Tactical victory

Whether the fate of the St. Isaac's Cathedral in St. Petersburg was resolved

The Government of St. Petersburg refused to transfer the St. Isaac's Cathedral of the St. Petersburg diocese. It would seem that this could be put on this in the scandalous confrontation of the city and diocese, but the legal service of the diocese has already stated that the refusal was illegal. It is possible that the refusal of the St. Petersburg authorities to return the cathedral to the free use of the Russian Orthodox Church will be appealed in court.

The scandal around the possible transfer of the cathedral to the gratuitous use of the Church broke out in late July, when it became known that the diocese sent an official application to the St. Petersburg authorities with a request to return the Isaac's Cathedral, which has been one of the largest museum complexes that attract millions of tourists from all over the world. It is important that the Isaac's Cathedral museum is almost the only museum of Russia that not only does not ask for money from the treasury, but pays impressive taxes, because its team managed to make the money earned for the salaries of employees, and to repair and restore a huge museum complex. In the case of the transfer of the Cathedral of the Church, the state would remain its owner and huge expenses for the maintenance of the cathedral - the very ones that the museum itself today be on the budget of St. Petersburg.

History with Mephistopheles is monstrous, merciful

Perhaps the decision of the city government to preserve the Isaac's Cathedral was the previous status was influenced by the considerations of a material nature, perhaps the reaction of the public, tens of thousands of signatures of citizens collected in defense of the cathedral-museum, as well as the intention of a group of deputies to initiate a referendum, also played a role. It is possible that the effect intensified thanks to the scandal with a knocked down figure of Mephistopheles on the architectural monument, the House of Zhvenensky on Lakhtinskaya Street - the act of vandalism was committed on August 26, the explanations of the odious organization “Cossacks of St. Petersburg”, which took responsibility, came down to the fact that Mephistofel had no place to do not do the place under construction. But although the passions of Isaac and Mephistopheles merged in the information space, the director of the museum complex "Isaac's Cathedral" Nikolai Burov believes that the new scandal did not affect the government of the St. Petersburg Diocese:

Nikolai Burov

- The government’s decision was rational, it relied on accurate statistical calculations and, probably, on the opinion of the townspeople. These two stories developed in parallel, but they are not connected. The story with Mephistopheles is monstrous, merciful, she managed to hurt me with a fragment, and I received my portion of slopes.

-Yes, someone accused you of the fact that this at your instruction was shot down by the Mephistopheles high relief.

“Maybe I seem to someone an idiot, but I’m not an idiot to order such a thing to someone.” I have not yet been sent to a psychiatric hospital either. In addition, I really love the Petrograd side, I once lived there for 15 years, I drove children in strollers along the same Lakhtinskaya Street, where Numlnevsky’s house is standing. The performer is not so important, I really hope that the competent authorities will find the source. I understand that Mephistopheles were physically not killed, but still we must treat this as a murder, find a customer and give hands and head so that it is disgraced.

What is happening under the banners of high ideas, disgustingly doubly

-By the way, the contractor appeared with a confession, but he was released from the police, and the church figures even stood up for him-they say, he is, of course, to blame, but we must be condescending to him, he was driven by good motives.

- Church figures must intercede for all the stumbled. Another thing, if the customer or organizer intercedes - here I would not consider who he is - a priest, lawyer or cook: the customer should be treated as a criminal, not taking into account any explanations - here neither hungry children, nor the location of the figure on the religious construction - nothing justifies the crimes.

- Here you say, the church should intercede for the fallen. Something she for Pussy Riot was not very fast, but she stood up for the vandals.

- We tend to root for our own. And then an unpleasant double bottom arises - what is your own: it means that you share their beliefs, so you are from their camp? It is one thing when the priest consoles the convict in prison, another - when the contrast of some and others begins, the separation in society deepens. Yes, Pussy Riot and I also condemned - for myself, it is disgusting to me, but what is happening under the banners of high ideas is doubly disgustingly. Like vandalism with Sidur’s broken works - it has a feeling of disgusting d oligo from him.

-In the 90s, Petersburg was called the criminal capital of Russia, they are now talking about the "Cossack capital"-after all, those who call themselves Cossacks really tear off the performances with impunity, hit the windows at the Nabokov Museum, throw pigs to the doors of the famous theater. And now the beautiful sculpture was shot down from the monument - openly, in front of the whole city. Why do you think this is happening?

In the Russian Orthodox Church, nothing happens

- We must also see what kind of Cossacks this is. There are quite decent Cossacks, not mowing, who want to benefit people and the city. And there are those who create disgrace under the name of the Cossacks - here we should find them and give them to the real Cossacks, let them teach them a halt so that they have nothing to sit on at least for a while.

“Why is none of them ever found or punished?”

-Maybe the investigation rests on someone's unwillingness, works at all.

-Is it possible to do something to reduce the degree of pogrom mood in the city? Why neither the Church nor officials express their clear attitude to this phenomenon?

- The best thing is to return to that style of Petersburg relations that have always been here. Smolny just clearly expressed his attitude, the diocese sometimes expresses through his press service, however, most often shaking and vaguely. Is it worth it to rally about this, I don’t know. We say a lot - but we must do. There is a wonderful church expression - cooperation. This means to engage in different things, to understand them differently, but the goal of having one and respect a person who is not from your trench, but for your victory. And in general, people lack education, there is not enough knowledge. After all, we have in many temples, on many icons - an image of a terrible trial with features, horns and hooves - so what? People have a lot of ambitions, and when they are not confirmed by knowledge and a thin, sensed attitude, the blind element breaks to the will. Anyone who knocks Mephistopheles takes a simple literary character for the devil, albeit very talentedly composed. This is a very stupid activity - to look for enemies where they are not. But if you are looking for them, you will always find.

- Let us return to the Isaacievsky Council - the city government refused to give its diocese, but it is already known that the legal service of the diocese called this refusal illegal and that, perhaps, it will be appealed in court. And you have already congratulated your employees on the holiday on September 2 - it turns out that this is a holiday in the trenches?

- The Russian Orthodox Church is a very highly organized structure, nothing happens without the permission of the hierarch. Here, probably, the will of Metropolitan Barsanuphius should be repeated, and it should be confirmed by the Holy Patriarch Kirill. Today, the legal field there is not so observed that even an appeal regarding the return of the cathedral cannot be called an official statement. And a large number of documents should also be attached, but all this was not. If, nevertheless, it comes to court, it will be a precedent of the judicial relationship of the church and one of the branches of the executive branch. And then, this is a very detailed story that requires many explanations, documents, guarantees-in any case, we breathe for some time, live-if such a decision is made. But how much the highest leadership of the church wants such a development of events, I do not know. At the same time, I will be respected by any decision. We are only one of the parties in the dispute. Someone congratulated me yesterday on the victory-I do not consider preserving the status of the Isaac's Cathedral as a victory, since I did not fought. Well, there were no 25 years of disagreement with the diocese, well, they arose, which means that we need to gather and decide them calmly and without mutual insults.

The deputy of the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg, Alexander Kobrinsky, generally believes that the law on the return of church property is very imperfect, since he lies on the shoulders of one person, albeit the governor, the whole severity of the decision on the transfer of the church of such objects that have long been not just temples, but world -famous museums, popular property:

- The law did not take care of cultural institutions that are in these buildings. In situations where the building is transmitted to the church, and the museum is evicted to nowhere, this museum simply dies, and there were such cases. Is it possible to evict the Isaacievsky Cathedral to Utkina Breaka? The question is rhetorical. Therefore, we have developed amendments to the federal law, which stipulates that buildings, where cultural institutions have been have been, are not transmitted to church faiths. We believe that the transfer of such buildings cannot be carried out by a simple return of property - because there is a conflict of the rights of the Church and the rights of citizens who visit these cultural institutions. We are not talking about buildings that are involved in warehouses, factories or some commercial enterprises, everything is quite simple here. But culture is a special sphere, and it must be adjusted in a special way. At the same time, the church asks her not to return it to some abandoned village churches, but restored temples in the center of St. Petersburg, because it will bring her more funds-a purely economic issue.

Professor of the St. Petersburg Theological Academy, church historian Archpriest George Mitrofanov does not understand why there are so many churches:

- I can’t say that the discovery of numerous temples created a true church in us, contributed to the development of its foundation - parish communities. For me, this is the main problem, and the dispute about whether to transmit the Isaac's Cathedral of the Church or not transmit, does not make sense. I am not very aware of the museum and liturgical atmosphere in the St. Isaac's Cathedral, but I know that in most of our diocesan temples there are no parish communities. And I am deeply convinced that this is not connected with the number of temples, but with completely other sides of our church life, we need a change in the general vector in our view of the church.

- After all, it is not only about the transfer of one Isaac's Cathedral, in line - the decision to save the blood and Sampsonievsky Cathedral, this is all one museum complex of four cathedrals. The Smolny Cathedral, also belonging to this complex, has already been transferred to the church.

-The Savior on Blood had a wonderful period when he was a parish temple in the 20-30s, but it was a tragic period in its own way. And if we even now began to turn the saved on blood again into a parish cathedral, we would hardly have found such a rector as Archpriest Vasily, and such ascetic receptions who were then. But I would like to emphasize the following: we live in a society permeated by a utilitarian approach to everything. Uplitarianly think and feel as government officials, and, alas, clergy. And it seems to them to all that the main thing is walls, dome, squares, the ability to sell some products on these squares and in these walls, to spend some people for a fee, selling tickets-but all this prevents people from seeing the main thing. Therefore, I, as a parish priest and a church historian, do not care, what will be the legal status of the St. Isaac's Cathedral. Another thing is obvious to me: he will not become a church until someone will consider it as a source of money. Museum workers are another matter, they, in many ways, involuntarily, with the exception of individual enthusiasts, played a large role in the preservation of church values. Like most Soviet people, they retained what they fed from, this inertia remains now. The temple may decline if it remains under the control of the state, it can decline if it is transferred to the church, it will begin to flourish if a parish community is formed around it. A very easily outstanding church elite, which are such temples as the Isaac's Cathedral, hide behind the grandeur of the historical past from specific spiritual problems. I repeat, I am not interested in who belongs to church buildings, the question is much more important, why people are indifferent to them both as temples and as buildings that have historical and artistic value. The only thing that can be of interest to people both in cassoons and in jackets is what it brings income. This is disgusting. With this approach, we are doomed to acquire many temples, but to lose the church.