Deacon Andrei Kuraev Believes that the New Patriarch Should Lead People to “Fall in Love” With Orthodoxy

Deacon Andrei Kuraev (1963- ), contemporary Russian preacher, theologian, and missionary

Deacon Andrei Kuraev, a Professor at the Moscow Spiritual Academy, believes that any future Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia should have a marked aptitude for missionary outreach. “The Moscow Patriarchate needs a patriarch who can make people fall in love with Orthodoxy. He should be able to send a ‘message’ to young people that Orthodoxy is not only a legacy of Russia’s past, but, also a part of its future. He should stress that the ultimate thing is Heaven above us”, Fr Andrei said at a press conference in Odessa. In his opinion, “The propaganda of death in today’s youth culture has too many faces, advocating homosexuality, drugs, and contraceptives, with a casual attitude to abortion. Abortion is viewed as a minor cosmetic surgery to improve the figure”.

“Therefore, we can set only one thing against this kind of ‘thoughtless tsunami’, that is, a world of ‘religious super-values’, through the means of a ‘missionary breakthrough’ in the MP”, Fr Andrei, himself a well-known missionary, believed. “It is too late to preach at our grandmas that abortions are no good and that contraception may cause their children to become migrant workers in Moscow. Consequently, we must convey these ideas to young people”, Fr Andrei said, and added, “I know no one amongst the ranking bishops other than Metropolitan Kirill” who could successfully meet such challenge. “There was nothing unexpected in the election of Metropolitan Kirill as the acting head (of the Church: Interfax). We need a comparatively young and vigorous man in this position”, the Ukrainian website Ekho (Echo) quoted Deacon Andrei as saying.

17 December 2008

Interfax-Religion

http://www.interfax-religion.ru/?act=news&div=27925

Editor’s Note:

Methinks that Deacon Andrei is speaking with a deliberately-forked tongue. Not for nefarious reasons, of course. If one looks at his description, it fits Kirill Gundyaev not at all. Kirill is no missionary, he is a bureaucrat through and through, he is windy, verbose, and rambling, as anyone who has read his speeches comes to realise in very short order. At age 62, he is on the old side for a “young” candidate. Indeed, there is a bishop who meets all of Deacon Andrei’s criteria… that is, Archbishop Vikenty Morar of Yekaterinburg, who is 55, vigorous, a missionary, and a man who cleaned up a corrupt diocese. Kirill is known for his ambition and non-tolerance of opposition. Deacon Andrei is being coy to save his own skin in the short term. By the way… Kirill is not capable of leading people to “fall in love with Orthodoxy”, whereas Vladyki Vikenty has that ability in spades. May the latter be elected and let the former “give speeches, issue ghost-written books, and jet about the world”, as a clerical friend of mine put it. Amen!

BMD

Free To Celebrate

Time to celebrate!

Of course, everyone loves a vacation, especially when it comes from the state and doesn’t eat into your precious paid time off work. But, such a long break is unusual for Russia and it isn’t clear what impact it has on day-to-day life. Whilst many people revel in a long spell of leisure, taking the chance to catch up with family and friends away from the workaday routine, others feel the rest is just too long and does more harm than good. Questions are being raised about the relative benefits of rest versus a stable and smoothly running commercial world at the start of each year.

In Russia, things are better in moderation. Our mentality has an in-built capacity for extremes of behaviour. Give us a deadline and a tricky task, and we work like horses to see that the work is done. But, ask us to take it easy, we put our feet up straightaway. Ambitious plans are replaced by a simple “fridge-TV-fridge” routine… only the bottles and the guests will change. New Year be­comes a continual feast where the only limit is money. Nothing else matters when you are away from work and can get up whenever you want.

I would hate to suggest that Russians cannot cope when they are not under someone’s control. But, the new-look holidays do cause problems. After a long time off, it turns out to be very difficult to be back to work. Once you acquire a taste for relaxation, your pace of life changes and returning to normal becomes tortuous. Your body and brain aren’t accustomed to a working schedule; they can’t manage any sort of tasks and the necessity of keeping track and taking responsibility. Medical re­search suggests this is a scientific fact, not just a worker’s grumble on 11 January.

This year, Russia will be on holiday from 1 to 10 January. Plus, on 13 January, Russians will celebrate the Old New Year, another great chance to do nothing. Within this period, as people aren’t expected to work, our economic life will be frozen. In 2008, for example, the Russian budget lost 700 billion roubles (24.85 billion USD. 17.85 billion euros. 16.66 billion UK pounds) because of the New Year holidays. Our businesses simply didn’t operate and GDP dropped by 2 percent.

This year, in the teeth of a global financial crisis, can we afford this idle time? How will it affect the wider economy? At the same time, even though the country is allowed to celebrate New Year and Christmas, life goes on, and people need their essentials. From shops and stores, to power stations and emergency services, not everyone can enjoy a holiday. Plus, top management can’t allow business to grind to a complete halt, and often continue even if on a reduced schedule. It may be on their own initiative but, it is still inevitable. The need for an extended New Year holiday has already been questioned by the RF Gosduma. Maybe, it was better before, with shorter holidays at this time. Is it time to switch back to the old-style midwinter break we were used to? Perhaps, we would benefit from measured holidays and a more restrained view of this period.

18 December 2008

Daria Chernyshova

A Russian Briefer

Moscow News

http://www.mnweekly.ru/columnists/20081218/55361783.html

Who Will Help The Disabled?

English footie fan at Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow. This facility is handicapped-accessible, and quite easy to get about, but, he found curbs and metro escalators a challenge. The metro trains themselves were easy to access, though.

Steep escalators, crowded streets, and imposing stairways into many buildings help define the look and feel of life in Moscow, but, for the city’s 1.2 million disabled residents these everyday features represent a serious barrier to everyday day tasks like taking the metro, shopping, or eating out. So serious is the problem that the city authorities are planning to invest 21.5 billion roubles (760 million USD. 550 million euros. 510 million UK pounds) in transforming facilities to create a disabled-friendly environment. The funding comes as Moscow gears up for the 2009 Year of Equal Opportunities.

But, Vladimir Pet­ro­syan, the man responsible for spending the cash, was handed a stern rebuke from Mayor Yuri Luzhkov along with his new budget. “I have looked at the official information and I see that many of our orders have not been met”, Mr Luzhkov told his head of the Department of Social Protection. “I will send reprimands from the mayor’s office with serious warnings about the failure to meet the com­mitments of this programme”. Ac­cording to Mayor Luzhkov, only 99 public spaces out of 217 were converted for improved access, whilst just 11 of 35 sports facilities received planned disability-friendly overhauls. The mayor added that the city has the resources to fund the proposed improvements and any failures will be the responsibility of the relevant officials.

Mr Petrosyan shared his own concerns, stating that just four of Moscow’s 200 universities were adapted for disabled students, noting that almost half of the city’s potential disabled workforce was unable to find a suitable job. But, he also listed some of the achievements in im­proving the lot of wheelchair-users and people with mobility problems. “Over the last two years, about 2,000 special low-access trolleybuses and buses have been working on 399 land transport routes”, he said. “More than 6,000 commercial premises and 1,500 flats have been adapted for the needs of people with disabilities, but, this is no more than 20 percent of what is re­quired”. Although about one in five of the city’s buses and trolleybuses are due to be made accessible by the end of the year, there are problems with pedestrian crossings. Just 8 percent of the 11,000 street-level crossings in the city are adapted for easy use by wheelchair-users. Over the past two years, about 7,000 public buildings and 4,500 entrances to apartment blocks were adapted by the Department of Social Pro­tection.

18 December 2008

Moscow News

http://www.mnweekly.ru/local/20081218/55361777.html

Ukrainian PM Timoshenko says President Yushchenko Must Resign

Ukrainian Prime Minister Yuliya Timoshenko (1960- ), Yuliya Vladimirovna is doing her best to save the Ukrainian economy, but, Yushchenko is nothing but a thief in the Chicago style… hmm… his wife is from Chicago… interesting, no?

On Saturday, Ukrainian Prime Minister Yuliya Timoshenko said that President Viktor Yushchenko must resign, as he is weakening the Ukrainian economy deliberately. “I believe that [Mr Yushchenko], who works on the principle, ‘the worse, the better’, and makes money through mischief must resign on Saturday, together with the head of the National Bank”, Ms Timoshenko said in an interview broadcast on the Ukraina television channel. Prime Minister Timoshenko said that she demanded the resignation of President Viktor Yushchenko as he and the administration of the National Bank and a number of other commercial banks weakened the exchange rate of the national currency, the gryvna, deliberately. The Ukraine was swept in October by a financial crisis caused by the current global credit crunch. Its key exporters, the steel and chemical sectors, were hit hardest. The International Monetary Fund agreed to lend the Ukraine 16.43 billion dollars (462.85 billion roubles. 11.81 billion euros. 11.02 billion UK pounds) to stabilise the domestic economy. So far, the Ukraine has received the first 4.5 billion dollars (126.77 billion roubles. 3.23 billion euros. 3.02 billion UK pounds) of the loan. The parliament passed anti-crisis legislation to help it deal with the situation.

20 December 2008

RIA-Novosti

http://en.rian.ru/world/20081220/118970061.html

Timeless Russia…

A riddle wrapped in mystery in the midst of an enigma… an excellent five-minute video.