The leadership of the State Archives of the Arkhangelsk Region and the local diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church are concerned about the interest of Mormons in archival funds

The State Archives of the Arkhangelsk Region intends to turn to the head of the regional administration Nikolai Kiselev and Bishop Tikhon of Arkhangelsk and Kholmogory for support in resisting the attempts of representatives of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) to conclude an agreement on copying parish registers (this information is subsequently used by Mormons when performing the rite of initiation of the dead people to become members of their church). reports with reference to the press service of the Arkhangelsk diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church As the local news agency Dvina-Inform , “today, eight regional and republican archives have already sold their information to the Genealogical Society of the State of Utah: the Republic of Karelia, Astrakhan, Nizhny Novgorod , Samara, Tver, Tula, Tyumen region". Arkhangelsk archivists are categorically against the agreement with the Mormons.

According to the director of the Arkhangelsk regional archive Nikolai Shumilov, representatives of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints made a similar offer back in 1996. Then they were refused for technical reasons: "... they didn’t dare to embroider documents - this was required by technology for microfilming, they were afraid destroy valuable documents.

“Now the motives for our disagreement are different,” continues N. Shumilov. “We don’t want the Mormons to rebaptize our ancestors, because they are all Orthodox people! We have the metrics of our St. John of Kronstadt in our archive! I consider it blasphemy to give away church documents. In addition, this is the loss of gigantic expensive information. This is a direct damage to the national security of Russia. Although the agreement stipulates that the information will not be used for commercial purposes, and without permission, but this is not so! As the director of the archive, I have no way to control , especially in electronic form, on the Internet, the use of these materials in Utah in the U.S. Even less likely to do so after the end of the agreement!"

On January 26, on the server of the Arkhangelsk and Kholmogory diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church, an appeal was published by the head of the diocese, Bishop Tikhon, to the regional governor N.I. Kiselev, which is a reaction to the mentioned letter from the archivists. The Bishop asks "to prevent a blasphemous action - official cooperation between the State Archives of the Arkhangelsk Region and the Genealogical Society of Utah (USA), which defends the interests of the destructive sect of Mormons."

Sources

• Mormon total control. Will Russia escape it? // IA "Dvina-Inform". 2005. January 17th. (With reference to the press service of the Arkhangelsk diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church.)
• Blasphemy over the memory of ancestors: thirty pieces of silver for a "dead soul" // Official server of the Arkhangelsk and Kholmogory diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate. 2005. January 26.