Jim Deitsch

Eastern Churches and Theology

Professor Yuri Avvakumov
November 12, 2018

Assignment 11

“The artfully offered human-rights phraseology acts like an anesthetic and makes Western

representatives feel morally uneasy about protesting the brazen falsehood of the Patriarchate’s

accusations.” (Avvakumov 6-7) Here, we find the key problem. Humans have a tendency to go

to whatever lengths necessary to morally justify the action that makes themselves come out

ahead. In the modern world, morality is cast aside for peace, human lives abroad are sacrificed

for democracy at home, and hypocrisy abounds. The same logic that allows Americans to

support human rights abuses by “stabilizing” middle-eastern tyrants allows those in the West to

turn a blind eye to the difficulties encountered by the Ukrainians. Even Ware (perhaps

unwittingly) buys into this logic, when he writes that “it is easy to understand how wounding”

the actions of the Orthodox were to Ukrainian Catholics, but that unfortunately, “the moment

had passed.” (Ware 160)

It is not just the West that suffers from a chronic inability to see the hypocrisy of their

actions; a similar phenomenon is what created the Russian/Ukrainian situation in the first

place. Russian Church leaders embraced moral decision-making that was remarkably

convenient for their own wellbeing, decision-making that solidified their personal comfort AND

their positions of authority. If they were willing to do that in the first place, surely it makes

sense that they would be unwilling to make drastic changes simply because their government

of choice is no longer in power. As Professor Avvakumov writes, “Discussing such events within
the framework set by notions borrowed from sociological thought is perfectly legitimate, but it

diverts the attention from the religious background of the event and overlooks the

responsibility of church leaders and theologians who provided justification for it.” (Avvakumov

15) The Russian leaders were (and are) not bound by politics, they embrace(d) politics.

That the Russian leaders wanted power, not morality, is further emphasized by their

unwillingness to listen to the members of their own flocks. “The episcopate, however, resisted

any vision that accorded a greater role to the laity, and feared the laypeople who sought to

articulate such a vision. Perhaps the bishops, still Soviets at heart, regarded the lay movements

as dangerously democratic, a threat to top-down control of church institutions.” (A Church of

Empire) If the leaders of the church are not willing to listen to those who seek to have an

influence from within, why would they ever deign to listen to those who seek to separate, or

seek to join a union with a different power structure (the Vatican)? The modern Church in

Russia is not just shaped by the Soviet Union, in many sense it still wants to BE the Soviet

Union. “Undertaking to shape Russian national identity, the Church promotes patriotism and

traditional values in coordination with government propaganda.” (A Church of Empire)

Catalyst: In his article, Professor Avvakumov alludes to the concept of necessary

deconstruction. I firmly agree with this concept, but I question what the end result of religious

deconstruction would be, if taken at face value. If you deconstructed fully, wouldn’t you end up

with the original Christian message? Wouldn’t that lead to the dangerous tendency which

Professor Avvakumov also warns against, that of each religion claiming that their tradition has

existed since the dawn of Christianity?