Gay lobby scandal brewing in Russia

This a collection of articles reflecting the developing news from Russia. The short of it is that a popular theologian, professor and thinker Deacon Kurayev decided to publicly condemn homosexuality and possibly pedophilia in his beloved Orthodox Church, to which he has every intention to remain faithful. The accusations take the form of a series of publications in Kuraev's blog; the accounts from the victims are published and the peculiar pattern of careers blocked or promoted based apparently on the intimacy of the candidate to a gay sponsor. The abuse itself is rarely criminal (other than grounds for a harassment charge) since the victims are young adults and the alleged sexual acts are technically speaking consensual. Kuraev does not disclose the victims' identity, but claims that they are his personal acquaintances who are ready to appear in court. "Victim" here is typically not a young man raped (even though some allegations include use of violence), but a young man slowly groomed for a homosexual relationship in exchange for a rapid career in a growing Russian Church.

For his trouble, Kuraev got fired from the Moscow Theological Academy for "shocking behavior in the media".

Are Russia's Gay-Haters in the Closet?

The official homophobia of President Vladimir Putin's third term in power is threatening to backfire on the Russian Orthodox Church, in whose name the anti-gay campaign began in 2012.

Andrei Kuraev, a widely-known Orthodox theologian and proselytizer, is using social networks to expose a "gay system" within the church, fanning a scandal not unlike the one that occurred in the Roman Catholic church shortly before Pope Benedict XVI's surprise abdication last year.

Deacon Kuraev, 50, a fiery missionary and a protege of the previous Russian Orthodox Patriarch, Alexis II, is a controversial figure. Known for anti-Semitic statements denouncing the country's oligarchs as a Jewish clique, he penned an apologetic article, explaining, "I don't consider the Jewish people in any way worse than Russians or any other people. I just don't consider Jews better than all the others. Even that, however, seems to be seen as anti-Semitic these days."

The church leadership tolerated Kuraev's idiosyncrasies and frequent disagreements with the official line, including his protests against the imprisonment of punk performance artists Pussy Riot for a crude song-and-dance number in Moscow's main cathedral. Kuraev is popular: His LiveJournal blog is the 37th most read in Russia, and he is one of the church's best public speakers and most erudite scholars.

On Dec. 31, however, the Moscow Theological Academy, the Russian Orthodox Church's top learning institution, removed Kuraev from its faculty, explaining that "Deacon Andrei Kuraev regularly appears in the media and in the blogosphere with shocking statements, and his activity in these areas remains, in a number of cases, scandalous and provocative."

It was not the deacon's stand on Pussy Riot or his recent support for Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the oligarch turned political prisoner pardoned by Putin late last year, that tipped the scale against him. It was, according to Kuraev himself, a LiveJournal post about a teacher from the Kazan Seminary who was fired for making homosexual advances to students and then transferred to a higher post in another diocese. Kuraev wrote that the case exemplified a broader "gay metastasis" in the church.

The Russian Orthodox Church considers homosexuality a grave sin, and Patriarch Kirill has s aid that the legalization of gay marriage is a "dangerous apocalyptic sign." This stance encouraged Orthodox Christians in Putin's United Russia party to propose anti-gay legislative initiatives that crystallized into a law banning "propaganda of non-traditional sexual relations to minors." Putin, a devout churchgoer, has publicly denounced "so-called tolerance, genderless and without issue."

Kuraev's firing from the theological academy only made things worse. The deacon has used his blog for daily attacks on an alleged "gay system" within the church, including a selection of testimonials by former seminarians, altar boys and clerics, who are quoted recalling their sexual encounters with bishops and ranking priests. One related how a bishop "poured almost a full bottle of vodka into me and started pawing me. That stunned me so -- I couldn't even imagine something like that -- that I even sobered up."

Kuraev claims he wants to clean up the church. "I am not sure the path of publicity is for the good," he wrote in his blog. "But I am sure it at least provides an opportunity. The path toward self-cleansing in the church is firmly clogged."

As a warning to the Russian church hierarchy, the deacon recalled the gay scandals in the Catholic Church, which led Pope Francis to admit the existence of a "gay lobby" in the Vatican. The Catholic church "seems to have realized now that if you keep sweeping garbage under bishops' prayer rugs, the stink in the church will be unbearable," he wrote.

Kuraev is taking a calculated risk: He has plenty of supporters among churchgoers. "The cleansing he wants to carry out using his reputation and public status will hurt many people's reputations and, what's more, their connections, their finances, their long-term alliances with bureaucrats and law enforcers, who knew everything but covered it up or even used it," political commentator Alexander Morozov wrote on Facebook. "God will help him."

The political stakes are high. Once the church and the state agreed it was legitimate to attack gays, they became vulnerable to attempts to prove their hypocrisy. After all, Russia has as many gays in positions of power as any other country, except here they have to nod along with the homophobic official rhetoric.

"The all-around homophobia actively pushed by our bosses in the last two years will now start bearing fruit," editor Alexander Shmelyev wrote on Facebook. "How soon should we expect a fired bureaucrat to start outing a 'gay lobby' within the presidential administration?"

(Leonid Bershidsky, an editor and novelist, is Moscow and Kiev correspondent for World View.)

Q&A with Russia’s Renegade Deacon

Andrei Kurayev talks "gay lobby" cover-ups within the church, Pussy Riot and the need for revolution

It seems unlikely that many members of the Russian Orthodox Church clergy are familiar enough with the plot of Star Wars (the superior 1970s trilogy, naturally) to drop casual references to the Death Star and Luke Skywalker into conversation. But Andrei Kurayev—deacon, theologian and popular blogger—is no ordinary clergyman.

Frequently at odds with the church’s hierarchy, Kurayev, 50, has in the past faced censure over his defense of anti-Putin punks Pussy Riot, barbed criticism of authorities, and attacks on the “Jewish oligarchs” he says have bled Russia dry.

All that paled in comparison, however, to when Kurayev alleged on his blog earlier this month that a powerful “gay lobby” exists and actively covers up the widespread sexual abuse of altar boys and seminarians by Russian Orthodox Church bishops and priests. (That’s right, the same church whose championing of “traditional values” led to Russia’s notorious law banning “gay propaganda.”)

Days after his explosive first post on the topic, Kurayev was fired from his faculty position at the Moscow Theological Academy, the church’s most prestigious center of learning. His dismissal prompted Kurayev to escalate his attack on the “gay lobby” by posting testimonies from its alleged victims.

I spoke to Kurayev as he was being driven to the offices of an opposition-friendly magazine in central Moscow. As we crawled through Moscow’s rush-hour traffic, Kurayev—complex, controversial and absolutely non-PC—expounded on his crusade to “clean up” the Russian Orthodox Church, called for a new revolution in the country, and explained why he didn’t have the heart to tell Pussy Riot they were Kremlin pawns.

You say you’ve known of the existence of the “gay lobby” and sexual abuse within the Russian Orthodox Church for years. Why are you speaking out about it only now?

I felt the time was right. It’s like in Star Wars, when the rebel fighters are trying to blow up the Death Star. They need to wait for exactly the right moment. It’s the same thing here. I believed the patriarch was serious about cleaning up the church. I believed I was helping. Perhaps I miscalculated, but we are just at the start of our journey.

Did you realize that your claims would be particularly embarrassing for the church, in light of its enthusiastic support for the Kremlin’s “gay propaganda” law, which forbids the “promotion of nontraditional sexual relations” to minors?

Complaints from children should be considered irrespective of any political considerations. But those members of the gay lobby who publicly back the anti-gay law are obviously hypocrites. I should, however, note that I support the law, which bans the promotion of homosexuality to children. It helps to make society more tolerant by clearly defining the line between what is a crime—pedophilia—and the right of adults to make free choices.

Are you likely to face any consequences over your claims of sexual abuse within the church?

It’s possible I could be defrocked. I’ve also received threats from ultra-Orthodox activists. We’ll see what happens.

I apologize, the second article did not come out whole. Here it is in full. Also, the source is Q&A with Russia’s Renegade Deacon

Q&A with Russia’s Renegade Deacon
Andrei Kurayev talks "gay lobby" cover-ups within the church, Pussy Riot and the need for revolution
It seems unlikely that many members of the Russian Orthodox Church clergy are familiar enough with the plot of Star Wars (the superior 1970s trilogy, naturally) to drop casual references to the Death Star and Luke Skywalker into conversation. But Andrei Kurayev—deacon, theologian and popular blogger—is no ordinary clergyman.
Frequently at odds with the church’s hierarchy, Kurayev, 50, has in the past faced censure over his defense of anti-Putin punks Pussy Riot, barbed criticism of authorities, and attacks on the “Jewish oligarchs” he says have bled Russia dry.
Controversial deacon Andrei Kurayev

All that paled in comparison, however, to when Kurayev alleged on his blog earlier this month that a powerful “gay lobby” exists and actively covers up the widespread sexual abuse of altar boys and seminarians by Russian Orthodox Church bishops and priests. (That’s right, the same church whose championing of “traditional values” led to Russia’s notorious law banning “gay propaganda.”)
Days after his explosive first post on the topic, Kurayev was fired from his faculty position at the Moscow Theological Academy, the church’s most prestigious center of learning. His dismissal prompted Kurayev to escalate his attack on the “gay lobby” by posting testimonies from its alleged victims.
I spoke to Kurayev as he was being driven to the offices of an opposition-friendly magazine in central Moscow. As we crawled through Moscow’s rush-hour traffic, Kurayev—complex, controversial and absolutely non-PC—expounded on his crusade to “clean up” the Russian Orthodox Church, called for a new revolution in the country, and explained why he didn’t have the heart to tell Pussy Riot they were Kremlin pawns.
You say you’ve known of the existence of the “gay lobby” and sexual abuse within the Russian Orthodox Church for years. Why are you speaking out about it only now?
I felt the time was right. It’s like in Star Wars, when the rebel fighters are trying to blow up the Death Star. They need to wait for exactly the right moment. It’s the same thing here. I believed the patriarch was serious about cleaning up the church. I believed I was helping. Perhaps I miscalculated, but we are just at the start of our journey.
Did you realize that your claims would be particularly embarrassing for the church, in light of its enthusiastic support for the Kremlin’s “gay propaganda” law, which forbids the “promotion of nontraditional sexual relations” to minors?
Complaints from children should be considered irrespective of any political considerations. But those members of the gay lobby who publicly back the anti-gay law are obviously hypocrites. I should, however, note that I support the law, which bans the promotion of homosexuality to children. It helps to make society more tolerant by clearly defining the line between what is a crime—pedophilia—and the right of adults to make free choices.
Are you likely to face any consequences over your claims of sexual abuse within the church?
It’s possible I could be defrocked. I’ve also received threats from ultra-Orthodox activists. We’ll see what happens.
Patriarch Kirill (Reuters/Marko Djurica)
Is the row over your allegations comparable in scale to the scandal that broke out in 1991, when dissident priest Gleb Yakunin, after gaining unprecedented access to the KGB archives, accused high-ranking members of the church of being former KGB agents?
I’d say it is much more serious. Back then, there was no clear consensus among the public that having KGB links was a bad thing. We were all still Soviet people. It was accepted that such a thing was often a necessary means of survival in the Soviet system. After all, the KGB of the [Yuri] Andropov or [Leonid] Brezhnev eras was a very different thing from the Stalin-era KGB. But here, there is a public consensus that it is a bad thing when elderly bishops make homosexual advances toward young boys.
In a recent interview with the opposition-friendly newspaper Novaya Gazeta, you called for “revolution.” What exactly did you mean by this? A peaceful exchange of power? Storming of the Kremlin?
However it comes about. It makes me sad that people in Russia have no real means of standing up for their rights. We have no genuine trade unions, for example. I confess, however, that I do not go on protest marches and that I am unlikely to be on the barricades throwing stones if a revolution does break out. That said, while I am on the whole against Vladimir Putin, I see no viable alternative to him right now. This is very strange, of course, for such a large country. It’s also a situation that Putin does his very best to maintain.
Opposition figures have spoken of their desire to see the church play a mediating role between the Kremlin and protesters.
I’d like this very much indeed. There was even a chance that this could happen, when the first anti-government protests broke out in December 2011. Back then, Patriarch Kirill said on state-run television that “our people are there and there,” meaning at the anti-government demonstrations and at the pro-Putin rallies. Of course, he then later openly came out in support of Putin.
You criticized the imprisonment of Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina from Pussy Riot and met with them after their recent release. But you have also suggested that they were a Kremlin project designed to turn Orthodox believers away from the protest movement.
I don’t exclude this. Pussy Riot’s actions had exactly the opposite effect from the one they were seeking. They forced Patriarch Kirill into the arms of the Kremlin by allowing the authorities to portray the opposition as anti-religion. I didn’t discuss this with them, however, as it’s clear that even if they were used, they were completely in the dark about how and why this was done.
Members of the Russian radical feminist group Pussy Riot sing in Moscow's Red Square. (Reuters/Denis Sinyakov)
What was your impression of Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina?
Any person is interesting in his or her own way. I believe they are sincere when they say they are not anti-religion. As for a future in politics, I’m not sure this is something they want for themselves.
Russian Orthodox Church spokesman Vsevolod Chaplin has spoken of his belief that the separation of church and state is a “monstrous” thing. Do you share his views?
I have no desire to see Russia officially declared an Orthodox state. In such a country, with so many serious problems, this would not be to the church’s advantage. State corruption would simply become Orthodox corruption, and so on. I do not want to see religious icons on every corner.
How did you become a Christian in the officially atheist Soviet Union?
I became a Christian after reading Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s novels.

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