Nationalism and Religion in Post-Soviet Russian Civil Society: An Inquiry into the 1997 Law “On Freedom of Conscience” (Part II)

The Russian Orthodox Church During the Yeltsin Years (1991-1997)

To determine whether the Russian Orthodox Church is a symbol of order or disorder, non-gnostic or gnostic, democratic or nationalist, I will focus on the events surrounding the passage of the September 1997 law “On Freedom of Conscience.” Such an investigation will reveal whether the intentions and goals of the Church, as manifested by its leadership, were nationalist in scope, or whether they sought a restoration of a system of church-state relationships based on the Byzantine arrangement of symphonia.^[21]

After the open persecutions and harassment of the Soviet period, the climate for religion changed dramatically at the close of the 1980’s.  In October 1990, both Mikhail Gorbachev (then-Soviet president) and Yeltsin adopted measures “On Freedom of Conscience and Religious Organizations” that revoked the 1975 legislation on religion (which itself was an update of Stalin’s 1929 law) which sole purpose was to eradicate religion in the Soviet Union.^[22]  The October 1990 law created a separation between church and state and permitted religious freedom for all religions.  The Russian Orthodox Church became legally established as a corporate entity, as did other Orthodox groups.  The Roman Catholic Church and Protestant missionaries were allowed to expand their proselytizing activities; and other religious sects such as the Mormons and Hare Krishnas were permitted to practice and to recruit members into their organizations.

For its part, the Russian Orthodox Church–the Moscow Patriarchate–managed to double the number of parishes in the six years since Russia had declared its independence from the Soviet Union.  The Patriarchate, however, faced competition from other Orthodox groups, which were also experiencing similar growth.  The Free Orthodox Church led by Archbishop Valentin of Suzdal’ claimed ninety-eight parishes in January 1996, while the “catacomb” True Orthodox Church declared twenty-six, and several unregistered, parishes.  The Russian Orthodox Church Abroad under Metropolitan Vitaly of New York had opened five dioceses in Russia; and the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Kievan Patriarchate) allegedly possessed seven registered parishes in Russia.^[23]

At the same time, the Russian Orthodox Church faced competition from groups that were external to Orthodoxy altogether; a growing Roman Catholic Church with 183 registered parishes and successful Protestant missionaries: 677 Evangelical Christian Baptists, 248 Evangelical Christian parishes, and 141 Lutheran ones.  Islam claimed 2, 494 communities in 1996, while Buddhism had 124 and Judaism, 80.  Finally, unorthodox religious denominations (“new religious movements”) continued to make inroads in Russia: 129 Jehovah Witnesses’ parishes, 112 hare Krishna’s communities, and 20 Bahai’i’s groups.^[24]  Much to the concern of the Russian Orthodox Church, the 1990 law “On Freedom of Conscience” law was successful in fostering religious diversity.

Faced with competition externally and internally, the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church became worried.  Although the Russian Orthodox Church had in the past had accepted that there were areas in Russia in which Muslims and Buddhists had traditionally predominated, it had difficulty ceding regions that had been predominantly Orthodox prior to the existence of the Soviet Union to Catholics, Protestants, and other religious organizations.  The Russian Orthodox Church therefore lobbied both houses of the Russian parliament to pass legislation that would restrict the religious activities of both its Orthodox and non-Orthodox competitors.

Ironically, the Church found a political movement receptive to its concerns in the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF).  The Communists, formerly devoted to the outright destruction of religion, now sought for itself the mantle of the defender of the Russian Orthodox Church.  Party leader Gennady Zyuganov referred to the proselytizing activities of non-Moscow Patriarchate organizations as “the uncontrolled activity of totalitarian sects in Russia, whose activity is often dangerous to people’s lives.”^[25]

Equally sympathetic to the Russian Orthodox Church’s plight was Vladimir Zhirinovsky and his Liberal Democrat Party.  By the summer of 1997, the CPRF, Liberal Democrats, and Russian Orthodox Church formed a united front to pass the restrictive “On Freedom of Conscience” legislation in the State Duma on 23 June 1997by a margin of 300 to 8 votes, and later in the Federal Council by 112 votes to 4 against and one abstention.^[26] The rationale for the legislation, according to the governor of Kaluga Oblast’, was “to protect society from the massive expansion of pseudo-religious cults and organizations, which through their proselytizing endanger individual rights and freedoms and the health of citizens.”^[27] However, there was no overwhelming public demand for such legislation; instead, it was orchestrated largely by politicians.^[28]

The reaction in the West was not favorable to the Russian Orthodox Church.  The Clinton administration, along with twenty-six members of the United States Congress, and the European Union appealed to President Yeltsin not to sign the legislation into law; and to add muscle to their measure, the Congress threatened to cut off $200 million in aid to Russia if the “On Freedom of Conscience” legislation became law.^[29] Yeltsin conceded to western pressure and vetoed the legislation on 23 July 1997.^[30] The bill, according to Yeltsin, contradicted “the fundamentals of the constitutional system of the Russian Federation . . . universally recognized principles and norms of international law.”^[31] Specifically, the bill violated 16 Articles of the Russian constitution and several international human right agreements like the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant for Civil and Political Rights, and the Convention of the Council of Europe.  Yeltsin particularly emphasized Article 15.4 of the Russian constitution: “acts of international law [are] an inalienable part of the Russian Federation’s legislation on freedom of conscience.”^[32] Yet two months later, Yeltsin had signed a revised version of the “On Freedom of Conscience” legislation into law on 26 September 1997.^[33]

In this second version, the Yeltsin administration had introduced minor changes to the text of the legislation in order to give the impression that the government would modify the law in a manner more agreeable to the international community.  Yeltsin’s official representative to the Duma, Aleksandr Kotenkov, stated that the new version of the law would remove all the “odious” points and conform the law with international standards of human rights.^[34] But this did not happen.  Instead, the opposite was true as attested by Viktor Zorkal’stev, the Communist Party chairman of the Duma’s committee on public organization and religious associations, who proclaimed: “We [the communists] did not surrender a single position of principle [to Yeltsin]”; and that Yeltsin actually “made the text of the law better and significantly developed its ideas.”^[35] The revised legislation was presented to the Duma on 19 September 1997 by Kotenkov and communist deputy Viktor Zorkal’stev.  It passed by 358 votes with 6 against and 4 abstentions.^[36] In the Federation Council, the revised bill was even more successful, passing unanimously.^[37]

The 1997 law “On Freedom of Conscience”

The 1997 law “On Freedom of Conscience” violates Articles 14, 15, 19, 28, 29, 45, 54, and 55 of the Russian Constitution; Articles 18, 19, 26, and 29 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; Article 13 of the International Treaty of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights; Articles 18 and 26 of the International Treaty on Civil and Political Rights; Articles 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 of the United Nations Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination on the Basis of Religion and Beliefs; and Articles 16 and 17 of the Concluding Document of the 1989 Vienna Meeting of the OSCE.^[38]

In the law’s preamble, the Russian Federation is declared to be “a secular state,” and Article 4.1 states: “The Russian Federation is a secular state.  No religion may be established as a state or compulsory religion.”  However, the preamble also recognizes “the special contribution of Orthodoxy to the history of Russia and to the establishment and development of Russia’s spirituality and culture.”  Other religions constitute “an inseparable part of the historical heritage of Russia’s peoples” are “Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, and Judaism.”

The law makes a distinction between a “religious group” (religioznaya gruppa) and a “religious organization” (religioznaya organizatsiya).  Members of religious groups are denied rights enumerated in the 1993 Russian constitution, while members of religious organizations are guaranteed those rights, if their registration is approved by the state.  A “religious group” is defined by Article 7.1:

“a voluntary association (ob’edinenie) of citizens formed for the goals of join confession and dissemination of their faith, carrying out its activities without state registration and without obtaining the legal capabilities of a legal personality (and therefore cannot seek legal redress through the judicial system) . . . Premises and property necessary for the activities of a religious group, are to be provided for the use of the group by its participants.”

Article 27 makes it clear that members of a religious group are not eligible to own premises or any property; nor are they permitted to disseminate their faith in public meetings or through the printed word.  The only right a religious group possesses is to hold a religious service in a private location; and even if the local law enforcement deems such services disruptive, then this right can be revoked.

A “religious organization,” on the other hand, is a body that “consists of ten or more participants who are at least eighteen years old and who are permanently residing in one locality” (Article 8.3).  However, a religious organization must first register with the state.  The first requirement is to have an official document that confirms the religious organization has “legally existed on a given territory for at least fifteen years (since 1982)” (Article 27).^[39]  Those organizations that do not have such a legal document must apply for registration annually for fifteen years.  During this “waiting period,” the members of the religious organizations are denied the religious rights guaranteed by the Russian constitution.

After a religious organization had registered with the state, a process that is difficult to accomplish because of the state’s demands of minute documentation of the organization’s membership, meetings, and history (Article 11), it is still vulnerable to liquidation by the state (Article 14).  The state can liquidate a religious organization on the following grounds: 1) “the undermining of social order and security”; 2) “forcing a family to disintegrate”; 3) “hypnosis and the performing of depraved or other disorderly actions”; and 4) “hindering the receiving of compulsory education.”  Finally, Article 8 of the new law stipulates:

“A centralized religious organization the structures of which have been active on the territory of the Russian Federation on a legal basis for no fewer than fifty years as of the moment when the said religious organization files its application for state registration has the right to use its names the words “Russia” (Rossiya) and “Russian” (rossiiskii).”

In essence any religious organization that has existed after 1947 cannot use the words “Russia” or “Russian” in its title.

And to make sure that there is no misunderstanding, Article 27 explicitly denies followers of unregistered religious organizations the right to religious expression: such organizations are not “equal before the law in all spheres of civic, political, economic, social, and cultural life.”  Unregistered organizations do not have the right “to create educational institutions” such as church schools or seminaries; nor do they have the right: “to carry out religious rites in health centers and hospitals and children’s homes, in old people’s homes and institutions applying sentences of imprisonment for criminal offenders at the request of citizens held there.”

Lastly, unregistered believers do not have the “right to produce, acquire, export, import, and distribute religious literature, audio and video material and other articles of religious significance.”  They are denied the right “to institute enterprises for producing liturgical literature and articles for religious services.”  Thus, the 1997 legislation places real limits on the development of civil society and genuine religious pluralism by restricting the number of organizations who can organize and have access to the public square.

After the legislation was signed into law, the first protesters against the “On Freedom of Conscience” law was not the Roman Catholic Church or Baptist organizations, as observed the director of the Institute of Religion and Law in Moscow, but “Orthodox Christians – those who do not recognize the Moscow Patriarchate.  They claim that the law is directed first of all against them.”^[40] In fact, breakaway Orthodox Christian organizations, as well as other indigenous Russian religious movements, have often proven to be the targets of official harassment to an even greater extent that so-called “foreign” religious organizations.

In some cases, it has been the federal government itself which has initiated action against a minority religious community; most religious persecution, however, happens at the local level by officials acting in contravention of federal statutes.  What is critical to observe, however, is that acts taken against both dissident Russian^[41] and “non-traditional” religious groups^[42] accelerated after the passage of the 1997 legislation.  The international human rights community began to wake up to the reality of Russia’s new law.  For example, the Moscow Helsinki Group sent a letter to the Russian government that expressed “grave concerns” over the erosion of religious liberties in Russia, particularly the attempts to close down the Moscow community Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Islamic Vatan party.^[43] However, both the Yeltsin and Putin administrations have largely ignored protests by the international community on the right to religious freedom.

While non-governmental organizations have taken a key role in the fight for religious liberty, official Western reaction following the passage of the legislation was also largely muted..  The United States, the European Union, the World Council of Churches, and the European Council of Churches made no reference to Yeltsin’s capitulation.  Only in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe did one deputy, a Briton, protested against the discriminatory nature of the law.  He was supported by forty-one deputies from ten countries.  One journalist speculated that “because the economic situation in [Russia] is seen as stabilizing and the climate for investment, as auspicious,” that the West turned a blind-eye to the “On Freedom of Conscience” law.^[44]

Notes

^[21] For a good discussion of the concept of symphonia, see Alexander Schmemann, The Historical Road of Eastern Orthodoxy, trans. Lydia W. Kesich (New York:  Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1963), especially 144-153 and 210-216.

^[22]  For the 1 October 1990 Soviet law, please refer to “O svobode sovesti i religoinznykh organizatsiyakh,” Pravda, 9 October 1990, 4; for the 25 October 1990 Russian Federation law, please refer to “O svobode veroispovedanii,” Sovetskaya Rossiya, 10 November 1990, 5; for the 1929 law, as amended in 1932, please refer to “Law on Religious Association of April 8, 1929” in Aspects of Religion in the Soviet Union, 1917-67, Richard H. Marshall, ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971), 438-45; for the 1975 law, refer to Religious Persecution in the Soviet Union: Hearing Before the Sub-committees on International Political and Military Affairs and on International Organizations of the Committee on International Relations, House of Representatives, Ninety-Fourth Congress, June 24 and 30, 1976 (Washington D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1976).

^[23]  The Russian Orthodox Church’s parishes grew from 3, 451 in 1990 to 7, 195 in January 1996.  Apparat Soveta Federatsii Federal’nogo Sobraniya Rossiiskoi Federatsii, Analiticheskoe Upravlenie, Religionzyne ob’edinneniya Rossiiskoi Federatsii: spravochnik (Moscow: Respublika, 1996), 244-49.

^[24]  Ibid.

^[25]  Sovetskaya Rossiya, 22 September 1997.

^[26]  Russkaya Mysl’ (Paris), 3 July 1997, appendix 1; RFE-RL Newsline, 7 July 1997.

^[27]  Ibid.

^[28]  “Half of Russians Are Against Granting the Russian Orthodox Church Special Status@ in The Current Digest of Post-Soviet Politics.  Vol. XLIV.  No. 32.  (1997): 16.

^[29]  Reuters, 16 July 1997.

^[30]  Alessandra Stanely, “Yeltsin Vetoes Curb on Religions but Could Face an Override Vote,” New York Times, 23 July 1997, A1, A10.

^[31]  RIA Novosti, 23 July 1997.  For the text of the 1993 Russian Constitution, please refer to Vladimir V. Belyakov and Walter J. Raymond, eds., Constitution of the Russian Federation (Lawrenceville, VA: Brunswick Publishing Corporation, 1994).

^[32]  Ibid.

^[33]  Michael R. Gordon, “Irking U.S., Yeltsin Signs Law Protecting Orthodox Church,” New York Times, 27 September 1997, A1, A5.

^[34]  RFE-RL Newsline, 22 September 1997.

^[35]  Segodnya, 20 September 1997.

^[36]  RFE-RL Newsline, 22 September 1997.

^[37]  RFE-RL Newsline, 24 September 1997.

^[38]  Vladimir Ryakhovskii, “Legal Opinion on the New Law on Church-State Relations Enacted by the Russian Duma on 19 September 1997,” Keston Institute, 29 September 1997.  For the text of the law, please refer to “O svobode sovesti i o religionznykh ob’edineniyakh,” Rossiiskaya gazeta, 16 September 1997, 5-6.

^[39]  This article, as Vladimir Ryakovskii has pointed out, is in direct contradiction with Article 54.1 of the Russian constitution.  Ibid.

^[40]  Anatolii Pchelinstev, “Bogu-Bogovo, a Dume,” Novaya gazeta, 50, 15-21 December 1997, 7.

^[41] On 29 September 1997, Russian militia and security forces stormed the embassy (podvor’e) of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Kievan Patriarchate) in Noginsk.  About one hundred worshipers, along with their leader, Archbishop Adrian, were arrested.  The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry protested the incident, but the Russian Foreign Ministry declined to accept the protest (Ukrainian Weekly (Parsippany, NJ), 5 October 1997).  On 29 September 1997 a group of Russian militia with a cleric from the Moscow Patriarchate beat Father Pavel Katunin, rector of a parish affiliated with the “Russian Church Abroad” near the village of Ivnya.  He received medical treatment at the hospital but had to be moved because of death threats.  His wife was arrested and fined 100, 000 rubles (Pravoslavnaya Rus’ (Jordanville, NY), 15/28 December 1997, 12).  Another case was Father Aleksander Zharkov who served in Leningrad Oblast.  He was stabbed to death.  The spokesman for the Church Abroad declared that Father Zharkov had been murdered because he had left the Moscow Patriarchate three months earlier and took his parish with him (Anatolii Pchelinstev, “Bogu-Bogovo, a Dume,” Novaya gazeta, 50, 15-21 December 1997, 7).  In Ryazan, the communist governor, Vyacheslav Lyubimov, played a crucial role in pressuring a parish of the Church Abroad to transfer to the Moscow Patriarchate in November 1997 (RFE-RL Newsline, 7 November 1997).

^[42] Non-Orthodox religious organizations also suffered a similar fate.  In October 1997 a Lutheran parish in Tuim, Siberia had been shut down by the local authorities, even though, as the head of the parish, Reverend Zayakin commented, “Since Lutheranism had existed in Russia from more than 420 years, we didn’t think that the law would be directed against our mission.”  (Boston Globe, 8 October 1997; Lawrence A. Uzzell, “Repressive Religion Law Has Russian Faithful on Edge,” Christian Science Monitor, 22 April 1998)  Furthermore, the Russian Foreign Ministry began to require all foreign clergy must leave the Russian territory every three months in order to obtain a new visa at the Russian embassy abroad.  Roman Catholics and Jews were affected the most, with Moscow’s chief rabbi, Pinchas Goldschmidt, a Swiss citizen, being forced to travel between Moscow and Switzerland every three months.  The spokesman of Moscow’s Choral Synagogue is quoted as saying, “We need him to lead prayers.  We need him to teach.  I’m not even talking about the money required to send him back and forth every three months and do all the paperwork.  On top of that he has a big family – six children.”  (Frank Brown, “Religions Hit by a New Visa Rule,” Moscow Times, 5 August 1998, 1, 2.)  And in September 1998 in Anapa Krai, two Cossacks had forcibly broken up a group of Seventh Day Adventists who giving away bibles at a public park.  The Seventh Day Adventist leader was detained and beaten twenty times by the Cossacks with an iron-tipped whip.  The local Cossack commander, Sergei Serebrov, was quoted as saying, “if Protestants continue to engage in public proselytism, then the Cossacks will whip them.”  (RFE-RL Newsline, 17 September 1998).  On-going incidents are chronicled by Keston News Service, available at http://www.keston.org/hnstitle.htm.

^[43]  Monitor (Jamestown Foundation, Washington D.C.), 24 September 1998.

^[44]  Natalya Babasyan, “Dvoinoi standart?  Reaktsiya mezhdunarodnogo soobshchestva na rossiiskii zakon o svobode sovesti” Russkaya Mysl’, 30 October-5 November 1997, 15-16.