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Editor’s Note:
There’s been much kerfuffle about this… but there’s much less than meets the eye at a superficial glance. It’s NOT an official Church publication. A Church-owned publisher printed it… but the creator and distributor is an outside enterprise. In short, the Church didn’t publish this… but it’s causing it fits because some lower-level lamebrain allowed its printing at a Church-owned plant. No doubt, there was money involved… but this time, the scoundrel got “hoist by his own petard”. Watch for someone to hit the bricks… and soon.
BMD
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Raising eyebrows of Christians and Soviet loyalists alike, an MP-affiliated printing house produced a calendar of one of the Church’s worst oppressors. The calendar by Dostoinstvo (Dignity) publishing house offers a series of pictures of Soviet leader Iosif Stalin. The calendar comes complete with biographic snippets and Stalin’s nicknames, including Soso, Pockmarked, and Lord. According to the calendar’s masthead, the Patriarchal Publishing Centre of the Trinity-St Sergei Lavra printed it. On Tuesday, blogger Mikhail Babkin posted the first images of the calendar online. As of yet, the Church hasn’t commented on the issue. The Church set up the Patriarchal Publishing Centre; it’s at a famous monastery in Moscow Oblast, it handles many of the publishing activities of the MP. Dostoinstvo is a conservative publisher whose back catalogue comprises a motley mix of pro-Stalin and pro-Church publications. Last year, it offered a monthly calendar with pictures of Russian tsars, which, inexplicably, cost twice as much as a Stalin calendar… 400 Roubles (12 USD. 13 CAD. 13.50 AUD. 8.80 Euros. 7.40 UK Pounds) vs 200 Roubles (6 USD. 6.50 CAD. 6.75 AUD. 4.40 Euros. 3.70 UK Pounds). Stalin, who was an Orthodox seminarist in his youth, ordered hundreds of churches destroyed and OK’d widespread repressions of clergy.
8 January 2014
RIA-Novosti
http://en.ria.ru/russia/20140108/186339195/Church-Linked-Printing-House-Produces-Stalin-Calendar.html
Voices from Russia 
Church-Linked Printing House Produces Stalin Calendar
Tags: Iosif Stalin, Josef Stalin, Joseph Stalin, Moscow, Moscow Oblast, Moscow Patriarchate, MP, odd lots, Patriarchate of Moscow and all the Russias, political commentary, politics, Russia, Russian, Russian history, Soviet, Soviet Union, Stalin, Stalinist repressions, Trinity-St Sergei Lavra, USSR, weird
______________________________
Editor’s Note:
There’s been much kerfuffle about this… but there’s much less than meets the eye at a superficial glance. It’s NOT an official Church publication. A Church-owned publisher printed it… but the creator and distributor is an outside enterprise. In short, the Church didn’t publish this… but it’s causing it fits because some lower-level lamebrain allowed its printing at a Church-owned plant. No doubt, there was money involved… but this time, the scoundrel got “hoist by his own petard”. Watch for someone to hit the bricks… and soon.
BMD
******
Raising eyebrows of Christians and Soviet loyalists alike, an MP-affiliated printing house produced a calendar of one of the Church’s worst oppressors. The calendar by Dostoinstvo (Dignity) publishing house offers a series of pictures of Soviet leader Iosif Stalin. The calendar comes complete with biographic snippets and Stalin’s nicknames, including Soso, Pockmarked, and Lord. According to the calendar’s masthead, the Patriarchal Publishing Centre of the Trinity-St Sergei Lavra printed it. On Tuesday, blogger Mikhail Babkin posted the first images of the calendar online. As of yet, the Church hasn’t commented on the issue. The Church set up the Patriarchal Publishing Centre; it’s at a famous monastery in Moscow Oblast, it handles many of the publishing activities of the MP. Dostoinstvo is a conservative publisher whose back catalogue comprises a motley mix of pro-Stalin and pro-Church publications. Last year, it offered a monthly calendar with pictures of Russian tsars, which, inexplicably, cost twice as much as a Stalin calendar… 400 Roubles (12 USD. 13 CAD. 13.50 AUD. 8.80 Euros. 7.40 UK Pounds) vs 200 Roubles (6 USD. 6.50 CAD. 6.75 AUD. 4.40 Euros. 3.70 UK Pounds). Stalin, who was an Orthodox seminarist in his youth, ordered hundreds of churches destroyed and OK’d widespread repressions of clergy.
8 January 2014
RIA-Novosti
http://en.ria.ru/russia/20140108/186339195/Church-Linked-Printing-House-Produces-Stalin-Calendar.html