The New Patriarch Will Play an Essential Role in Driving the Country’s Future Development
The new Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia is about to be elected, and Alexander Arkhangelsky has a few favors to ask of him, mainly – to restore the Russian people’s faith in themselves and in their ability to change things for the better. It has been this lack of faith, Arkhangelsky argues, that has been the most detrimental to the Russian society, and now a new, authoritative figure can inspire some historical change.
Today the sixteenth Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia will be elected. What we’ll find out is not just the name of the new Holy Patriarch; we will discover the direction of the country’s and the Church’s future development. Every time since the revival of patriarchate in Russia in 1918, His Holiness ended up perfectly corresponding to the era, rhyming with it. Saint Tikhon concurred with the time of heroic resistance that transformed into a tactical balance. Sergius I Stragorodsky coincided with the period of evading the state inside the slippery, suffocating embrace of Stalinism… And this went on until Patriarch Pimen, whose lack of manifestation in history and silence expressed the general inertia of stagnation with an incomprehensible force, and until the late Alexy (Ridiger), who was a model “protohierarch” in an era of transition.
Having taken a close look at the person who will be elected today, we will have at least a partial understanding of what direction our country, and not just the Church, will move in.
Whoever becomes the new Patriarch, though, I think he will have to participate in a major social activity (and somebody else can talk about the Church’s inside affairs). The activity that everyone expected the politicians to perform, but they evaded it. I am not talking about elections and democracy, nor about reforms and compromises; I’m talking about something much more important, something that everything else is derived from. I am talking about the country’s lack of faith in itself.
Wherever you go and whoever you talk to, you can see pretty much the same thing. There are people who are strong, quite capable of historical creativity, and displeased with the current condition of their Fatherland; they look toward the future.
There are more of such people in some places, and less in others, but they are everywhere. They think, they write, they earn money, they raise children. It would seem that with such people forming the potential nucleus of the elite, Russia should have long ago become a calmly free power, self-sufficient, completely devoid of a hysterical feeling of having been offended and wounded, included on equal terms in the world space; we have someone to lean on. But! These same people that we could place our stakes on keep repeating: will anything really ever change? Come on, the nation is so tuned in to Yuri Budanov! Come on, the people have no desire, whatsoever, to be free and responsible! Come on, this is the way it’s always been! Nothing will ever be different.
And they wander off in different directions.
But if we agree in advance with the fact that nothing will ever happen – then nothing will ever happen. Of course, practical experience and sensible calculation force gloomy conclusions and skeptical prognoses. Does anyone in history ever rely on a given, though? Does anyone look back at sociology to guide their actions? Nobody ever acts while looking back; they just hide in their cottages. And if people do act, they do it with a firm belief that despite everything, we will succeed. Or at least we can succeed; we should just try. Actually, the whole experience of mankind tells us: only the impossible ever succeeded in this world. Barbaric tribes simply could not become the nation of Israel. Christianity simply could not triumph in a pagan world.
But let’s lower the bar and look at politics. The Swedes could not overcome the hard drinking and moral decay in the country at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century. One third of the population, practically all the people who led sober lives, emigrated. The remaining people degraded. The Church was destitute and had no authority. But they got themselves together – and believed in themselves. And having found that faith, they were able to unite societies around the parishes into voluntary sobriety, and to agree that the state will give the church grants to work with the poor and the drunkards. And thus, without any formal employment or state control, will give the Church a source of independent existence. They were able to pull themselves out of the swamp by the hair, just like the great Baron Munchausen advised.
The Spanish had no prospect of turning into the modern Spanish. The Italians of the mid-1970s had no opportunity to get rid of the mafia rule and the chaos of the red brigades. The Germans did not have the least chance of turning into the most orderly democracy in Europe… and so on.
As soon as you say all of this, however, you run into the same type of despondence. Come on, how did it really go? The Germans had the Americans. The Spaniards had their king. The Italians—they most probably had some help as well. And we have nothing: no American orders, no Spanish king, and no Italian drive.
As far as the orders go—it’s good that we don’t have any. As for the king: just imagine someone saying, about fifty years ago, that the Spanish monarchy is a prerequisite for transitioning to a full-fledged democracy: this person would be laughed at. It means that it’s not just about the king, although, naturally, Spain got very lucky in that area. What mattered is that the king took on the role of the guarantor of changes that are of a non-monarchic character. That is, he did something that was considered impossible. And it’s only the impossible things that come true in history. We start whining, once again: “poor us, we don’t have anything, and they are so lucky, they have everything – they have the king, and the orders, and energy.” This is what comes to mind then: the brilliant formula derived by a little boy of the later Soviet era. After communicating with his American peers, he philosophically observed: there is not one foreigner who doesn’t have anything.
So then, here is a humble request for the new Holy Patriarch. It is obvious that your main business is faith in God. But faith in a human being is also your business. Faith in our country being able to change for the better. Faith in that strength comes in the process of self-improvement. Faith in the fact that it’s not too late to wake up and start restoring ourselves, our original freedom, and our branched culture. That any complexes can be defeated with the help of hope and effort. Including the complex of an outcast who feels cornered and who wants to prove to everyone that he is a grown-up.
Please talk to the people, and not just the religious ones, about the fact that we cannot go anywhere without this faith. Breathe the air of creativity into them. Show them an example of unfading hope. And the people will reply. They will respond. It is just that it’s been long since anyone has talked to them about the sober happiness of a historical effort.
And after this we will be able to address the president and the prime minister with a request to carry out a new reform of the Russian language. To issue a joint decree banning the general usage of improper words: never and forever. So that we would be forever deprived of the opportunity to use the force of historical habit as an excuse to talk about the fact that things will never be any different in Russia.
Feedback:
Constance Blackwell, UK: Just one note of correction about Spain--while they had the King, who was magnificent, they also had the European Union. The German political parties went down to Spain to help train the Spanish in a political activity - in representative democracy. Representative democracy does not just happen; it is the result of learned ways of dealing with the needs of people, the discussion of what is really important, and the selection of those to put those needs forward.
One can not change any government, local or national, all at once. In neighborhood committees in New York and Chicago, groups from different ethnic groups came together to present their desires and grievances - then a trained organizer helps them to choose those one or two aims achievable at the time. Then they go forward to present them to a designated body.
Such neighborhood committees can be the basis of a representative local government-if they are given the power to do this - it can happen step by step. It need not bring down a government - but it can begin to build a Russia Russians desire.
