The Patriarchates of Constantinople and Moscow in a global age: acomparison

Abstract

This overview article will attempt a comparison between the Patriarchates of Constantinople and Moscow in terms of the way they have articulated their strategy and agenda on a national and international level since the collapse of the Communist Bloc in 1989/1991. New and comparatively young Patriarchs came to office at the beginning of the 1990s. This paper focuses on the way each of them has tried to cope with recent changes in global politics, such as the changing role of religious institutions in the modern world and the consequences of the collapse of ideological bipolarity. The new circumstances under which both Patriarchates function have engendered numerous problems and conflicts between the two Patriarchates and between them and other religious institutions, as well as within the jurisdictions of each Patriarchate. As a second step, we will attempt to identify the changing policies of the last two decades, assess their consequences, and sketch out possible scenarios for the future. This will also take into consideration the election of the new Patriarch of Moscow in January 2009.

Keywords:

• Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople
• Patriarchate of Moscow
• Bartholomew I
• Alexei II
• Kirill I
• ecumenism
• inter-Orthodox relations
• modernity
• globalisation

Notes

¹Meyendorff, The Orthodox Church, 132.

²Pospielovsky, The Orthodox Church, 285–9.

³Ibid., 313–29.

⁴Ellis, Triumphalism and Defensiveness, 1–10.

⁵An autocephalous church has full independence, including the right to choose its leader, while an autonomous church is dependent on the mother church for this choice.

⁶See especially Schmemann, Historical Road, 277–81.

⁷Allen, ‘The New New Rome’; Silber, ‘Patriarch Bartholomew’.

⁸Ohme, Das Ökumenische Patriarchat, 10–11.

⁹Ibid., 18–19.

¹⁰Allen, ‘The New New Rome'.

¹¹For more on the revival of Islam in Turkey see, for example, Vertigans, Islamic Roots and Resurgence in Turkey.

¹²For the interview see: http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=6001717n.

¹³Ibid.

¹⁴Voulgarakis et al., ‘Bartholomaios I’, xiv.

¹⁵Keleher, ‘Orthodox Rivalry’, 135.

¹⁶Voulgarakis et al., ‘Bartholomaios I’, xxii.

¹⁷More recently the Patriarchate of Moscow has ceased openly to promote this idea.

¹⁸The involvement of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in various ecclesiastical organisations such as the WCC or the ECCC is an issue we cannot address here, as space is limited. See the special issue of Ecumenical Review 51, no. 4 (1999).

¹⁹Silber, ‘Patriarch Bartholomew’.

²⁰On the 'dialogue of loving truth' see, e.g., ‘Lecture of Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew at the Islamic College in Libya: The Necessity of Inter-Religious Dialogue – The Relationships between Christianity and Islam’, given on September 11, 2003. Full text: http://www.patriarchate.org/documents/christianity-and-islam.

²¹The topic of war and peace is one of the main concerns of the Ecumenical Patriarch. He also addressed this issue in a recent book (see Bartholomew I, Encountering the Mystery, 206–29).

²²Bartholomew I, Encountering the Mystery, 89–119.

²³See the official website of this prize under http://www.sophieprize.org/Articles/175.html for the jury's reasons.

²⁴Allen, ‘The New New Rome'.

²⁵The address in its entirety can be found on most Orthodox news-sites, e.g. http://www.antiochian.org/node/18378.

²⁶See the recent (March 2010) criticism of Turkey by the Council of Europe regarding the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople. Document available from: http://www.venice. coe.int/docs/2010/CDL-AD%282010%29005-e.asp.

²⁷Couretas, ‘A Patriarch in Dire Straits’.

²⁸For the full interview see: http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=6001717n.

²⁹Media advertisements criticising Turkish policy have appeared in some places, and various religious organisations have expressed their support for the Ecumenical Patriarch.

³⁰ http://en.sae.gr/?id=18468&o=3&tag=Bartholomew%E2%80%99s%20Appeal%20Shocks% 20Public%20Opinion.

³¹Ellis, Triumphalism and Defensiveness.

³²Ibid., 52–4.

³³Ibid., 88–9.

³⁴Knox, Russian Society, 92–3; Corley, ‘The Patriarch and the KGB'.

³⁵Behrens, Die Russische Orthodoxe Kirche, 81–2.

³⁶Ibid., 86.

³⁷Ibid., 95.

³⁸Ibid., 110.

³⁹Ibid., 177–8.

⁴⁰Mitrokhin, Russkaya pravoslavnaya tserkov, 235.

⁴¹Behrens, Die Russische Orthodoxe Kirche, 188–9.

⁴²Knox, Russian Society, 111–15. The full text of this document is available from the website http://www.mospat.ru/archive/sd00r.htm in Russian and German and http://orthodoxeurope.org/page/3/14.aspx in English.

⁴³See article III.8 of the document.

⁴⁴Knox, Russian Society, 115.

⁴⁵Richters, ‘The Russian Orthodox Church's Relations', 86.

⁴⁶Behrens, Die Russische Orthodoxe Kirche, 281–307.

⁴⁷Mulders, ‘The Debate on Religion’, 15; Mitrokhin, Russkaya pravoslavnaya tserkov, 360.

⁴⁸Mulders, ‘The Debate on Religion', 17.

⁴⁹See Papkova, ‘Contentious Conversation’ for an excellent overview of this debate.

⁵⁰Richters, ‘The Russian Orthodox Church's Relations', 124.

⁵¹Ibid., 133.

⁵²Ibid., 148.

⁵³Ibid., 153. Richters is here citing the Russian analyst Sergey Mozgovoy.

⁵⁴Verkhovskii, Mikhailovskaya, and Pribylovskii, Politicheskaya ksenofobiya, 108–9.

⁵⁵Behrens, Die Russische Orthodoxe Kirche, 200–9. See also the official website of the forum at: http://www.vrns.ru.

⁵⁶Available in English from: http://www.sras.org/news2.phtml?m=608.

⁵⁷See Agadjanian, Russian Orthodox Vision, for an excellent analysis of the Russian Orthodox Human Rights discourse.

⁵⁸Behrens, Die Russische Orthodoxe Kirche, 137–55; Knox, Russian Society, 159–60.

⁵⁹Behrens, Die Russische Orthodoxe Kirche, 151.

⁶⁰Richters, ‘The Russian Orthodox Church's Relations', chapters 5 and 6, analyses the situation in Ukraine and Estonia in amazing detail. The Moldavian case is analysed in Popescu, ‘L'Église moldave’.

⁶¹Richters, ‘The Russian Orthodox Church's Relations', 165–6.

⁶²Ibid., 248.

⁶³See Buciora, ‘Canonical Territory’. This is a detailed, yet at times polemic analysis of the use of the concept.

⁶⁴Keleher, ‘Orthodox Rivalry’.

⁶⁵AFP, ‘Outspoken Kirill’.

⁶⁶Simakov, ‘V poiskakh’.

⁶⁷Sysoev, ‘Duxovnaya diplomatika’; Zolotov, ‘Bartholomew, Kirill’. Patriarch Bartholomew made a historical ten-day return visit to Moscow in May 2010. Unfortunately, we were no longer able to include an analysis of this visit in the article.

⁶⁸da Polis, ‘Kyrill in Constantinople’.

⁶⁹da Polis, ‘Bartholomew I in Kiev’.

⁷⁰Zolotov, ‘Poslanie vsemu miru’.

⁷¹Yekikan, ‘The Halki Seminary'.

⁷²‘Bases of the Social Conception of the Russian Orthodox Church’ (2000) and ‘Bases of the Russian Orthodox Teaching on Dignity, Freedom and Human Rights’ (2008).

⁷³Alfeyev, Orthodox Witness Today, 199.

⁷⁴The last sign of this dispute was the visits of both Patriarchs to Ukraine in 2008, as mentioned earlier.

⁷⁵The final decision is available from http://www.goarch.org/archdiocese/documents/chambesy/decision.