Thank you, Jean-Serge. I discussed this very case on the Indiana mailing list. It seems to me that the distinction is traditional, but doesn't mean what the MP revisionists want it to mean. The MP wants the term "passion-bearer" to mean someone whose death need not be related to the defense of Orthodoxy, but this does not seem to be how the term is traditionally used. With regard to SS Boris and Gleb, for example, these martyrs were murdered by their pagan brother Sviatopolk because they were devout Christians. However, in their case, they were not given the opportunity to recant their faith, which does make them a different kind of martyr from, say, St Stephen or St Barbara. Nevertheless, the Church understands their death to be martyric; SS Boris and Gleb are venerated as Russian Proto-Martyrs, as well as passion-bearers. Likewise, the Tsar-Martyr Nicholas and his family were not given the opportunity to renounce their faith, but their murders were still very much connected with their faith and their status as representatives of Orthodox monarchy. The MP wants to make the death of the Tsar and his family completely unrelated to the faith, since the martyric significance of the Tsar's murder is connected with the anti-Christian nature of the power that ordered his death, namely Soviet power. The MP owes its existence to that same power.
