Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, known for over a century now by his Bolshevik nom-de-guerre, Lenin, was one of history’s greatest mass murderers. In the course of his ruthless efforts to impose communism on Russia and its neighbors through brutal force, terror, and extra-judicial homicides in the millions, he became one of the greatest persecutors of the Christian Church in two millennia. Lenin’s minions killed more Christians in a slow week than the last of the great Roman persecutors, Diocletian, did in years. All this is thoroughly documented—to the point where Russian Orthodoxy considers many of Lenin’s victims as martyrs and saints and celebrates their feasts in its liturgical calendar.Read the rest here.
And yet today’s Russian Orthodox leadership cannot bring itself to say that this monster’s mummified corpse should cease, immediately, being an object of curiosity or veneration?
HT: T-19
George has something of a track record when the topic is the Orthodox Church. File this under "there he goes again." See my response at the T-19 post linked above.
6 comments:
I see a link to First Things, but not to T-19.
As a Catholic keenly observing Orthodox matters, I have the following observation:
The Moscow Patriarchate doesn't seem to have any real concept of public relations outside of Russia, and even in the "Near Abroad". The Moscow Patriarchate and its eparchies have very many websites but very little of the material on these websites are ever translated into Western languages, including materials that would go far to dispel many of the misconceptions about it. I guess this is because it doesn't seem to care about how it is perceived abroad. This is a mistake; if the Russian Church really wants its "strategic alliance" with Rome to become a reality it cannot allow Catholics to become alienated from it. One old stereotype about the Russians is that they are ham-fisted idiots, and given the way they're behaving, the Russians have no one to blame but themselves if this is how they continue to be perceived.
The only reason I'm aware that there is much more to the story of the Russian Church than what one usually finds on Western media is because I liberally use Google Translate on Russian Orthodox websites.
Judge,
Thank you. I have corrected the problem.
Pascal,
I think that you make a very good point. The Russian Church really does need a better PR and media-press relations department. I am routinely frustrated by important documents or articles that are rarely translated out of Russian. As the by far largest of the Orthodox Churches the Russians really should be taking more of a lead on things like this.
In ICXC
John
When I was in Russia, I had the opportunity to dine with one of the then cabinet ministers (then meaning in Yeltsin's overnment, a few years after the fall of communism in Russia. This minister told me, regarding that corpse of Lenin on display in the Kremlin, "Of course it is only wax. Nobody knows what became of the actual body."
Whether Lenin's carcass should be on display is quite a different question than when it should be moved or when the Church should embarrass the State into moving it. In Weigel's fantasy world of pure abstraction, the inappropriate display should be immediately remedied.
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