Daily Journal:

Drawing up a set of eternal values, a code of ethical rules for migrants, an all-Russian dress code - all this is increasingly reminiscent of a fantastic project. On the one hand, this is Manilovism - “how nice it would be if migrants behaved decently, and girls wore long skirts.” On the other hand, church initiatives are proposed to be introduced with the help of the authorities, at the state level, in the form of laws and regulations, or through education through schools from grades 1 to 11 (the army and universities will catch up on their own). And then secular and church officials, without even noticing it themselves, become living characters from the city of Foolov and from the Bulgakov house of Professor Preobrazhensky. They sing songs about a new person and a better life, while around them there is devastation and galoshes disappear.

Obviously, and both Patriarch Kirill and Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin speak about this, that you need to start with yourself, pay attention to how responsible a citizen you are. Because the devastation is not on the street, but in our heads. The only question is - in whose minds...

Evidence of the Church fulfilling its social tasks is nurses in hospitals, well-groomed lonely old people, a rehabilitated drug addict, a fed homeless person, a sane member of an Orthodox parish who does not attack others.

In reality, everything turns out differently. Representatives of the Church, for example, while developing partially acceptable recommendations for establishing interethnic and interreligious relations, gather around themselves small Orthodox public organizations, which the Russian Orthodox Church itself has never really supported, as well as associations of fans and nationalist-minded groups. Despite the mass of official events, meetings and speeches by Patriarch Kirill that are important for society, there is no wide public field around the Church. The sermons and meetings of Patriarch Kirill themselves have already done a lot to overcome this alienation, but one person is not enough. The Synodal Department for Relations between the Church and Society, headed by Father Vsevolod Chaplin, gathers around itself those who can and, hopefully, will expand the circle of participants in this dialogue.

But, for example, the Information Department of the Patriarchate, headed by Vladimir Legoyda, purposefully scares away society, citizens and the intelligentsia from a broad discussion of church and public problems, creating a much more aggressive image of the patriarchy than the one that actually exists.

In the current situation, it is difficult to seriously discuss values ​​that are not even within the church fence. All that remains is to propose a new initiative - to introduce the Day of Solidarity, the Day of Conciliarity, the Day of Self-Sacrifice and Self-Denial of the Russian People, declare all these days as church and state holidays, maybe even weekends, and celebrate them widely, expecting that the next morning we will wake up - and the values ​​are right there.