A RETROSPECTIVE LOOK AT THE RUSSIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH STALIN’S RESTORATION ACTIVITIES

Abstract

The work examines the reasons for the restoration of the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church in 1943 with the dictator J. Stalin’s help. The role and main activity directions of Stalin’s Russian Orthodox Church are determined. Emphasis is placed on the fact that the objective prerequisites, in particular the turning point during the Second World War, the preparation for the opening of the second front and the creation of a new international security organization – the UN, forced Stalin to radically change his attitude to the church and religion in the USSR. Attention is drawn to the fact that internal factors, in particular the intensification of church life on the territory occupied by the fascists, the revival of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Church, the Romanian Orthodox Church and others, the loyal attitude of the believers of the Russian Orthodox Church to the Soviet government caused these changes. It is emphasized that the dictator J. Stalin, while legalizing the activities of the Russian Orthodox Church and declaring the patriarchy, primarily pursued his own goals – the transformation of the Russian Orthodox Church into an espionage institution, a servant of the regime and a structure controlled by the Soviet authorities. The article proves that the election of Serhii (Stragorodskyi) as patriarch was perceived ambiguously both in the Soviet Union and abroad. It is summarized that both in the synodal period of the existence of the Russian Empire and in the Soviet period, the Russian Orthodox Church was completely subordinated to the existing authorities and was a reliable instrument of believer’s manipulation. It was concluded that all the hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church were agents of the KGB and no ordination to the priesthood took place without the permission of the special services. It is emphasized that the Council of the Russian Orthodox Church in 1943 was not canonical and the future activity of the church was far from the ideal of a true religious organization. It is emphasized that the «Stalinist tomos» for the Russian Orthodox Church turned it into a formal religious organization that functioned in the USSR, and after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Putin’s regime turned it into the main ideological organizer and propagandist of the «Russian World». The current Patriarch Kirill declared Putin’s «special military operation» against the Ukrainian people a «holy war».