The monster is wretched shamefully

The administrative case of Timofei Kulyabin, director of Tangayzer, is closed. On April 6, the Central District Court of Novosibirsk granted the petition of the city prosecutor's office to recall the protest for the decision of the justice of the peace who terminated the case. In the history of legal persecution of a scandalous setting, it would seem, a point is set .

Of course, the review by the prosecutor's office without explaining the reasons is the reaction of the authorities to the rally in Novosibirsk on April 5 in Novosibirsk. He collected, according to various estimates, from two and a half to three thousand people. Less people came to the rally than the annual city " monsters ", but the very fact of mass consolidation under the slogans of the protection of culture is unprecedented.

The week did not set by church figures, acting as "zealots of Orthodoxy", who opposed themselves in one way or another to modern society.

Archpriest Vladimir Zaitsev from Yekaterinburg, the former head of the missionary department of the local diocese, and the decision of the diocesan council, was removed from service . Zaitsev became famousfor the nourishment of the Cossack "caterpillar" , going to "beat the fascist scum" in the Donbass. The reason for the removal is formulated unequivocally: "The bright and politically painted statements by Archpriest Vladimir Zaitsev can be regarded as the blessing of the church for the fratricidal war, which does not correspond to the aspirations of all the faithful children of the Russian Orthodox Church, on each divine liturgy calling the world to Ukrainian land."

On April 6, the Governor of the Kaliningrad Region expelled from a meeting of the regional council for the culture of the head of the department of operation of the monuments of the local diocese Mikhail Cherenkov. He will continue to be prohibited from appearing at meetings of the Council. Cherenkov, known for his activity in the transfer of the ROC of historical and cultural monuments that previously belonged to Protestant faiths, the Catholic Church and the Knight's Orders, the champion of the "Slavicization" of the region’s cultural heritage, decided to oppose the Kuban rave and rock festival exiled from the Krasnodar Territory and adopted in the Kaliningrad region. His arguments were traditional: half -naked people, gays and "drug addicts" will undermine the morality of the local population. However, the initiative came out sideways.

Does all this mean that there is a new trend that the Russian government changed his mind and ceased the crazy clericalization of public space and the cultural sphere? Of course, no. Recent events suggest that the Russian Orthodox Church has been and remains quite rationally arranged by a public institution, which has by no means a decisive influence on the current Russian policy. And that power on him also does not impose serious hopes.

I already had to write in connection with the business of the Tangaiser that the hopes of cultural figures and other progressive public for the "mercy of the sovereign", which protects them from Orthodox fundamentalists, are very naive. And that the authorities seriously perceive only one argument - the access to the street of angry citizens.

Immediately after the first decision of the justice of the peace in Novosibirsk, who, after letters of prominent cultural figures and testimoniesof the experts who sympathized with the prosecutor’s office in the lawsuit, was resumed with renewed vigor . The surrender of positions ( removal from the performance of a disputed image ) did not help. The director was fired, the production was closed.

But it was worth announcing the rally - and the authorities instantly went back. April 3, two days before the action, the prosecutor's office gave a reverse. To risk calmness in the city for the sake of self -satisfaction of the Metropolitan, a couple of his subordinates and a pro -Corporation of the young prosecutor? Not in this universe.

In Yekaterinburg, other factors acted. There, the priest blessed the action extremely dubious from a theological point of view - circular fraternity and walking , and his radical calls contradict the official, very practical, position of the Church in Ukraine. If he calmly did everything the same without advertising in the media, no one would have reproached him. But the act, which has become public, gained a completely different weight, and the Moscow Patriarchate reacted adequately to it.

In Kaliningrad, to the local analogue of the reconstructor Girkin - Mikhail Cherenkov - the authorities have long had enough complaints. His overly annoyed performance on the council, where he allowed himself to interrupt the governor, overwhelmed the challenge of the authorities.

Thus, the chain of defeats of Orthodox nationalists this week is due to various factors. But they say about one thing. The authorities in Russia - both in the center and in the field -, with all the sympathy for anti -Western movements and the Orthodox moralists, continue to carefully observe the "balance of forces" in the public space.

Hence two conclusions. Firstly, the benevolent attitude of the authorities towards the "anti-Westerners" does not mean card-blanche. They also need to know their place (and time). Secondly, any clericalization, any ideological anti -shipping would have been impossible if professional corporations - journalists, officials, cultural workers, education and health care would not contribute to this.

It is very important for the Orthodox nationalists and those who sympathize with the authorities to understand where their initiatives can be sold by playing indifference, deceiving, intimidating or confusing people. And where they will meet real resistance - including street protest activity. As the history of the last decade shows, along this border, the division of society into a secular (albeit sincerely believing) and pseudo -religious (but “patriotic”) part will most likely pass.