil had gone
irreversible. In the process of its development the evil seeks to
achieve its culminating point. In other words, death, non-existence.
Murder is considered one of the most terrible sins for a good reason…
In a word, civilization lacked the strength to leave the vicious path
and then God punished the human race, leaving alive only one pious
family. Also, God promised to never punish the human race again. True,
the Divine Punishment is a super-natural correction of our life path.
The Holy Fathers say: if God does not visit you when you are sick or in
grief, this means He has turned away from you. But if in response to
your prayer and faith God sympathizes with you, He corrects your
actions. Many people feel that very well. Possibly, in this particular
case it would be inappropriate to speak about my own self, but I can
tell you that in my lifetime there have been such supernatural
interferences involving grief, emotion and suffering.
– Would you share some of your recollections on that score with us, Your Holiness?
– I would prefer to keep quiet about some things, if you don’t mind.
What I’ve just mentioned occurred back in the Soviet period. At a
certain point I developed problems in relations with the authorities of
the city of Leningrad. It was a no easy time at all. In secular terms
that could have possibly been described as a hopelessly ruined career.
In December 1984 I was dismissed from the position of the rector of the
Leningrad theological academy and seminary and moved to a provincial see
in Smolensk. My demotion and transfer alone were not the biggest
problem, though! At the then very influential organization called the
Council for Religious Affairs I was told something like this: “You
should always remember that you are the last in line, the worst bishop
of the Russian Orthodox Church. And you will remain so. Your task will
be to stay quiet in Smolensk, to follow in the others’ footsteps and to
master the skill of building relations with the authorities in a society
that does not pin its future on religious faith.” That’s the sort of
instruction I heard then.
– Did you heed the advice?
– I stopped to think: what is it I have been put to this kind of test
for? By all odds I had been doing my utmost all the way. Why has God
punished me that way? In Smolensk, I had to put up with very harsh
conditions. I lacked the basic things. Let’s call a spade a spade. At
first I had no place where to live. Whenever I narrate this story to my
colleagues, in particular, young bishops, these days, they just don’t
understand what I am talking about. They find it really hard to believe.
For instance, one little thing: the first night after my arrival I
spent in a room where I was taken to by a local parish watchman. The
next morning he asked me if I had had a good night’s sleep. “It was
generally OK,” I said. “But early in the morning some cat started
running over the blanket to wake me up.” The man said: “We don’t have
any cats here, Your Holiness. It must have been a rat.”
That was the kind of new experience for a person who thought he had
been useful to the Church, who had led a theological academy and made
foreign trips… In a word, in plain secular terms that moment in life was
no easy at all. And I kept asking God: “Why?” and “What for?” It
sometimes happens that God replies to you with your own thoughts. It
occurred to me: you will not know why and what for right away. The truth
will become clear to you later. Then one day I went to Moscow to
discuss diocese affairs with the then chief of the Moscow Patriarchate’s
administrative department, Metropolitan Alexy, a future Patriarch of
Moscow and All Russia. All of a sudden he expressed the very same
thought. “Your Eminence, we do not know why this has happened to you.
All this will become known to us later.”
Hadn’t I been sent to Smolensk, I would have hardly explored Russia’s
remote provinces and got familiar with the realities of Russia’s
parishes and dioceses of the Russian Orthodox Church. It took seeing and
walking those dirt roads, witnessing the life of poor parishes that had
opened after World War II only to lead a squalid existence in
semi-ruined buildings, to experience the every-day life of our villages
with all of their numerous problems to realize one simple thought:
Russia is much wider than Moscow and Leningrad. God helped me discover
those realities and gain experience, which I would have never obtained
otherwise, had I stayed in my habitual environment.
On General Kalugin’s ‘trip-up’, Geneva instead of Oxford, and young lad at the head of a theological academy
- Your fall into disfavor is said to have followed public
criticism of the decision to move Soviet troops into Afghanistan in
1979. Rumor has it the KGB and the Communist Party’s Central Committee
got very angry about that.
– You know, I was acting from the standpoint of common sense. I was
more or less familiar with the history of the state of Afghanistan and
the way relations between Britain and Russia had unfolded over many
centuries against the backdrop of both empires’ southbound expansion and
London’s determination to stop our movement towards Kabul at any cost. I
was unable to get rid of the firmest conviction that the introduction
of the limited Soviet contingent to Afghanistan was a tremendous
historical mistake that would cost us very dearly. I was pretty certain
that it should have never been done. Not that I professed some
oppositionist ideas or dissident views. Far from that. I only had my own
conscience and knowledge to rely on. When the World Council of Churches
gathered for a session in order to express its attitude to the Soviet
Union’s actions in the territory of a neighboring state, I was one of
those who authored the draft of the final resolution. I volunteered to
co-author it, for I was well aware that otherwise excessive
politicization would be unavoidable.
Of the three terms proposed for describing what was happening –
“aggression,” “invasion” and “intervention” I selected and insisted on
the latter. I thought that it would sound far milder than “invasion” or
“aggression” – the words proposed by other delegates. It did not realize
that to our people the Russian equivalent of “intervention” had a far
stronger and harsher meaning. That explains why the authorities in
Moscow reacted the way they did … Then there followed what Air Force
pilots would possibly call “post-flight debrief.” Its outcome was one of
the reasons why I was dispatched to Smolensk.
– And who explained to you that you, so to say, don’t love your motherland strong enough?
– The secular authorities. In those days the Church had no freedom to make personnel decisions entirely on its own.
– Oleg Kalugin, a former KGB general turned US citizen, is said to have played a role.
– He did.
– Have you ever met the man personally?
– Never in my life. I saw him in Geneva, where I was on a mission in
the early 1970s. Our paths crossed a couple of times on the premises of
the Soviet Union’s mission at the UN office. Adulation surrounded
Kalugin wherever he went, so I realized he was a very big boss. At that
time I could not have imagined the role that man would play in my life.
– You went to Geneva when you were just 24…
– Before that I finished a course at a theological seminary and then
at the Academy in just four years instead of eight. A real stampede it
was. That was one of the conditions that my spiritual father,
Metropolitan Nikodim, of Leningrad, had set to me. With his blessing I
entered the seminary in the mid-1960s. Much later Metropolitan Nikodim,
whom I still regard as one of the most outstanding bishops, continued to
offer me his guidance through life and often extended a helping hand.
He told me: “Hurry to finish the Academy. If you graduate with
excellence, I will see to it you go to Oxford to write a doctorate
there.” I felt really inspired. I always liked studying. I obtained a
master’s degree in theology and then served as Metropolitan Nikodim’s
personal secretary. After a year he said. “Oxford is for the next
generation. You will go to Geneva to represent the Moscow Patriarchate
at the World Council of Churches.”
– Not a bad offer it was. In the Soviet era in particular…
– I have never thought about that in such terms, whether it was good
or bad for me. Metropolitan Nikodim was a man of great authority and
respect, and I would have never dared argue with him or make any
objections. I thought: that means it is destined to happen this way. At
this point I would like to remark that my work at international
organizations was worth another university course and that it would help
me a great deal in the future. It was a unique experience. Those
familiar with the geography of the French-speaking part of Switzerland
surely know that the distance between Geneva and neighboring Lausanne is
just 60 kilometers: a thirty minute ride by car. But the first chance
for going to Lausanne offered itself only when I was in my second year
in Switzerland. Before that I had absolutely no spare time for
sight-seeing. Too many tasks had to be attended on site. Firstly, I
worked really hard to brush up my English. Secondly, it took me a while
to get used to the specifics of the work there and become accustomed to
the Anglo-Saxon style of conducting meetings and sessions. Later, when
the Soviet Union had already entered the perestroika era, whenever I
watched televised debates at the congresses of people’s deputies, I
often had the thought the then Soviet officials lacked the skill of
moderating discussions. In Geneva, I had been able to gain first-hand
experience of that kind. It has turned out that even such a minor
technicality is extremely necessary and crucial for a bishop in doing
his service. I feel no regrets that instead of Oxford I went to Geneva.
– Four years later you returned to Leningrad (currently St.
Petersburg) and at the age of 27 took office as the rector of the
theological seminary and academy. Haven’t you ever been looked at as an
upstart by your older, more experienced colleagues?
– No, there was nothing of the sort, although I would agree that the
situation was unique in a sense. To my recollection only Metropolitan
Peter Mogila in his day led the Academy in Kiev at such a young age. But
that does not really matter, though. I returned to my alma mater, which
I graduated from shortly before that. I was appointed to govern my
former teachers, among them lecturers who had been students of the St.
Petersburg Theological Academy before 1917. They were people of
tremendous experience and knowledge. Now all of a sudden a very young
man, their former student, becomes their chief! A no simple task it was.
But by that time I had already earned some reputation and authority. I
had been tested really hard when in just four years I coped with a
course of instruction that normally lasted eight years. My lecturers and
tutors were asking me: “Where are you hurrying?” “What do you need this
for?”
– Indeed, what for?
– As I have already told you, I was obeying Metropolitan Nikodim’s
instructions. He set a deadline for me, and I was trying to meet it by
all means. In the meantime, some of my teachers had thought I would be
playing the fool at the exams and using the name of my high-ranking
patron as a shield.
– So they tested you in earnest, I guess.
– To say the least! I remember one such occasion. A teacher of mine –
I would not mention his name: he is still with us and a very worthy
teacher he is… He told me in a rather confidential manner: “You don’t
have to study all materials of the course. It’s going to be too
difficult and time consuming for you. I know how very hard you have been
working. Study well just one theme. I will not be asking you any other
questions.” I thanked him and bowed out. But when I came home, I told
myself: “Listen, man. Of course, you must be grateful for such a gesture
of sympathy, but what you really need is knowledge, and not a good mark
in your record book. So I thoroughly studied every single item on the
question list. And at the examination that same teacher interviewed me
for about an hour and a half. He rained me with questions covering the
whole course, from beginning to end. Not the slightest smile ever
touched his lips. All proceeded the way it should. I got the highest
mark in the end. But, the most important thing of all, later he must
have shared the impression of my readiness with his colleagues, because
at all other tests the examiners were far less strict. They really
believed that I was studying in earnest, and not hopping from course to
course and from year to year.
– When you got back to the Academy in the capacity of its rector, did you use the chance to retaliate the breach of the deal?
– Of course, not. The other way round. I made some arrangements to
commission that lecturer’s chair to do the maximum amount of
translations of foreign books. No theological books were written and
published in the Soviet Union in those days. There were great problems
with original sources. In fact, I opened an underground translation
office. The most important texts printed abroad were included in the
instruction programs. Incidentally, I felt an echo of that affair when
the question of my expulsion from Leningrad was being decided.
On punitive confinement, Kolyma instead of wedding and the ability to wait…
– Your family suffered considerably from the Soviet regime, beginning with your grandfather who was imprisoned twice.
– Actually three times. He was first imprisoned in 1922 in the
process of seizing valuables and the struggle against Church
Renovationism. I can’t say exactly how long he was held at that time.
Apparently, not very long because I have not found documents anywhere
about this jailing. It was only when he was questioned as part of the
second case against him that my grandfather was reminded of his first
prison term. He was then sentenced to five years in prison, which he
spent in Solovki (the prison on the Solovetsky Islands in the White Sea)
and other prison camps. My grandfather was arrested for the third time
in 1945 and was imprisoned until 1953. My mother and I went to meet him
at the Moskovsky railway station of then-Leningrad.
– Did your father suffer less?
– He had only one jail term – from 1934 to the eve of 1937. If he had
not been released, I don’t think we would have been now talking about
this and the family’s history would have taken a different turn…
– Did your grandfather and father tell about GULAG?
– Very much. But, as it turned out, far from everything. After I
visited Solovki already as the Patriarch, I suddenly discovered what my
grandfather had never talked about. As it turns out, he spent three
weeks in a punitive isolation cell on Sekirnaya Mountain, a place from
which people returned alive very seldom. The prisoners worked in a
logging camp and had to stand waist-deep in the icy water to fasten
rafts. The poor men then tried to dry off in a temple… My grandfather
was sent to this prison camp in November. So you can imagine what was
going on there! Normally, human body resources would fail in a week or
two at best but my grandfather held on for three weeks and survived. He
was then transferred to a prison camp already on the mainland. My
grandfather treated philosophically everything that he had gone through.
He never showed off his sufferings or singled out his fate against the
general background. He critically assessed the events in the country,
defended the faith and struggled against Renovationism, actually
devoting his entire life to this struggle, although he was a secular
person. It was only after he returned home from the third prison term
that my grandfather was ordained. He served as a priest in Bashkiria and
received a blessing from Patriarch Alexy I. My grandfather died at the
age of 91…
My father also told about what he had lived through but in a somewhat
different tonality. He was sent to prison on the eve of his wedding,
virtually several days before that. But this circumstance didn’t break
him down and he remained full of strength and energy. I read about this
in a diary of a Smolensk resident who had been convoyed together with my
father in a Stolypin railway car (originally, railway carriage during
the Stolypin reform in tsarist Russia for massive resettlement of
peasants in Siberia, which was used after the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution
for transporting large numbers of incarcerated convicts) to Kolyma. I
received the notes from that man’s son, a local theater actor. My
father remained in that man’s memory as a wondrously bright and joyful
person, as if he were going for a pleasure trip rather than to a prison
camp, from which he might not return. I can recall that my father,
indeed, spoke about his calm state as he had not breached any laws and
felt no guilt while he perceived hardships and griefs as sufferings for
the faith. This consciousness added strength.
– Your father was arrested for writing the word “God” with a capital letter in his notes, wasn’t he?
- He was jailed because such was the plan of the Leningrad
authorities of that time who took advantage of the assassination of
Sergei Kirov (the first secretary of the Leningrad branch of the
Communist Party) to quietly eradicate the Orthodox Church’s youth and
intellectual activist group in the city. The authorities carried out a
wide raid campaign, arresting a lot of people and bringing completely
idiotic charges against innocent victims. They said these people were
allegedly part of the Anglo-Turkish plot designed to destroy the Soviet
regime with reliance on white émigrés represented by Metropolitan Evlogy
of Paris, the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Patriarch of
Constantinople.
– Rich imaginations!
– But this is not the most striking thing! I read the materials of
the case and never ceased to be amazed by how smoothly the repressive
machine worked! If I had not known how things had been in reality, I
would have surely believed that this was true and a monstrous conspiracy
was uncovered. Outstanding people of Leningrad, including former
professors of the Theological Academy, wrote terrible things about
themselves, confessed to the wildest crimes, which they could not commit
in principle. I don’t know, possibly these confessions were forced
under torture or by threats and blackmail but the materials I read
produced the gravest impression on me. The point is that it would have
never come into the mind of any investigator to link together
Metropolitan Evlogy, the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Ecumenical
Patriarch!
My father was charged with an attempt to kill none other but Stalin.
He was arrested together with other parishioners at the mission of the
Kiev-Pechersk Laura in Leningrad. My father studied at an institute and
went to a church during his free time. On Sundays, he sang in an amateur
church choir, which was the place where he actually got acquainted with
my mother. The investigation subsequently explicitly wrote down what
each group of plotters was doing and was responsible for. According to
the investigation, the community of the Kiev-Pechersk Laura’s mission
was assigned the task of preparing the assassination of the leader of
the working people. The investigators made a search in my father’s house
but, naturally, found no incriminating evidence. They came across his
notebook with lectures where the word “God” was, indeed, written with a
capital letter. This was enough for passing a guilty verdict. And that
was it. My father spent three years in Kolyma.
– Did the bride wait for him?
– Yes. The investigator tried to convince her that she should not do
foolish things and should get married to a normal man rather than to an
enemy of the people. My mother continued waiting for my father, without
knowing whether or not her betrothed was alive and what was happening to
him because they were not allowed to maintain correspondence. It was
only at the very end that a message came saying he would come back soon.
He returned, married and then nearly went to Kolyma as a freelance
lecturer because he had been able to set up a local school for workers
there and he was asked not to give up what he had started and continue
the classes. He was promised good earnings. My father was poor and the
invitation seemed attractive. Fortunately, a clever woman worked in the
office of the Dalstroy state construction company, which dealt with
formalization procedures for volunteers. After hearing my father, she
recommended him to stay away from Kolyma. It was in December 1936…
This is yet another example of God’s interference in the life of our family.
On goose-stepping, scandals in the press, moral authority and people not to shake hands with…
– Did you realize that you may follow in the footsteps of your grandfather and father? A prison term.
– I did not prepare myself to be a victim, but I never said never. It
would have been a pity to lose years of freedom but I was well aware
that the probability of that outcome was great – fifty-fifty. Especially
amid Khrushchev’s persecution of the Church, when I actually decided to
go to the seminary. The authorities were massively shutting down
churches and monasteries at the time, finding any pretexts, which, as a
rule, did not hold water, to launch criminal cases against the clergy,
after which central newspapers carried smashing articles about “priests
and their accomplices…” It was a tough fight. I certainly saw that and
was aware of that, but I was taking the risk and was not going to change
my life choice to adapt to circumstances.
– But in school you refused to march in goose-stepping columns too?
– Figuratively speaking… in childhood, it’s particularly hard to
speak out against everyone alone. Certainly it required certain courage.
My family was on my side, and I was raised in Christian traditions. At
the same time, trials strengthened and eventually influenced the
formation of convictions. I had to defend them, not only before my
equals but before adults as well. I was repeatedly summoned to teachers
councils and told that God does not exist, while I was trying to
convince teachers of the opposite. That’s the way we lived.
– You studied very well, but did not become a Pioneer.
– I said at once that I was ready to tie a red scarf only on one
condition: if I was allowed to go to church with it on me each Sunday.
School authorities thought at first that I would not keep my word, and
they will improve their statistics, which favored making all junior
school students Pioneers. But then they realized that I will not miss
church services and will not demonstratively take the scarf off. After
that they said: no, you may not be a Pioneer. That’s what was decided.
…In short, I did not acquire the ability to counter external
influence yesterday. Of course, today you have to face challenges of a
different scale. And this is also explainable. Each action causes a
counteraction. Our Church has in recent years become considerably more
active, and it causes strong irritation in people who prefer to live in a
world without God. Because there are such people among them who believe
that their idea of world order is the only right one, while all the
rest is a mistake, fallacy hindering human progress.
But we see quite the opposite. This is particularly noticeable on
great church feasts. I rejoice when I see young married couples with
babies on Easter night in churches. This is the new face of the Russian
Orthodox Church. I travel a lot across the country and often hear from
people how important faith is for them in their everyday life. But I
repeat that there are also those who don’t like our efforts aimed at
strengthening church life and religiousness. Yes, the church comes under
powerful attacks, but if there are none of them, it would mean we do
something wrong, do less than we should. Bishop Nikodim, my spiritual
adviser, taught me: if everyone says good things about you, be sure
you’ve done something in a bad way…
It does not mean that you need to create a Calvary with your own
hands and heroically ascend to it. It means a different thing: when you
become a priest, you doom yourself to confrontation with a certain part
of society. But it is important not to grow bitter in this
confrontation. Dialogue with opponents should not destroy your own
religious identity. It is bad when a cleric in a dispute starts using
words and terms which are not authentic for a Christian. And if you
speak showing respect for people – even if there are deep-rooted sinners
in front of you or those who don’t like you personally, if you avoid
insults and making personal remarks, if you try to formulate your life
view so that no one could dismiss it without hearing arguments for it,
then the result will be different. The Church today has to participate
in the public discussion, it is called upon to unite people.
Sometimes we are scolded for not being principled enough, according
to critics, when we speak about the Ukrainian conflict or our domestic
situation. They say: “How can you keep silent, take a compromise
position? You should fight…” followed by a list of who we must
immediately fight. Enemies are listed depending on preferences of those
who suggest this role for us.
We respond to opponents that the Church’s key task in the public
space is to preserve society. The state, as Vladimir Solovyov said well,
can’t make this life heaven, but its key aim is to prevent it from
turning into hell. But as for the Church, it can and should work on
creating God’s kingdom in people’s hearts. But we can’t use improper
means even in the name of a good cause. This is a sin.
– The Public Opinion foundation conducted a survey last fall
regarding moral authorities in our society and found out that most
respondents believe Vladimir Putin is a paragon of morals. The president
gained 36 percent of votes. Six percent of respondents named Russian
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, five mentioned Sergey Shoigu. They are
followed by Vladimir Zhirinovsky, Dmitry Medvedev, Nikita Mikhalkov.
You, Your Holiness, have one percent. Similar figures have been gained
by Vladimir Churov, Yevgeny Primakov, Ramzan Kadyrov, Vladimir Pozner…
– Ideally, moral authority should be based on holiness. You can judge
that only on the basis of personal communication with the person. All
the rest is the work of the evil one.
Take startsy [spiritual guides]. Those who had the
opportunity to get familiarized with them closely, state: these are
special, unique people, who are holy. Unfortunately, far from everyone
knows that, because startsy do not engage in self-promotion. On
the outside, people may have a deceptive impression that the Church has
a deficit of moral authorities. It’s not true.
– Who is a moral example personally for you, Your Holiness?
– It may sound not too modest, but I would say these are my parents
first of all. They have had a great impact on my entire life. I owe them
what I have managed to achieve. It’s sufficient to say that there has
been no single conflict between my father and mother in our family.
– Maybe you didn’t know?
– We lived the five of us in a 19-square-meter room in a communal
apartment in Leningrad. Parents, a younger sister, a brother. You can’t
hide in such conditions. Everything is seen like during an X-ray
examination… No, I recall now: there was once a household quarrel.
Father was angry at mother for about three-four hours, and then it
stopped, and peace set in at home again.
Mother had the absolute moral authority. In the sense that she was
unbelievably honest. Sometimes she corrected father’s behavior. She
said: “Mishenka [contracted form of Mikhail], leave your diplomacy.”
Father had to take into account the circumstances of life and build
relations with others proceeding from that. Mother did not make any
public demarches but decided on her own whether to shake someone’s hand
or not, receive the person at home or not to let him in. It was very
important. Mother embodied our family conscience.
– What parent did you take after?
– It’s difficult to say… I can’t even compare. I think they were so
much better than me that any parallel will look as a compliment to my
address.
– But are there any persons for you who you wouldn’t like to shake hands with?
– Of course. But due to my position, I can’t and will not demonstrate
it. Besides personal likes and dislikes, there is a pastor’s attitude
toward people. And the “non-handshakability” of this or that person may
seriously harm him. I shouldn’t harm, my task is to help.
– So you will at first shake the other person’s hand and then go and thoroughly wash yours?
– I will try to do everything to shake the same hand next time
open-heartedly. There should just be a chance. A position of
non-acceptance is an excessive gesture on the part of the Patriarch.
Even, I repeat, if the talk is about people who deserve to be avoided.
– Do you happen to feel wrath?
– This emotion is familiar to me, I won’t hide that.
– Are you dreadful in anger?
– The Apostle Paul said: “Let not the sun go down upon your wrath.”
In other words, you shouldn’t be angry for more than one day. The
apostle must have been a hot-tempered man too… I can’t hide that emotion
either. If the situation annoys me too much, I need to have it out
after which I calm down. It’s not a matter of upbringing or will, it’s
in my nature.
– What worries you the most now?
– The situation in Ukraine, deaths of people have caused my sorrow
for many months. This does not let me sleep – both literally and
figuratively.
– And the zone of influence of the Russian Orthodox Church in the neighboring state is shrinking fast.
– I can’t agree. Indeed, churches of the Russian Orthodox Church are
violently seized in Ukraine, unfair fight is being waged against us, but
even this convinces people that their position is right. It was like
that in Soviet time too, when churches were being closed and faith was
getting stronger. Such methods will not achieve anything. This is a huge
mistake on the part of those who declared war on the Church in Ukraine.
Politics are currently actively mixed with religious matters.
Schismatics hurry to seize the moment and make a repartition. But the
more violence, the more resistance. Proceeding from prospects of
reconciliation, we are calling on the conflicting sides in Ukraine to
show prudence. The seeds of antagonism will grow with poisoned fruit in
the future. The Church is doing everything possible to prevent the
conflict from bringing new deaths. We do not exaggerate our
capabilities, but we don’t belittle them either.
– How do you see the development of the situation?
– Our Church in Ukraine will remain, there is no doubt of that. There
is no other way to overcome the current split than to take the path of
canonical unification. Without that, you can’t speak of a nation’s unity
either. Yes, the situation today is difficult, it will surely last for
some time more, but all will end in peace. There have been such
precedents in history many times. We just should constantly work, and
that is what we all do. The Church is an instrument of peace. And
justice.
On parishioners, occasional visitors, Pope Francis, Charlie Hebdo, and Leviathan
-- In your book ‘Life And Contemplation Of The World’ you
wrote that, as a young man, you asked yourself whether a greybeard in
his seventies, whom a youth deciding to take the monastic vows would
once turn into, would spit at the his own reflection in the mirror. You
turned sixty-eight years old recently…
– The essence of the formula is that the choice I make as a youngster
is the choice of what I will be at the age of fifty or seventy. When I
was a young lad, I had to take a decision that would predestine my whole
life in the future. I think no one who is decent and soberly minded
will claim in the decline of years, even when he is alone with his
thoughts, that he has lived a life free of errors or sins. And I won’t
claim it either. But I never regretted my choice of service to God and
to the Church.
– Is the authority over others a trial test or punishment for you?
– Authority can be perceived as a trial test, a punishment, or a
gift. The problem is all these interpretations stay far away from the
Church. Any clerical authority implies service, not possession, first
and foremost. Service is what Jesus commanded to the Twelve. Do you
remember the moment when He washed their feet and explained to them for
why He was doing it? If anyone wishes to be first, he shall be the last
of all and the servant of al. I perceive service in the capacity of the
Patriarch as a sacrifice I must bring to the Lord and to the people
every day. I often tell young monks that taking the vows for the sake of
career growth is tantamount to madness and spiritual suicide. A rise in
the Church hierarchy means a growth of one’s self-sacrifice and
commitment, not a multiplication of privileges granted to those in
command. More than that. One should realize that this sacrifice is not a
forced one. It is a voluntary sacrifice that is made freely and even
with gratitude. Why does the Orthodox Church entrust governance only to
the bishops who are monks and not to married men? Because it is
impossible to be torn between two families – the smaller family and the
bigger one, which is the Church. Service requires your fulltime
commitment without any diversions to private interests, entertainments,
hobbies, etc., that are quite admissible in secular life.
Incidentally, responsibility in the face of God cannot be put into
opposition to responsibility in the face of people. A person responsible
in the face of God cannot behave irresponsibly to people. Of course,
nothing can be higher than the responsibility of standing in front of
the Lord. This responsibility has more different sensations than it
would have in the system of hallmarks of the secularized world. The life
of the Church in imbued with heavenly grace and the Church cannot exist
in its absence. During the ordaining of each new priest, the bishop
pronounces a very profound prayer: “The Heavenly Grace that always cures
the sick and makes the impoverished ones plentiful […].” The Church
would not have survived the unending struggle that some people and evil
forces have waged against it if it did not transmit this constant care
for us from above or if it did not do a never-ending correction of
inescapable errors and shortcomings. What is more, the Church is a
living organism. It is not a factory where you can replace the
technological procedures and get quality new products almost at once.
That is why the main objective is to avoid doing harm to anyone.”
– About eighty percent Russians rank themselves among
disciples of Eastern Orthodox Christianity. Are you not dismayed by the
fact the occasional ‘droppers-in’ prevail in their ranks over
parishioners?
– For some Russians, Orthodoxy is a strictly religious category,
while for others it is much more of a cultural notion. But frankly,
these divisions are very tentative. The way I see the problem, the main
thing today is not the size of one or another category but their
dynamics. Man changes over the course of time. The answer to your
question sounds like this – and any opinion poll or any scrupulous
sociologist will confirm it to you: the first category (parishioners in
your terminology) is growing constantly and this growth brings in
predominantly the young and educated people. It is a good thing that a
very considerable part of our fellow-countrymen associates themselves
with Eastern Orthodox Christianity. All of them are members of our
congregation, albeit with a different depth of religious practice,
without regular church attendance, and with an irregular observance of
the Church canon. Still they are far from hopeless. My heart aches for
these people in the first place. I give my thoughts to how we can help
them get closer to God, become rooted in the Orthodox tradition, develop
stronger faith, get filled with the beauty our liturgy, and cognize the
profound meanings of the Holy Scriptures.
We can see the degree, to which the moods in society have changed
over the past two decades. This is an objective and very gladdening
picture. Everyone realizes clearly today the Orthodox Christian faith
cannot be ignored in this country. This is also a big victory, a victory
that would be impossible without contribution by each devout member of
the Church, without the good endeavors that he or she implements at his
or her proper place. Besides, sociology is not precise enough as an
instrument for assessing a person’s affiliation with the Church and/or
faith. Some people accept Jesus Christ only on their deathbeds and thus
they do not have any time to tell the sociologists about it. Any person
coming to the church makes us very glad because stands in line with
Jesus’s behest.
– The Russian Orthodox Church is rebuked for an excessive
orthodox content compared with Roman Catholics, who look less
conservative…
– It is nice to hear the accusations against the Church for
maintaining fidelity to its fundamental principles. There is a clear
space, within which we are not changing, and it is limited off by the
Church canons and institutes of the creed. This is the space of the Holy
Tradition and the Church stands on that foundation. Still, when we ask
ourselves how one or another canon could be best applied in the
conditions existing nowadays and what the efficient ways of
familiarizing today’s young people with the dogmas of faith could be, we
need a thoughtful and creative approach of the practicing professionals
concerned about the situation. In this sense, the Church is
transforming all the time.
And as for comparisons between the Eastern Orthodox and
Roman-Catholic believers, they are unrewarding and devoid of meaning by
and large. They belong to different nations with age-old different
traditions. Why the Great Schism – the separation between the Western
and Eastern Churches -- occurred (in the early Middle Ages) and where
the real border, not the declared one, between the Western and Eastern
parts of the Roman Empire ran in reality is a subtle historiosophical
question. Each of us should focus on their own business and should not
knock about in others’ yards.
– Pope Francis spectacularly gave up his papal apartments in
the Apostolic Palace and came to a meeting with Italy’s President in an
economy class car. And the Ring of the Fisherman was cast of silver for
him instead of gold. What do you think of this style of conduct?
-- I do not think I should comment on the style of conduct of the
Primate of the Roman Catholic Church. And I am confident he would not
make comments as regards me either. I have sincere respect for Pope
Francis and for the fact he keeps up close bonds to the monastic
tradition that molded him.
– Well, let me put it differently. Do clerics have the right
to stand out in terms of their affluence compared with rank-and-file
people?
– A cleric should be on a par with an average level of his laymen and
this is normal. It is important to remember the majority of clerics are
married men and quite often the fathers of many children. Do we have
the moral right to compel them to live in poverty, even out of the
serenest intentions? Obviously, we do not.
Absence of neediness is a normal condition for living and this is
what we daily pray for at our services. A priest’s family should have
appropriate living standards so that he could give the bulk of his
attention to the parishioners and to the problems of spiritual upgrading
instead of immersing in the worries about daily bread. It is for this
purpose that the parishioners give away slivers of their material
well-being to the clergymen and thus take upon themselves a part of the
clergymen’s daily material concerns. There is nothing bad in it. But it
is a different story, though, if a priest indulges in secular daily
routine and entertainments. However, the lay will unlikely follow a
priest of this kind or help him. It is not for nothing that priests are
said to be living in glass houses.
– The Old Testament commandments did not have enough space
for the one that would prohibit lies. Does it mean spreading lies is a
smaller sin than larceny, murder or adultery?
– But why? Do you not think the commandment saying ‘Do not bear false
witness’ prohibits lying? The Book of the Wisdom of Sirach states: “A
thief is better than an inveterate liar, yet both will suffer ruin.”
(Sirach, 20:25). Jesus called devil straightforwardly “a liar and the
father of lies” (John, 8:44). And the Apostle Paul’s Epistle to the
Ephesians calls on all the Christians: “Therefore, putting away
falsehood, speak the truth, each one to his neighbor […]” (Ephesians,
4:25).
– The year 2015 started out with the killing of journalists
of Charlie Hebdo magazine. The French responded to it by a manifestation
in support of free press, in which three million people took part.
Ramzan Kadyrov, in his turn, brought almost a million Moslems to the
streets of Grozny to protest against the cartoons featuring the Prophet.
Which of the two columns would you prefer joining personally?
– I have fundamental objections against an unnatural and contrived
division of society in this way as regards the Paris tragedy. We
unambiguously condemn terrorism and killings of people for their
convictions. We are grieving for those who suffered at the terrorists’
hands. But along with it we find both pseudo-religious and secular
radicalism unacceptable, and we think the problems of inter-religious
and inter-ethnic relations in the context of human rights deserve the
closest attention and an extremely delicate treatment. Outrages on
religion and defilements of religious feelings are inconceivable in the
same way as insults in connection with someone’s ethnic identity are.
Today’s Europe is choking with the scum which it churned itself as it
strived to combine multiculturalism and liberal values. Thanks God
Russia has enough common sense at the legislative level so as to prevent
actions like publication of religious cartoons in the media. Regardless
of what particular religion is concerned in each case.
– And what about movies? ‘Leviathan’, a new film by Andrei
Zvyagintsev has sparked harsh debates. It received the Golden Globe and
was nominated for an Oscar, but here in Zvyagintsev’s homeland the
Russian Orthodox activists urged the authorities to strip it of the
running license and dismissed it as the plot of a Russophobic
politically motivated order. Others said ‘Leviathan’ was an
anti-clerical movie, not an anti-Church or anti-Orthodox one. Do you
think fighting with clericalism is work in God’s name? Does the Church
have the right to claim the role of the fourth estate?
– I cannot discuss a film that I did not see myself. That is why I do
not have any immediate impressions or sensations from watching it. I
would only like to say that any artists claiming the right to free
creative expression must be prepared to meet face to face with the
freedom of criticism of what he is doing. If we defend the importance of
a free discussion, we should realize that, on top of bombastic
complements, we can also hear highly unflattering opinions. As for the
fighting with clericalism, let us call a spade a spade. Before you
plunge into fighting against something, make sure that the thing you are
going to fight with exists in real life and not only in your
consciousness. What clericalization of society could we possibly speak
about today when the majority of schools will not let an ordinary priest
come in? No doubt, some people are exasperated by the fact the clergy
has stopped being a marginal group in society. But clericalism is
something entirely different.
On the whole, there is no surprise that the followers of Jesus Christ
irritate some people and trigger hatred in others. This has always been
so. It was not accidental that Jesus told his disciples at the Last
Supper: “The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have
persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have kept my
saying, they will keep yours also.”(John, 15:20). And this is our main
solace – they will persecute us but they will listen to us, too...
