Lessons in Cynicism

Just before Easter, in the midst of Holy Week and preparations for the holiday, a rather important and eloquent event somehow quietly and imperceptibly happened: at a meeting of the Commission on Religious Associations under the Government of the Russian Federation, religious schools were denied state accreditation, that is, the recognition of religious diplomas schools by the state. Not that it was categorically refused, but it was decided to discuss the issue “later.” What this means is not very clear, since the Ministry of Education does not comment. Meanwhile, the problem has already been discussed many times, most recently at a meeting of the same commission in December 2004, then the Ministry of Education also opposed it, although the majority was in favor of granting accreditation. Ministry representative Larisa Efremova noted at that time that the law prohibits government agencies from issuing accreditation to church educational institutions. However, it would be strange to think that this fact remained a secret for the interested party and other participants in the discussion. The issue of providing state accreditation to theological schools has a long history.

The Russian Orthodox Church started thinking about the reform of religious schools back in the mid-90s, when it became clear that there was a catastrophic shortage of priests, and the education system, which had been in a rut for 70 years of Soviet power, did not meet the new needs at all. It was decided to increase the level of education, introduce missing subjects - for example, the basics of missionary activity, which for obvious reasons were excluded from programs in atheistic times, and in addition to unify the educational system, which was quite chaotic and heterogeneous. Schools - the secondary preparatory level - should be made three-year, seminaries turned into five-year higher educational institutions, and academies (three years) given the status of scientific and educational institutions, creating dissertation councils for the defense of candidate and doctoral works. They decided to extend their studies in seminaries to five years precisely with plans for state accreditation - so that it would be like in universities (before that, they studied in seminaries for 4 years).

The Church is concerned about the powerless situation of graduates of theological schools (Muslims fully share this concern, since they are in the same situation). Religious education is not considered complete in society. At one time, the Soviet state strictly ensured that the theological school remained in a kind of ghetto. And to this day, even if you are a doctor of theology, without a state-issued diploma you do not have the legal right to teach in a secular school of any level; you will not be hired anywhere that requires higher education. A graduate of a seminary or academy cannot enter secular graduate school if he suddenly wants to continue his studies. An icon painter cannot go to work as a restorer in a museum. It turns out that people with a church education in Russia still live in the position of “disenfranchised”.

The former leadership of the Ministry of Education looked favorably on the reform initiated by the Church. It was then that a scheme was invented - approved, by the way, by the Ministry of Justice - to introduce into the program of seminaries and academies subjects of a general humanitarian profile (such as literature, sociology, political science, as well as the indispensable physical education and life safety), so to speak, a secular component, and “under him" to obtain state accreditation. Although this is probably the most labor-intensive of all possible paths: seminarians have to study in almost two specialties. It would be possible to solve the problem much simpler, namely, to recognize spiritual education as equivalent to state education, as is done in many European countries, for example, Italy, where the Church is now also separated from the state. But the church authorities apparently did not hope for such “generosity.”

Be that as it may, the reform started in 1997 and is progressing at the very least. Some seminaries - for example, Tobolsk, Smolensk, Zhirovitsk (in Minsk) - have already switched to five-year education and, according to members of the inspection commission of the Educational Committee of the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church, are fully consistent with the status of universities. A lot of effort and money have been spent on all this work over the past eight years. And now the Ministry of Education and Science, where the leadership was changed a year ago, has backed down: the legislation, they say, does not allow, and some other nonsense about the fact that a diploma from a religious educational institution cannot be stamped with state symbols, that is, the coat of arms (from the response of Deputy Minister A.G. Svinarenko to the Government of the Russian Federation).

In fact, the reason for ministerial “stubbornness” is much simpler. For almost the same eight years that the Church has been reforming its educational institutions, it has been fighting for the introduction of the subject “Fundamentals of Orthodox Culture” into secondary schools. All conditions for elective education have already been created, but the church leadership is not satisfied with “optionality” - he would like a full-fledged compulsory subject, otherwise why periodically demand the introduction of the defense education system into state general educational standards. A seminarian with a state diploma is an important trump card in this game. “Let’s imagine that... our graduates receive state diplomas, and, accordingly, theological schools begin to prepare students for teaching in the secular educational system... It is now difficult to even assess the opportunities that open up for the church mission in such a situation,” said one from the meetings of the Educational Committee, its head, Archbishop Eugene of Vereya. That is, church leaders are going to use state accreditation for preaching. Which, firstly, is dishonest on their part, because they assure everyone of the opposite and never tire of repeating that the defense industry is a cultural subject, not a cultural one. not doctrinal. Secondly, it is extremely inconsistent, because they themselves love to talk about how much harm the compulsory teaching of the Law of God in Tsarist Russia brought to the cause of the Church. And thirdly, it is even somehow indecent: they could treat it with more respect. the laws of the state in which they live, as well as their fellow citizens - representatives of other faiths.

But the ministry is not behaving any better. Is it really so difficult to protect the school from the “clerical element” and at the same time solve the problem of the legitimacy of religious education? If the military-industrial complex remains a strictly voluntary and optional subject, and the subject “History of Religions” is introduced into the main course, as the Ministry of Education and Science seems to be planning now, isn’t this alone a kind of barrier against the “threat of clericalism”? Or is the government completely powerless and afraid of everything? Or do we no longer pretend to build a democratic state and are quite ready to put up with the fact that some of our citizens are openly deprived of their rights? I admit that the last thing I want is to suspect the head of the educational department, Andrei Fursenko, of such sentiments. One of the last ministers appointed to his post, he, unlike most of the current “statists” and “statists” in power, allows himself to talk from time to time about the “priority of individual rights.” But why is a believer who wishes to receive spiritual education deprived of such an elementary right as the opportunity to find use for his powers in society? After all, no one forces, say, graduates of the philology department at gunpoint to become philologists. But in the current situation, a seminary graduate is simply obliged to become a priest (or go into the scientific field and continue his studies at the academy) - all other paths are closed to him.

This is if we take the legal aspect. But there is also a human one. Almost ten years were spent on reforms, on wooing opponents of reforms within the Church (and there were many of them who feared the “erosion of tradition”), on searching for all these teachers of sociology and political science, on finding salary money - this despite the fact that some dioceses are not at all rich and maintain their seminaries with all their might (from the general church budget funds are allocated only for central theological educational institutions). So what, now everything is down the drain? It is more or less pointless for the Church to drag this cart without hope of state accreditation: it, of course, can be proud that education has become of better quality, but in general it can easily do without priests versed in political science.

In a sense, the Church is being treated like Khodorkovsky. He worked under the conditions proposed by the state, but as soon as the authorities felt that he posed a threat to them, to the authorities, he immediately turned out to be completely to blame. Aiming at reform, the church leadership also worked on conditions, if not proposed by the state, then, in any case, agreed upon with it, but as soon as the state saw a threat to itself in its actions, it immediately changed the rules of the game.

Naturally, the patriarchate can hardly be happy with this turn of events. However, the issue is not closed, and while hope for a favorable resolution remains, church leaders will certainly use all the resources they have in stock to achieve success: both secret and obvious. Last week, for example, Metropolitan Kirill convened a meeting in the Department for External Church Relations, where he gave the go-ahead to begin work on a new conceptual document, which is intended to reflect “not a purely church, but a religious and social view of the rights and dignity of the human person.” And quite original way: “the document should answer the question of whether there are values ​​that are higher than human rights and freedoms.” The decision to create such a concept was made at the World Russian People’s Council back in March as a result of what had been going on for almost a year (since last summer, when). The president, in his message to the Federal Assembly, spoke impartially about some human rights organizations) attacks by church leaders on secular human rights activists. But what is more important here is not the decision itself, but the comments about Metropolitan Kirill’s document: “It should be acceptable not only for Orthodox believers, but also for representatives. other traditional religions of Russia, as well as people who do not directly associate themselves with any religious tradition, but are thinking people who are not inclined to mindlessly follow the ideology dominant in modern political circles and the media,” the bishop said, speaking at a working meeting.

Of course, perhaps the Bishop simply did not formulate his thought very well and did not at all want to stigmatize “all politicians.” However, usually Metropolitan Kirill does an excellent job with formulations, and in this obvious demarcation “with politicians” one can see a slight opposition or even a hint of a threat: they say, we are always ready to help the state and explain to everyone who has not yet understood that all these human rights are before the value of the state is nothing, but if the state is not ready to help us... then we will still think about whether it is worth supporting its “politicians”. Alas, a cynical state fosters cynicism in all its citizens.