S T A T E M E N T
Of the Chairman of the Synod of Bishops
of the Russian Orthodox Autonomous Church
Over the last 20 years, the fate of the Russian Orthodox Autonomous Church has not been easy. In her aspiration to “walk in the Holy Spirit,” and live in accordance with the Holy Gospel of Christ, the ROAC remains a “stumbling block” on the path leading to globalism and modernism, so enticing to the powers that be, including many of the clergy of the Moscow Patriarchate. The task of bearing witness before the Orthodox world as a whole to the truth about the condition of the “subjugated church” in our enslaved homeland, countering the lies emanating from the official representatives of the Godless authorities, calling attention to the evil perpetrated by the hierarchs of the Moscow Patriarchate, who are subservient to them, has always been, is now, and always will be among the most important obligations of the Russian Orthodox Autonomous Church.
The hierarchs of the Moscow Patriarchte have unlawfully taken churches in Kainsk, Votkinsk, Trubchevsk and Zheleznovodsk away from us. We have been denied the right to register our dioceses in Tula, Cheliabinsk, Orenburg and Borisovo-Otradnoye; we have been either partly or completely hindered from registering our parish by-laws, thereby relegating these parishes to the equivalence of an “unruly crowd” or an unauthorized “religious gang.”
More than once, they have exposed our clergy and faithful to beatings, set fire to our churches, and the residences of our elderly and handicapped nuns as well. In the “official” media, the true facts relating to these events have always been concealed or distorted. And in some especially important cases, as during the week of the Local Council of the Moscow Patriarchate in January of this year, unwanted media attention was simply suppressed, just as in the old Soviet days.
There can be no other interpretation of these actions other than as an attempt to finish off the ROAC for good. About a year ago, the Vladimir Regional Administration of Rosimushchestvo (RussProperty) brought 14 legal cases against us in order to take away all of our churches in Suzdal from us.
In the early 1990’s, the unlimited use of all of these churches had been legally given to us by this same office of Rosimushchestvo. Binding agreements were signed. What was left of the buildings that we received, which were referred to in these agreements with labels such as “national heritage” and “treasures,” was nothing more than the crumbling remains of their foundations, such as in Sanino, Krapivye and other half-destroyed and desecrated churches, if that.
The bureaucrats from Gosimushchestvo of the Russian Federation (Federal Property Agency) have now completed the “work of Cain;” they have sent those Orthodox Christians who do not wish to accept the ideologies of Ecumenism and Sergianism into exile, by transferring their churches to the Vladimir Diocesan Administration of the Moscow Patriarchate. The bureaucrats of Rosimushchestvo have set before themselves the goal of making the faithful of the ROAC outcasts in their own land, so that later on, they can claim that the Russian Orthodox Autonomous Church is outside of the law.
The contempt of the state bureaucrats for the religious feelings of the citizens of Suzdal has gone so far as suggesting that they simply “change their leadership,” which is a way of saying to them that they should join the Moscow Patriarchate, and that by so doing, the lawsuits against them will cease, and they will be left in peace. In the Russian Federation today, where the government has ostensibly turned in favor of the church, it has actually started returning to the Soviet methods of religious politics, with the only difference being that now “the starring role” has gone to “the only true and correct Church – the Moscow Patriarchate.”
The Vladimir regional court, in its ruling of February 5th, 2009, has asked our congregations to vacate their churches with the clear intention of handing these buildings over to the Moscow Patriarchate. Instead of expressing gratitude and respect to those who worked so hard to save and preserve the churches of Suzdal from complete destruction, restored them from ruins and reinitiated church services and spiritual life in the city, the bureaucrats in Vladimir have shamelessly and unflinchingly spat upon their souls, and have thrown them out into the street, deprived the local clergy of their livelihood, and have sentenced their families to starve, simply in order to please the Moscow Patriarchate, which has arrogated to itself the prerogative of a monopoly over Orthodoxy in contemporary Russia.
There are dozens of churches in the Vladimir region that are in dilapidated condition, or are close to complete destruction. However, the bureaucrats at Rosimushchestvo don’t seem to be worried about the destiny of these churches, at all. Instead, they want to take everything that we have worked to restore away from the faithful, violating their rights to freedom of religion and assembly, humiliating and insulting the feelings of our flock, and stomping the ROAC into the ground via the jackboots of the Special Purpose Militia.
Earlier, we, together with other communities of faith, have repeatedly appealed to the former president and current prime minister of the Russian Federation, V. V. Putin; the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation, Y. A. Chaika; the Attorney General of the Russian Federation, V. V. Ustinov; the President’s Council for Facilitation of Development of Institutions of Civil Society and Human Rights; the Senior Deputy Prosecutor and Chairman of the Committee of Inquiry for the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation, A. I. Bastrikin; the Public Chamberlain of the Russian Federation and Chairman of the State Duma’s Committee for Matters concerning Non-profit Organizations and Religious Institutions, S. A. Ponomarev; the International Human Rights Center; the Slavic Legal Center, and other agencies. But our voice remains “the voice of one crying in the wilderness,” and we have received no reply to date.
If once we hoped for a fair decision on the part of the Guarantor of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, we have now become acutely aware that the Constitution is being trampled upon by government bureaucrats and that the outcome of legal cases is decided beforehand, for in this case, the courts are but formal executors of the will of people who want to leave us homeless and deprive our Church of the right to exist legally. We have no doubt that the next thing to expect will be the same as we have already seen: the bailiffs being sent in to execute the court’s rulings, and the Special Purpose Militia. We are doing everything in our power inside Russia and beyond her borders to prevent the implementation of the Vladimir regional court’s decision. But, unfortunately, with the present court system of the Russian Federation being the way it is, it is impossible to find any other truth than the one that is wanted in the Kremlin and in Chisty Pereulok – the residence of the Patriarch of Moscow.
We feel intolerable pain for the fate of our nation, where the constitutional rights of its citizens are trampled upon, where the common man cannot gain the right to live in freedom and enjoy the defense of his own government. Instead of fulfilling the requirements of the Directly Applicable Law of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, specifically article 46, which guarantees the right of due process, they comport themselves like corporate raiders, and the Machiavellian principle of “the end justifies the means” holds sway. In the face of this kind of “justice,” a man of faith is left without rights and defenseless. Blasphemers clothed as bishops of the Moscow Patriarchate and in judges’ robes commit evil unto the death of their souls, and are incapable of finding truth.
PRESIDENT OF THE SYNOD OF BISHOPS
OF THE RUSSIAN ORTHODOX AUTONOMOUS CHURCH
+VALENTINE ,
Metropolitan of Suzdal and Vladimir
February 12, 2009
Suzdal