WHO IS
RESPONSIBLE FOR RELIGIOUS ACTIVISTS?
by Maria Shustrova
The Orthodox
public movement "God's Will" replaced its leader, expelling
Dmitry
Tsorionov, nicknamed Enteo. The reason is his friendship and
joint
demonstration with a member of the notorious punk group Pussy
Riot, Maria
Alekhina. The reins of the organization were taken by Liudmila
Esipenko, the
principal defendant in the case of the pogrom in the Manezh. And
then she
accused her former comrade of friendship with "unrepentant
blasphemers," sacrilege, and slander.
Such a change of
leadership in "God's Will" evokes in many a fear that the
movement
will be yet more radicalized, since it was Esipenko who hitherto
has performed
all the "work" in hooligan actions. At the same time her credo
is
that everything that she and those who agree with her do not
like is subject to
destruction and prohibition. The article from RIA Novosti is
about the
prospects now of this and several other organizations.
Orthodox
activists before Pussy Riot
Orthodox social
movements appeared in Russia back in the 1980s. One of the first
was the
national patriotic front "Pamiat" [Memorial], remembered for its
blatant antisemitism. But the real lawgiver of fashion in public
demonstrations
was formed in 1992 with the blessing of the then metropolitan of
St. Petersburg
and Ladoga, Ioann Snychev—the Union of Orthodox Banner Bearers.
Members of the
movement pierced portraits of the singer Madonna with a wooden
stake, broke up
unsanctioned rallies of the LGBT community, and set fire to
Harry Potter books by
Joanne Rowling. In addition, it was this organization that
devised the slogan
"Orthodoxy or death," that was later ruled to be extremist.
But the real
boom in movements of Orthodox activists began with the uproar
surrounding the
punk prayer service of the group Pussy Riot in the church of
Christ the Savior.
It was then that the news media was filled with news about
demonstrations of
"God's Will" of Dmitry Tsorionov and "Forty Forties," whose
leader was Andrei Kormukhin.
Are all hooliganisms equal?
The activity of "Forty Forties" originally concentrated on support of the construction of Orthodox church buildings. But in addition, members of the movement provided humanitarian assistance to civilians in the Donbass and supported children's homes, the homeless, and prisoners. But the organization acquired real notoriety only after the conflict of 2015-2016 surrounding the never completed construction of a church in the Torfianka Park of Moscow.
And although after the mass expressions of local residents against the appearance of a church in the park zone, official representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church declared their readiness to consider alternative sites for construction, activists from "Forty Forties" still did not leave the park for a long time. Occasionally it came to fist fights with opponents of the erection of a church. In the end on the site of the confrontations in Torfianka there remained only an Orthodox cross, and the authorities and the RPTs, after the personal intervention of the patriarch, considered the possibility of constructing the church nearby, on Anadyr Passage.
After this, talk about the "Forty Forties" movement began only in connection with protests against the motion picture "Matilda." It was members of this organization who were able to unite several dozens of other Orthodox movements, including the Union of Orthodox Banner Bearers, and to conduct throughout the country demonstrations of thousands for a ban of the picture. To be sure, without violating existing laws.
"God's Will" acted completely differently. In 2012 it immediately began to demand a maximally harsh prison term for members of Pussy Riot for their hooliganism. Although the methods of action on the public by "God's Will" itself did not differ much from the demonstrations of Pussy Riot. Activists often got into fights with representatives of the LGBT community, broke up performances and exhibits that seemed to them to be blasphemous, pelted the singer Marilyn Manson with eggs, and put a pig's head on the threshold of Oleg Tabakov's theatre. The last blatant demonstration by "God's Will" was the pogrom in the Manezh, which resulted in a criminal case against one of the members of the movement, Liudmila Isipenko. However, in the end she was acquitted, but the activists calmed down for a time.
Enemies of Orthodoxy
"The attempt to justify hooliganism by their own religious affiliation is an activity that undermines moral messages and the social status of the respective religion. Enteo is an enemy of Orthodoxy," declared the chairman of the Public Chamber's Commission for Harmonization of Inter-religious Relations, Iosif Diskin.
The prorector for international work of the Orthodox St. Tikhon's Humantarian University, Archpriest Georgy Orekhanov, thinks that the problem is that today the mechanisms of influence on the "Orthodox activists" practically do not exist, either in the church or in law enforcement agencies.
"Unfortunately, today there appear in the Russian Orthodox Church people who have the gall to speak out in its name with the most controversial and completely insane statements. By their statements they cause harm to the church's reputation, especially among youth," the clergyman thinks.
But he says, the "church does not have legal means of influencing them." "If such hooliganism occurred in the 19th century, this could bring some rather harsh discipline. But then the church was a state church, part of the system, and therefore it was simpler. It is impossible to excommunicate Enteo from the church. His spiritual director could exclude him from communion for some time for his antics, but that is all," Orekhanov emphasized.
At the same time he noted, law enforcement agencies also cannot exert influence on religious activists so long as they do not directly violate the law. At the same time the representative of the RPTs is sure that "representatives of such movements as 'God's Will' either are receiving money from somebody for their activity or they have simply lost their minds."
The church is left with only conducting explanatory work inasmuch as it should not and cannot be responsible for what the "Orthodox activists" do, Orekhanov is sure.
Nostalgia for excesses
Perhaps the leader of "God's Will" was sobered by the harsh reaction of the law enforcement system to the "activism" of the organization calling itself "Christian State—Sacred Rus," which is not registered in the Ministry of Justice. And perhaps Enteo really made friends with a woman, hatred for whom motivated his movement. But he has declared that "God's Will" has fulfilled its mission and he is engaged in a new project under the name "Decommunization." Demonstrations with his participation have become milder and now proceed fully legally, as the recent single pickets at the busts of Lenin and Stalin in Moscow.
But now on his VKontakte page, Dmitry Tsorionov has been frankly nostalgic for the times when he and those who supported him broke into the studio of Sergei Bratkov. They "tore up all posters" (announcing his students' exhibit) with the image of a crucified frog and "used special means"—some kind of stinky gas.
"The one who behaved toward us in an uncivilized manner and talked most of all about his rights was reconciled with a brotherly slap upside his face. It was impossible to spend another week in the room since their sin stank," the activist writes.
And at the same time he says that everything that they did then was regarded at most as petty hooliganism.
However, as one of Dmitry's friends noted,
today most likely
religious activists will not be able to get off so easily if they
take up the
old ways again. (tr. by PDS, posted 6 October 2017)
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