Posted on 06/11/2017 8:52:31 AM PDT by marshmallow
*** Russia guards Christian heritage of the Old World
Moscow, June 9, Interfax - Expert on Christian shrines Mikhail Arteyev believes that Russians' level of spirituality can be compared to Europeans of the Middle Ages.
"I would say that Russia today is more like Europe of the Middle Ages, more than Europe itself, and it is wonderful. Today Russia is Europe's guardian," he said in his interview with Interfax-Religion.
According to Arteyev, "all European greatest works of art, churches, culture in general were based mostly on Roman and church components."
The interviewee of the agency believes that "mass Catholicism has blown off."
"They consider the Church a kind of membership club with church parties, trips to Taize, concerts, even rock concerts, but church component passes away. In Russia people mostly search blessed elders, grace, they search specific spiritual elements," he said.
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Putin said the church would save Russia.
Oddly enough, Russia might save the church. First Rome, then Constantinople were the “seat of Christendom” in their time, and Russia assumed that Moscow would be next, after the fall of Constantinople. They were very unhappy that the seat went back to Rome, and have stewed about it since.
Oddly enough, every time Putin does something to support Orthodox Christianity, it works far better than expected, and he looks great around the world. And nothing succeeds like success.
Putin is what he is. That being said, he has filled a vacuum and in many respects, it has been for the greater good as opposed to the fecklessness and dithering of Western Europe and up until President Trump, the USA.
Thanks for posting this “secret study” of why the progressive left loved Russians when they were Communist atheists, but hates them now! Do we need more evidence of the forces moving in the world?
I’d be careful about taking stories from Russian news outlets at face value. They are pretty much all mouthpieces of the Kremlin. That said there is much to celebrate about the spiritual state of Russia even if this does tend to look at things through rose colored lenses. Certainly there has been a massive religious revival in Russia. Abortion rates, while still high are dropping dramatically. New churches (Orthodox) have been opened at an average rate of around three per day for the last 15 years. The Royal Family have been exonerated of the silly charges concocted by the Communists and the last Czar along with his murdered wife, children and faithful servants were canonized. Efforts are underway to catalogue the atrocities committed against Christians during the Communist era and commemorate the New Martyrs.
Still one should not assume Russia is some kind of paradise. The government is authoritarian and highly corrupt. Freedom of speech and the press are severely curtailed. Most Russians, while self identifying as Orthodox, still only attend services four or five times a year. Outside the major cities poverty is widespread. Russian infrastructure makes our look good. Russian foreign policy is clearly aggressive towards its neighbors.
So yeah... it’s a mixed bag.
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