World Watch - Catholic World Report

In Moscow’s Shadow

A Turn for the Worse?
The Russian Orthodox hierarchy sees the papal visit as the latest in a series of unwelcome challenges to Moscow’s jurisdiction.

No Room in Sevastopol
Catholics—of both Latin and Ukrainian rites—have been frustrated in their efforts to recover old parish churches or build new ones.

Investigating “Catholic expansion”

Vladimir Zhirinovsky, the nationalist leader who is vice-speaker of the Russian Duma, or parliament, has embarked on a campaign to investigate Catholic activity in Russian territory in general, and the Roman Pope’s visit to Ukraine in particular.

The RIA Novosti agency reported that the Duma, responding to pressure by Zhirinovsky, has charged a Committee on International Affairs to seek information about measures being taken to prevent the expansion of Catholicism in the territory of Russia and other Orthodox states, to sound out Moscow’s reaction to Pope John Paul II’s planned visit to Kiev, and to discover the purposes of the February visit by Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Kasjanov to Pope John Paul II.

Zhirinovsky also obtained formal authorization for the Duma’s Committee of Culture and Tourism to request information from the Ministry of Culture of Russia about measures being taken to return the icon of Kazan Mother of God—which is now located in the Vatican—to its native city.

Catholic priests in Russia say Zhirinovsky’s instructions are not surprising. Although some suspect that he is concerned with his own political reputation, his actions are in keeping with a state doctrine which sees nationalism and the Orthodox religion as the glue that holds together a disintegrating society.
In February, Zhirinovsky met the chairman of the Department of External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate, Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kalingrad. They discussed a wide range of questions, including the Pope’s visit to Ukraine and the divisions within the Orthodox community in that country.

Zhirinovsky suggested the organization of a unique “agitation train” which would travel through Ukraine, explaining to the Orthodox faithful the errors of the “schismatic” Orthodox groups, and stressing the importance of fidelity to the canonical hierarchy of the Moscow Patriarchate.

—Fides News Agency

Underground Churches?
Within European Russia, Eastern-rite Catholics are searching
for recognition.

When the Ukrainian-rite Catholic community in Moscow attempted to register a parish (as reported in CWR, “World Watch,” March 2001), they were told by government officials that their application required the supporting signature of Archbishop Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz, the Roman Catholic apostolic administrator for European Russia. “He refused to sign,” the Ukrainian Catholic Bishop Gbur reported, “saying it would be viewed as proselytism by the Moscow Patriarchate, and the consequences would be bad for the Catholic Church.”

Father Sergi Golovanov, who maintains an Internet site for Ukrainian Catholics, is unsure of the number of Byzantine Catholic communities in European Russia, but knows of the presence of such groups in Vladimir, Tula, Moscow, Perm, Samara, and St. Petersburg. But none of these groups has official recognition as a parish. Father Andrei Udovenko—the only Ukrainian Catholic priest in European Russia—said that the Moscow community, with approximately 40 members (most of them ethnic Russians), meets for worship in the chapel of Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity on the eastern edge of the capital city. In Father Udovenko’s view, this situation gave Moscow’s Byzantine Catholics “enough” freedom, since “all we need to do is gather together.”

Father Udovenko says the Moscow community is content to be “invisible and quiet.” If the Ukrainian-rite community obtained its own church building, he said, “the priest would not be free, nonbelievers would come and try to get baptized, there would be financial issues to deal with.” He estimated, however, that if there were a Byzantine Catholic church building, it could support a parish of several thousand people. If the community is never able to obtain such a church, he added, “There are no prospects for us; it will all end with my death.”

Although Father Udovenko reported that seasonal workers from Ukraine formed a significant part of the Byzantine Catholic presence in Moscow, he thought the Ukrainian parishes in Siberia were openly tolerated since they were “ethnic Ukrainian” communities. Father Igor Kovalevsky, of the Latin-rite apostolic administration of Moscow, made the same link. “There are of course Byzantine Catholics in Russia because there are a lot of Galicians [west Ukrainians] here, especially in Siberia,” he noted.

Father Golovanov, however, denied that this was an accurate explanation for the difference in treatment of Ukrainian Catholics between Siberia (where Ukrainian parishes are registered and supported by the Catholic bishop) and European Russia. The real difference, he maintained, was not the number of Ukrainian Byzantine Catholics, but the attitude within the apostolic administrations. “Bishop Josef Werth [of western Siberia] takes responsibility upon himself and is of truly catholic views, whereas in Europe they are trying to keep on the right side of the Moscow Patriarchate,” he charged.

In Siberia, the priest continued, it was the policy of Church officials to register a Byzantine Catholic parish under the apostolic administration if it had a priest. Under that policy there are now four registered Ukrainian Catholic parishes, with a total of approximately 400 parishioners, in Novokuznetsk, Prokopiyevsk, Omsk, and Sargatskoye. Father Golovanov said that his own Omsk parish even had its own church building—a former mosque, bought with funds from the German Catholic foundation Renovabis.

Igor Vyzhanov, spokesman for Orthodox-Catholic relations at the Moscow Patriarchate, told Keston that the Russian Orthodox Church would naturally view an open Byzantine Catholic presence in Russia negatively, “but it isn’t very strong right now, thank God.” If 100 Byzantine Catholics said they needed a church and a priest, the Moscow Patriarchate would not complain, he said: “We can’t stop them; it is for the state to decide.” If the Ukrainian community decided to build the church before assembling 100 believers and gaining legal registration, however, that would constitute proselytism, Vyzhanov maintained.

Father Udovenko told Keston his community was not encountering concrete obstruction from the Moscow Patriarchate “as yet.” Father Golovanov added that the Orthodox around Omsk had tried to warn people about “Uniates” five years ago, “but they stopped when it became clear they were merely advertising our presence.”

Father Golovanov added, nonetheless, that the current situation causes some people who wish to form Eastern-rite Catholic parishes to turn away disillusioned. He reported:

Ukrainian Catholics are not the only Eastern-rite believers whose existence in Russia is a delicate issue for the Catholic Church. Sister Nune, who is a member of Georgia’s Armenian minority, disclosed that the worsening economic situation in Armenia has resulted in the formation of a community of Catholics of the Armenian rite in the Russian capital. This community is neither listed in the official 2000 directory of the Catholic Church in Russia nor advertised at the church where it meets.

Since spring 2000, Sister Nune reported, the community has met within the Roman Catholic Church of St. Louis every Sunday for half an hour of prayer and song in the tradition of the Armenian rite. There is no facility for the full liturgy in the Armenian rite (which is the same as in the Armenian Apostolic Church, except for the addition of a prayer for the Pope). Sister Nune explained that this would require a different altar arrangement, curtains, and other adjustments—as well as a priest. As a result the Armenian Catholics celebrate the sacraments with their Latin-rite Catholics neighbors. “They normally make their confessions in Armenian,” she said; “the priests are very patient.”

As with the Byzantine Catholics, the Armenians are subordinate to the Latin-rite administration and are not registered as a parish. At the moment, said Sister Nune, “We are not talking about a parish; it is forming very slowly. Everyone is happy with the current situation —that they have been given the opportunity to pray for half an hour.”

This situation contrasts sharply with that of the Armenian Apostolic Church in Moscow. Two of three pre-revolutionary buildings belonging to the Armenian Apostolic Church in Moscow were destroyed under the Soviet regime; the third is a chapel within the Armenian cemetery. Last summer, billboards in Moscow’s metro carried public appeals for the construction of a second church. The appeal carried a message from Patriarch Aleksei of the Russian Orthodox Church expressing the hope “that the Armenian diaspora will soon receive the opportunity to erect a new church in Moscow.” The church, on which construction has already begun, is to have room for 1,000 worshippers.

Igor Vyzhanov appeared surprised to learn of the existence of Armenian Catholics in Russia. Asked how the Moscow Patriarchate would react if the Armenian Catholics sought to build a church in Moscow, he replied that it would depend “whether there would be mission or if it were in response to real pastoral need.” Then why, asked Keston, had the construction of a large Armenian Apostolic church been unequivocally welcomed? Vyzhanov replied, “Because the Apostolic Church doesn’t say that the Pope has jurisdiction over the whole world.”