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62-413: Russian True Orthodox Church may refer to: Catacomb Church True Russian Orthodox Church Russian True Orthodox Church (Lazar Zhurbenko) Topics referred to by the same term [REDACTED] This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the title Russian True Orthodox Church . If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change

124-745: A grassroots movement among the Russian Orthodox clergy for the reformation of the Church, but was quickly influenced by the support of the Soviet secret services ( Cheka , then GPU , NKVD ), which had hoped to split and weaken the Russian Church by instigating schismatic movements within it. The beginning of actual schism is usually considered to be in May 1922, when a group of Renovationist clergy laid claims to higher ecclesiastical authority in

186-647: A "Declaration" proclaiming absolute loyalty of the Church to the Soviet government and its interests. Subsequently, a Synod formed by Sergius, received recognition from the Soviets. This had effectively put the Renovationist Synod out of place as the chief spokesman for the alliance between the Church and the Soviet state, and it was then that the Renovationist movement began its rapid decline. By

248-650: A brief time it seemed that the Renovationists had gotten the upper hand. The Renovationists, with full support of Soviet authorities, seized many church buildings and monasteries, including the famous Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow . In many dioceses, the married ("white") clergy was encouraged to take church government into their own hands, without approval of their diocesan bishops. Simultaneously, these bishops were often threatened and pressed to recognize

310-752: A declaration in 1927  [ ru ] calling all members of the Russian Orthodox Church to profess loyalty towards the Soviet government . The declaration sparked division among the hierarchy , clergy , and laity , which led to the formation of the Russian True Orthodox Church, or Catacomb Church, a group of which was the Josephite movement . Opposition to Sergius' declaration was based not only on his political concessions , but also on canonical and theological disagreements. The earliest documented use of

372-459: A letter to Lev Kamenev , Vyacheslav Molotov and Timofei Sapronov , formulated 17 theses containing detailed instructions to the party-Soviet and Chekist bodies regarding the forms and methods of expropriation of church valuables (the leadership of the campaign was henceforth in the hands of party organs). Among other things, it was proposed to "decisively split the clergy" by taking under the protection of state power those clergy who openly advocate

434-586: A more traditional style: The Holy Synod of the Orthodox Church in the USSR (1923–1935). Its President was usually considered a chief hierarch of the church, regardless of the see that he occupied. In its later years, the Renovationist administration started to lean more toward more "traditionalist" titles. In 1933, the position of the First Hierarch ( Первоиерарх ) was introduced, in opposition to

496-641: A number of consecrations of "married bishops" throughout the country, especially in Siberia . As a result of its promulgation, of 67 bishops that arrived to the Second Moscow Council in April 1923, only 20 had been ordained before the schism . The consecration of the "married bishops" without waiting for a conciliar decision on changing appropriate Canons met with opposition even among many Renovationist leaders and those "married bishops" later received

558-479: A religious movement that schismed from the Russian Orthodox Church in 1922. Sanctioned by the Soviet authorities, the movement ceased operations in the late 1940s. In 1927, the movement was blessed by the future Patriarch Sergius of Moscow , a political move that enabled the reformation of the modern Russian Orthodox Church in 1943 by Sergius (Stragorodsky). This movement originally began as

620-510: A second laying on of hands before the Council opened. The I Renovationist (or officially "II All-Russian" Council ) met in Moscow between 29 April and 8 May 1923. Its most controversial and infamous decision was to put Patriarch Tikhon (who was under house arrest, awaiting trial) on ecclesiastic trial in absentia for his opposition to Communism , and to strip him of his episcopacy , priesthood and monastic status. The council allowed

682-581: A series of radical liturgical experiments: e.g., moving the altar table to the middle of the church, among other changes. He made one of the first translations of the Divine Liturgy into modern Russian . His group disintegrated in 1929. The telling blow against Renovationism was the return of Patriarch Tikhon to active duty in June 1923 when, under international pressure, he was released from house arrest. Already by that time, large passive resistance to

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744-530: A staunch fighter against the regime. In this form, the expression "catacomb church" became an instrument of ideological polemics used by the ROCOR. According to the ideologists of the ROCOR, the powerful underground church in the USSR which was in opposition to the Moscow Patriarchate proved the illegitimacy of the official hierarchy. In journalism, this term has passed into the official documents of

806-415: Is because people who called their existence "catacomb" compared it with the life of early Christians , who allegedly secretly gathered during the persecution to hold religious ceremonies in the catacombs of Rome . So, the persecutions that befell the Church under Soviet rule were likened to the persecutions of the first centuries of Christianity. According to historian Alexey Beglov  [ ru ] ,

868-838: The Union of the Communities of the Ancient Apostolic Church (Союз общин древнеапостольской церкви - Содац SODATs) of Alexander Vvedensky ; and the Union for the Renewal of the Church (Союз церковного возрождения) – the group of bishop Antonin Granovsky , whose interest was in liturgical reform; along with several minor groups. In 1919–1920, the Cheka officials began actively seeking contacts with those representatives of

930-741: The Central Executive Committee of the RSFSR from North Caucasus and from Middle Asia , and later from the Central Black Earth Region , there were references to "Old Orthodox" and "True Orthodox Christians" who opposed themselves to the Renovationists. In these documents, it is not the legal position of the parish that comes to the fore, but its attitude to the Renovationist Higher Church Administration and attitude to

992-476: The Eastern Orthodox Church , Joseph Stalin decided to turn to the more popular and traditional Russian Orthodox Church led by Sergius , rather than to its largely unsuccessful rivals. On 8 September 1943, Stalin met with three chief hierarchs of the "Patriarchal" Church and promised to make concessions to the Church and religion in general in exchange for its allegiance and support. One of

1054-539: The Living Church ( Живая Церковь , Zhivaya Tserkov' ) —officially named Orthodox Russian Church ( Православная Российская Церковь , Pravoslavnaya Rossiyskaya Tserkov' ), and later Orthodox Church in the USSR ( Православная Церковь в СССР , Pravoslavnaya Tserkov' v SSSR ), was the official Christian Church in the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1946, which following World War II was proclaimed as

1116-401: The " Living Church ". In addition, opponents of the Renovationists used the self-designation " Tikhonites ". The term "Catacomb Church" began to be actively used in the works of Ivan Andreyev  [ ru ] , a figure of the Josephite movement who fled to Western Europe in 1944, under the influence of whose works this term became widespread in emigrant periodicals. Other emigrants of

1178-566: The "Tikhonite" Church, which was not to have a Patriarch until 1943. The position was given to the then-President of Synod Vitaly Vvedensky ; however, since the mid-1920s all power in the Renovationist Church had consolidated in the hands of its actual leader, Metropolitan Alexander Vvedensky . Toward the latter part of the 1930s, A. Vvedensky bore a very peculiar conglomerate of titles, invented specially for him: Metropolitan - Apologete - Evangelizer and Deputy First Hierarch . In

1240-491: The "allegiance to the old church" ( староцерковничество ), i.e., the Patriarchal Church, to be a "heresy" and a "schism". The mastermind behind that decision, Metropolitan Nikolai (Platonov) of Leningrad resigned from episcopacy in 1938, publicly denounced the faith and became an infamous propagator of atheism . The Renovationist church continued to dwindle in numbers; the process intensified starting in 1939, when

1302-460: The "underground" and to affiliate with various more-mainstream Orthodox bodies. The death of Patriarch Tikhon , the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church in April 1925 led to unrest among the followers of the church. Tikhon's designated successors were arrested by the civil authorities . Metropolitan Sergius became the Acting patriarchal locum tenens of the Moscow Patriarchate. Sergius issued

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1364-847: The 1920s, the Renovationist Church had some activity in the fields of education and apologetics. Particularly, in 1924 the church was allowed to open two institutions of higher learning: the Moscow Theological Academy and the Theological Institute in Leningrad . Some contacts were made with other portions of the Christian East: thus, the II Renovationist Council (a.k.a. III All-Russian Council ), convened in Moscow in 1–9 October 1925,

1426-472: The Catacomb Church. In the 1960s and 1970s, through illegal literature published abroad, and then through samizdat , the concepts of "catacombs" and "catacomb church" returned to the USSR. After that, some authors in the USSR used the word "catacomb" to designate ecclesiastical opposition to the Moscow Patriarchate, while others used it as a technical term as a synonym for the epithet "illegal" from

1488-525: The Cheka, which was then located on Gorokhovaya Street , 2. It was Krasnitsky who became the main organizer among the participants of the Petrograd group. Under his leadership, which, however, was disputed by Vvedensky and Boyarsky, the Petrograd group became the center of the nascent renovationist movement. This move was quickly (18 June 1922) denounced by Agathangel as unlawful and uncanonical. However, for

1550-446: The Church does not necessarily mean its intransigence. This term covers all unofficial and therefore not state-controlled church activities". Organizationally, the Catacomb Church communities were usually not interconnected. Unofficial Muslim, Catholic, Protestant, Judaic and Uniate groups in the Soviet Union also engaged in similar Catacomb-like activity. From the 1990s some (though not all) Catacomb Church groups began emerge from

1612-506: The Church: "If necessary, individual representatives of the clergy may be involved, who, contrary to the anti-Soviet clergy, would sharply defend the government's measures, thus introducing a split among the clergy." After the events in Shuya on March 15, 1922, where the commission for the seizure of valuables faced massive and stubborn resistance of believers, Leon Trotsky on March 17, 1922, in

1674-472: The Moscow Patriarchate were catacombists rejecting the Moscow Patriarchate. In response to her protests, the editorial board of Orthodox Russia replied: "The truth is extremely harmful for the cause of the church in America." In 1974, Alexander Solzhenitsyn , who was exiled from the USSR, addressed an open letter to the participants of the 3rd All-Diaspora Council of the Russian Orthodox Church organised by

1736-544: The Orthodox clergy who, in their opinion, were suitable for the role of destroyers of the unity of the Russian Orthodox Church. The first attempts to introduce an element of disorganization into the church environment, acting through hierarchs (or former hierarchs) from the patriarch's entourage, were not crowned with success. Therefore, the Cheka decided to act through the young white parish clergy, who are revolutionary in relation to possible intra-church transformations, leading

1798-513: The ROCOR, where, among other things, he criticized the "pious dream" of the existence of the "sinless – but also bodiless – catacomb" (о «сколь безгрешной, столь и бестелесной катакомбе»). He also stated that the Catacomb Church should not replace the "real Russian Orthodox people" in the eyes of the Russian diaspora . Solzhenitsyn wrote that the Catacomb Church as a whole is more a myth than a reality, that secret communities took place only because of

1860-481: The ROCOR. The ROCOR Bishops ' Council of 1956 declared that only "the Catacomb Church has preserved purity and fidelity to the spirit of the ancient Apostolic Church" and enjoys "respect among the people." On September 14, 1971, the ROCOR Bishops' Council officially adopted a resolution, which implied that the ROCOR was in communion with the "Catacomb Church", but not with the Moscow Patriarchate. This position

1922-459: The Renovationists, especially in rural areas, had undermined their efforts to "take over" the Russian Church. On 15 July 1923, the Patriarch declared all Renovationist decrees, as well as all their sacramental actions (including ordinations ) to be without grace, due to the "trickery" by which they tried to seize power in the Church and to their complete disregard for the canons . In August 1923,

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1984-467: The Russian Church. Three days after the establishment of the new Church, the Soviet authorities arrested Patriarch Tikhon of Moscow on May 19. Both factions were calling each other names "Renovationites" and "Tikhonovites" ( Russian : тихоновцы и обновленцы ). The movement is considered to have ended with the death of its leader, Alexander Vvedensky , in 1946, although the last unrepentant Renovationist hierarch, Philaret (Yatsenko), died in 1951. While

2046-538: The Synod forbade the diocesan bishops to do any priestly ordinations without its approval. The final blow to the movement came with the beginning of the Second World War in 1941. The Metropolitan's residence had to be relocated due to evacuation. Therefore, the Synod had difficulties contacting and controlling its clergy in the parishes. More importantly, in its efforts to seek moral and financial support from

2108-401: The USSR, Natalia Kiter, a spiritual writer and an active participant in the church life and the underground Orthodox brotherhoods in Leningrad until 1941, complained to Metropolitan Anastasius that Orthodox Russia was distorting her articles about ascetics and martyrs among the clergy of the Moscow Patriarchate. She said that Orthodox Russia changed her articles to state that those member of

2170-586: The authority of the Higher Church Administration (HCA). In effect, this resulted in "parallel" church administrations existing in one diocese and one city, one supporting the HCA and the other supporting the canonical bishop. This campaign of terror had its effects: by the summer of 1922, more than 20 hierarchs had recognized the canonical authority of HCA, the most notorious of whom was Metropolitan Sergius (Stragorodsky) of Nizhny Novgorod ,

2232-508: The case to eventually quarrel between "the priests and the episcopate", married ("white") and monastic ("black") clergy. The special VI branch of the GPU became the coordinating center of all efforts to split the Church through the GPU ( OGPU since 15 November 1923) headed by Yevgeny Tuchkov . The general management of the process of the split of the Church was concentrated (although not immediately) in

2294-478: The council of Russian Orthodox bishops, returned from exile and imprisonment, confirmed Tikhon's decision, proclaiming the Renovationist hierarchy as "unlawful and without grace". Some of the churches were returned to the "Tikhonites" (as Renovationists called the "Patriarchal" Church at that time), and many bishops and priests who had been pressed to support the schism , repented and were received back into communion . In addition to ecclesiological experimentation,

2356-409: The country, headed by priests, who, in case of repentance, were defrocked for canonical reasons. The last Renovationist bishops to recognize the patriarchal Church were Archbishop Gabriel (Olkhovik) (1948) and Seraphim (Korovin) (August 1, 1948) and Alexander (Shcherbakov) (April 17, 1949). The last Renovationist hierarch in the USSR was Metropolitan Philaret (Yatsenko) of Krutitsy, who considered himself

2418-399: The effects of this unlikely concordat was that the days of the Renovationist movement were numbered. What followed was a deluge of Renovationist clerics seeking reconciliation with Sergius. As a general rule, the Patriarchal Church considered all sacraments celebrated by Renovationists "null and void", hence these receiving clergy were received in those orders in which they happened to be upon

2480-576: The entire movement is often known as the Living Church , this was specifically the name of just one of the groups that comprised the larger Renovationist movement. By the time of the Moscow Council of 1923, three major groups had formed within the movement, representing different tendencies within Russian Renovationism: The Living Church of Vladimir Krasnitsky lobbied for the interests of married clergy;

2542-445: The expressions "my catacombs" and "my secret catacomb church" several times. It can be seen from the context that this is how she designates her house church , contrasting her "catacombs" with the officially functioning church of the Renovationists. The use of the expressions " catacombs " and "catacomb church" in relation to the 1920s–1930s realities showed a certain educational and cultural level of those who used these concepts. This

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2604-410: The future Patriarch. In many large cities, all of Orthodox church properties were in the hands of Renovationists. Before convening any general council to discuss their measures, the Renovationists began to implement radical reforms aimed at what they perceived to be the interests of the married clergy. Among the measures, changing the traditional order of ecclesiastic life were: The last decision sparked

2666-568: The hands of the Politburo of the Central Committee (personally responsible – Leon Trotsky ). By the spring of 1922, the necessary organizational preparations for striking the Church were completed. The right moment to start was needed. Such an opportune moment soon presented itself on the occasion of the launch of a campaign to seize church valuables. As a special representative of the Council of People's Commissars, Leon Trotsky led

2728-527: The head of the Renovationist Church. He died in early 1951, leaving no successors. The central administrative body of the Renovationist Church, as well as its entire administration, was in a state of constant flux and changed names several times in the 28-year period of its existence. Initially it was called the Supreme Church Administration ( Высшее церковное управление ), then Supreme Church Council (1922–23). Thereafter it assumed

2790-411: The lack of functioning churches. He claims that after the weakening of the atheist dictatorship and the opening of churches, the problem of underground parishes has practically disappeared, and that most Eastern Orthodox Christians, including former Catacomb Church members, were using the official churches of the Moscow Patriarchate. The appeal of Alexander Solzhenitsyn caused a heated debate, revealing

2852-475: The link to point directly to the intended article. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Russian_True_Orthodox_Church&oldid=1106290626 " Category : Disambiguation pages Hidden categories: Short description is different from Wikidata All article disambiguation pages All disambiguation pages Catacomb Church The historian Mikhail Shkarovsky  [ ru ] argues that "the catacombness of

2914-564: The marriage for episcopate and second marriage for priests. Monasteries "as having deviated from the pure monastic idea" were ordered to be closed. The Council then resolved to abolish the Patriarchate altogether and to return to the "collegial" form of church government. The Supreme Church Administration was renamed to the Supreme Church Council, still under the chairmanship of Antonin (Granovsky). Patriarch Tikhon , who

2976-441: The mid-1930s the general failure of the movement had become evident. Having failed to attract the majority of the faithful, the movement ceased to be useful for the Soviet regime and, consequently, both the "Patriarchal" Church and the Renovationists suffered fierce persecution at the hands of Soviet secret services: church buildings were closed down and often destroyed; active clergy and laity were imprisoned and sometimes executed. At

3038-483: The moment when they joined the schism (i.e. 1922). The only exception was made for Metropolitan Alexander Vvedensky , who was regarded as the ‘father-founder’ of the schism. Vvedensky refused to come into the Moscow Patriarchy as a layman, and died unreconciled. In 1943, the Renovationist church had 13 active hierarchs and 10 more bishops, retired or in exile. By 1945 only three bishops remained, one of whom

3100-591: The opposing positions of the disputants. Some completely denied the existence of the Catacomb Church, while others sought to prove the opposite and thereby justify their own position which was irreconcilable with the respect due to the official Church in the USSR (the Moscow Patriarchate). Solzhenitsyn's opinion was not met with sympathy by the leadership of the ROCOR. In 1975, First Hierarch of ROCOR Metropolitan Philaret (Voznesensky) wrote to Solzhenitsyn that not only priests, but also bishops were part of

3162-501: The point of view of Soviet legislation. Since the second half of the 1980s, in connection with the policy of glasnost , the concept of "catacombs" has returned to journalism. Renovationists Renovationism ( Russian : обновленчество , romanized :  obnovlenchestvo ; from обновление , obnovlenie 'renovation, renewal')—also called the Renovated Church ( обновленческая церковь ) or, by metonymy ,

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3224-452: The same time, trying to "win back" more traditional Russian Orthodox , the church had abandoned all attempts at ecclesiastical or liturgical reform, with the exception of the concessions previously made to married clergy. Instead, the Renovationist Church made attempts at imitating external liturgical and organizational forms of their opponents from the "Patriarchal" Church. In 1934, the Renovationist Synod issued an infamous decision declaring

3286-575: The second wave of Russian emigration noted the purely foreign nature of the expression "catacomb church". Since its resumption in 1947, the magazine Orthodox Russia had been running the column "And the Light Shines in Darkness" with the subtitle "Soviet Catacombs of the Spirit", in which everything related to the everyday side of the underground Soviet church life was published. The catacomb church

3348-467: The term "catacombs" and its derivatives were a local Petrograd/Leningrad neologism, where there were many active church intellectuals who could appreciate the diversity of meanings associated with this word. Meanwhile, in the 1920s and 1930s, the term "catacomb church" was not widely used; other expressions were used more often. In letters sent during 1923 to the Commission for Religious Cults under

3410-545: The transfer of church wealth to the state. In the same month, the so-called "Petrograd Group of Progressive Clergy" was formed. The first program document of the group was the declaration on famine relief dated March 24, 1922, was signed by 12 clergymen. The participants of the Petrograd group immediately became active: Alexander Vvedensky and Alexander Boyarsky made reports almost daily, urging them to give away church values. Vladimir Krasnitsky did not make reports, but he tied ties with various institutions, in particular with

3472-554: The word "catacombs" to describe the Russian realities of the 20th century is found in the letters of abbess Athanasia (Gromeko) to Metropolitan Eulogius (Georgievsky) , written in 1923 from Petrograd . After the nuns were expelled from their church building by the Renovationists , the community did not disband, but continued its existence as a convent in a private home. In two of the four surviving letters, abbess Athanasia uses

3534-400: The work of the Commission on Accounting and Concentration of Values. On January 23, 1922, the members of the Commission agreed that work on the removal of valuables from existing religious institutions should begin in the near future in the two or three most important regions of the country ( Moscow , Petrograd , Novgorod ). Among the preparatory activities included work with representatives of

3596-506: Was criticized by people who directly knew church life in the USSR. Archpriest Vasily Vinogradov  [ ru ] , who fled the USSR and served 6 years in Soviet camps, noted that Metropolitan Anastasius (Gribanovsky) , who headed the ROCOR, and the hierarchs subordinated to him, wanted to live in a myth about the supposedly numerous catacomb Church that existed in Russia, and considered them as doing wishful thinking . Another refugee from

3658-426: Was described as the only force opposing the godless regime. In the works of Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia (ROCOR) authors, the typical image of the catacomb church was formed: ecclesiastical and political opposition to the leadership of the Moscow Patriarchate, illegality from the point of view of Soviet legislation, and consistent anti-Soviet sentiments of its members. Such "catacombists" were perceived as

3720-604: Was marked by the presence of the representatives from the Patriarchates of Constantinople and Alexandria who concelebrated the eucharist with other members of the Renovationist Synod. In the second half of the 1920s, the canonical Russian Orthodox Church started making steps toward some form of rapprochement with the Soviet regime. Significantly, in 1927, the Deputy Patriarchal Locum Tenens , Metropolitan Sergius Stragorodsky issued

3782-458: Was retired. In Moscow, only one church remained under Renovationist control; the rest of the church properties had been returned by the Soviet government to the Moscow Patriarchy while Vvedensky was in evacuation. Vvedensky died of a stroke on July 8, 1946, with his church in complete disarray. By this time, almost all the Renovationist parishes and clergy had been annexed to the Moscow Patriarchate. After that scattered and isolated communities left in

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3844-609: Was visited by delegation from the council, refused to recognize the authority of this council and the validity of the "court" decision, due to many irregularities in canonical procedure: essentially, the decision had no effect on the life of the Patriarchal or "Tikhonite" Church. On June 24, 1923, a power struggle among the factions resulted in the forced resignation of Metropolitan Antonin (Granovsky). On June 29, 1923, he declared his "Union for Church Renewal" autocephalous and soon reverting to his previous title of "bishop", engaged in

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