By Fr. Alexey Uminsky
About the author: The Moscow Patriarchate has imposed a ban on the ministry of Fr. Alexey Uminsky, who is no longer the head of the Church of the Holy Trinity on Khokhlovska Street in the Russian capital. This was reported by the Russian opposition media “Radio Liberty” and the TV channel “Dozhd”, referring to the journalist Ksenia Luchenko and parishioners of the church where Fr. Alexey. According to information from the same media, instead of Fr. Uminsky, the Holy Trinity Church has appointed the scandalous priest Andrey Tkachev, known for his support for Russia’s war against Ukraine and his advice on violence against women, as the rector.
I have a feeling that the level of aggression is not decreasing. Aggression is wave-like. It does not need occasions, objects are always sought and always found for it. Aggression in society always overflows, is redirected from one channel to another. An object of some kind of hatred arises, so we must direct the aggression in this direction.
When the level of aggression reaches such a heightened level, then it is already poured out on specific people. Then people begin to simply destroy each other – in the most brutal, most inhuman way. Then it goes away. Aggression is always present in our society, and it is incurable. No one is concerned with curing society of aggression.
Aggressive society is very comfortable, easily controlled from above. You just have to find an object for the aggression. On a state scale, aggression can be a very “useful” thing. It infects people, mobs them, deprives them of their individual consciousness and turns them into a collective unconscious.
And this way of thinking the person then brings with him to the Church. It is very comfortable to live with. Not long ago, I read one of the letters of the apostle Paul, in which there were such words: “I declare to you, brothers, that the gospel that I preached is not human, because I neither received it nor learned it from a man, but by revelation Jesus Christ” (Gal. 1:11-12). Very important words about what we Christians are dealing with, that there is nothing there that was invented by man.
By itself, the Gospel is a very uncomfortable book that does not allow a person to live in those paradigms in which only aggression can exist: “own-stranger”, “friend-enemy”, “near-far”. If it was a human book, like many of the religious human books, then the enemy would be indicated. “His-foreigner” would definitely be clearly described. It would be clearly stated who is “own” and who is “foreign”, and what are the parameters of “own”, who should be helped, who should be served, with whom should be shared, and who is the one not to be shared with, who we can lie to, who it is necessary to destroy.
So the Gospel is such a book that does not give man human ways to feed his aggression and multiply it. However, people often come to the Church who are not transformed or who live with ideologues, with ideologies instead of a living faith. Ideology is always a human thing, and the Christian faith is not human. It is a gift of God, a gift from the unattainable God who became Man. And it is very uncomfortable to deal with such a non-human religion, and that is why the desire to replace the Christian faith, to replace the Gospel with some ideology, constantly appears.
Wherever ideology appears, even under the sign of Christianity, under the sign of Orthodoxy, whatever, there immediately appear the enemies – of this ideology, of this faith, of the Church.
And there are too many enemies – you don’t need to look for them, they will be found immediately. And then this aggression, which could be healed by the mercy of Christ, by the love of Christ, including by our repentance, our change, cannot be like poison squeezed out of man. Quite the opposite – suddenly this aggression acquires its good meaning, becomes a good, acquires power because it can be used against the common enemy. Then it doesn’t go anywhere, it just gets another name.
They were not the class enemies, they were not the enemies of the people – the enemies immediately appear in the Church, her enemies: those who are foreign, who are not your own, who you can always separate. Someone is a fundamentalist for you, and you are a liberal for them. And at that moment, people suddenly begin to feel so much “love” for each other, so ready to utter nasty, vile curses and insulting names, forgetting that they partake of the same Cup.
The question even arises among them: “Can we partake of a Chacha with such people?” Can any people, if we don’t like them, be Christians at all?”.
So this aggression can perfectly exist in the Church as well. Then it flows into an aggressive and malicious declaration of one’s own faith, which is done with an almost benign goal – the protection of our sanctuaries.
We saw how last year all this terrible, sinful aggression suddenly began to be understood by some people as a way of defending the faith, as Christian behavior.
I remind you that the Gospel bequeathed to us is not a human gospel, there are no ideologies there. Therefore, aggression has no place in the Gospel, and therefore only the Christian is able to heal this aggression in society, who can love his enemy, so that he does not respond to a blow with a blow, but hate with hate. We have this opportunity.
We could give this world an example of how aggression heals, but alas, we haven’t yet.
Source: Archpriest Alexy Uminsky, Oksana Golovko, Archpriest Alexy Uminsky – about aggression in the Church (And why the Gospel does not divide the world into “us” and “strangers”), April 14, 2021. Read on Pravmir: https://www.pravmir.ru /agressiya-i-xristianstvo-kak-my-sovmeshhaem-nesovmestimoe-video-1/ : “Anger, rudeness – towards acquaintances and complete strangers – it seems that this has almost become the norm of communication on social networks. Has the level of aggression in society increased? Or, on the contrary, does it spill out onto the Internet, leaving real life? What is happening to us, why are we dividing everyone into camps, groups of “us” and “strangers,” reflects Archpriest Alexy Uminsky. “Pravmir” again publishes a video recording made in 2013.”
Note: So far, there is no official announcement from the ROC about the removal of Prot. Alexei Uminsky and his imposed ban. Father Alexey has been the chairman of the Holy Trinity Church for more than thirty years. The repression against him began last year, when he gave an interview in which he did not hide his anti-war views. He is a well-known publicist, the author of a large number of articles on various topics: from pastoral ministry to Christian pedagogy to commentaries on current events. He is known for his active civil position on a number of important public issues, defends those persecuted for political reasons, criticizes the authorities for violating the rights of citizens.
In his address at a parish meeting at the end of December, Fr. Alexey touches on the issue of Christian peacemaking, which is “unbearable to hear in a world where people tear their hearts out in search of justice and which is always achieved through the violence of some over others. Only violence must defeat other violence, otherwise it is not fair. To be a Christian is to make up your mind. No one can force a person to become a Christian. However, if we have once decided on this, then let us do it properly. Even if it doesn’t work out completely… Otherwise, we will have to subdivide the Gospel, make it a convenient book for us and say that we are Orthodox, without adding – Christians. Let us first of all be Christians, and then we will necessarily be Orthodox. And if for us the external ideological form is more important than the gospel words – then something is wrong here”.
Social media cites another announcement by journalist Ksenia Luchenko that another well-known Moscow priest, Vladimir Lapshin, has also been removed from the position of chairman of the Assumption Church in Moscow, which happened at the end of December. Vladimir is known as one of the last students of Fr. Alexander Men. This change in the leadership of this temple was not officially announced on the website of the Moscow Patriarchate.
These actions of patriarch Cyril are a sign that the repression against the opponents of the war among the priests is deepening and affecting iconic clerics known not only in Moscow, but throughout Russia and abroad. The replacement of Fr. Alexey Uminsky with Andrey Tkachev is a clear demonstration of the line that supports the leadership of the Moscow Patriarchate – to impose an aggressive and violent Christianity, incompatible with the image of Christ, but fitting the state policy of Putin’s Russia.
