Re: Death of Zoya Krakhmalnikova

Steve Hayes <hayesmstw@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>:

>>> Michael Bourdeaux, The Guardian, Tuesday May 13 2008 ...

>>> Krakhmalnikova became an active democrat, calling on leaders of the 
>>> Orthodox church to repent of its collaboration with the 
>>> authorities (which they never did).

Catawumpus <kimmerian@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>:

>>      First things first, tho:  has the Orthodox church _stopped_
>> collaborating with the authorities?

++ <friend@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>:

> Catawumpus, first things first, before I have an anonymous discourse on 
> this.  What are your own thoughts on the same.  There are a lot of 
> layers of "collaboration"

     I'm thinking two main things.  In the West, the Church has
a history of complicity with the authorities going back to 
Constantine.  In the East, it was in bed with Byzantium.  There 
are some nice exceptions (for instance the liberation 
theology recently displeasing the Vatican), but that's been the 
rule.

     Scripturally speaking, the Church could base itself on Rom.
13:1-6 -- setting aside any questions about Biblical 
consistency -- which announces "the powers that be are ordained 
of God" and conversely damns anyone who resists them on 
grounds fighting the ruling powers is a rebellion against God's 
will.

     But that doesn't leave room for picking and choosing.  God
installs the rulers, Rom. 13 claims, and Christians are 
required to follow them.  Applied to Russian history that makes
the Tsars and the Bolsheviks both "God's ministers."  Ditto 
the gangster capitalists and ex-KGB apparatchiks running things
today.

-- Catawumpus