Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev is suspended

Read the full story here.

HT: Blog reader John L.

My thoughts...

This is disturbing. Hilarion has a reputation as a staunch theological conservative. But, and this is extremely important, he is not believed to be a member of Putin's cheerleading squad. It has been hinted that this may have been the reason for his exile to Hungary. Over the last decade+ the ROC has become a de facto department of the government, serving as a religious propaganda agency for the Putin dictatorship. While not directly attacking Putin, that would have been dangerous (and not just politically), Hilarion has been notable for his public reticence on sensitive political subjects. Privately... well there have been a lot of rumors about his views on things like the war in Ukraine (not a supporter), political corruption and so on. And it is fair to note that Hilarion lives quite well. But this is not unusual among the princes of the Russian Church. 

For his part, Putin is an old KGB man. And one of their favorite tactics for dealing with clergy who wouldn't tow the party line from the old days in Soviet occupied Eastern Europe, was to accuse the priest of being homosexual. This was most commonly done with Roman Catholic priests because the Communist Party was never able to establish quite the same level of control over that church as they did over the ROC. Some church historians and biographers have suggested this as one of the reasons why John Paul II was so slow to act on the clergy abuse crisis in the Catholic Church. He had seen the secret police in Poland use that tactic to smear inconvenient members of the clergy on multiple occasions. 

To be clear, I don't have information that I would call coming from a credible source. And it's entirely possible that these allegations could be true. It would be foolish to think that the ROC is immune from clerical sex scandals. But I will make a couple observations. First, the ROC clearly holds a special status of high favor within Russia and enjoys the patronage and protection of the Putin regime, which the church repays with its full throated professions of loyalty. Secondly, nothing of any real consequence at that level of government, or quasi government institutions, happens without the Kremlin's discreet nod. Which is to say that scandals touching on prominent persons or institutions don't become public without the approval of the state. 

Could this be legitimate? Yes. One thing worth noting is that the principle accuser is not living in Russia. But it also has all the hallmarks of an old fashioned KGB character assassination plot. For now, I would adopt a wait and see approach while keeping in mind who really controls things in Russia, and by extension, its branch of the Orthodox Church.

Update: I got an email from a blog reader who points out, correctly, that the two scenarios discussed above are not mutually exclusive. The accusations could be true and the Russian government simply views this as an opportunity to be rid of a troublesome cleric.