Home
/
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
/
Patriarch Alexy II: An Epoch Passes Away
Patriarch Alexy II: An Epoch Passes Away
Apr 4, 2025 12:25 PM

The casket with the body of Patriarch Alexy II is displayed during a farewell ceremony in Christ the Savior Cathedral in Moscow, on December 6.

Russian Orthodox Christians are holding memorial services and preparing for the Tuesday funeral of Patriarch Alexy II, the man who led the world’s largest Orthodox Church out of the Soviet era and into a period of remarkable rebirth and growth following decades of persecution and genocidal martyrdom at the hands of munist regimes.

Carrying mourning bouquets, thousands of people queued in cold drizzle across several blocks of central Moscow to Christ the Saviour Cathedral, where Alexy II will lie in state until his funeral on Tuesday.

“I feel like a bit of my heart has been torn out,” said tearful pensioner Maria Mindova, who had traveled from Ukraine. “No words can express the pain of this loss.”

The Zenit News Service published this touching account of the Patriarch’s passing by Bishop Hilarion Alfeyev of Vienna and Austria, representative of the Russian Orthodox Church to European Organizations:

In my memory Patriarch Alexy will remain first of all as a loving father, who was always ready to listen, who was supportive and gentle.

Almost half of the bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church, including myself, were ordained into episcopate by Patriarch Alexy. We are all deeply indebted to him.

The years of his patriarchate constituted an entire epoch in the life of the Russian Orthodox Church. It was precisely in this time that the resurrection of the Russian Church took place, which continues to this day.

May his memory be eternal.

The Federation of Jewish Communities of Russia said Patriarch Alexy’s leadership formed and strengthened cooperation between the country’s Orthodox world and munity, with the munity, and with representatives of other faiths on the questions of social ministry.

“The great man has died and the whole epoch has passed away with him. Patriarch Alexy II’s death is a great loss for the Russian Orthodox Church and for the entire munity,” FJCR President Alexander Boroda said in his address handed over to Interfax-Religion.

“Jewish tradition says that people who led righteous life don’t die as their deeds go on living. Today Alexy II is not with us anymore. But his outstanding deeds have stayed with us as well as the blessed memory of a person who did so much good for Russia,” he added.The Orthodox Church in munications office released the following statement:

The Holy Synod of Bishops of the Church of Russia announced today that funeral services for His Holiness, Patriarch Aleksy of Moscow and All Russia, who fell asleep in the Lord on Friday, December 5, 2008, at 79 years of age, will take place on Tuesday, December 9, 2008, at the Cathedral of the Epiphany in Moscow.

The Holy Synod also announced that His Eminence, Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad, has been elected Patriarchal Locum tenens.

May the memory of His Holiness, Patriarch Aleksy II of Moscow and All Russia be eternal!

The Russian Church recently offered this account of its growth during the last 20 years:

At the end of the 1980s the Russian Orthodox Church counted 6,000 parishes; currently this number is almost 30,000. Back then there were three institutions of theological education; now there are more than 100. There were 18 monasteries; now there are more than 750. It should be noted that none of these monasteries are empty: some of them have more than 500 monastics (e.g. the Diveevo Convent).

The Russian Orthodox Church does not know of the “crisis of professions” that plagues many Christian Churches in the West. On the contrary, the number of people wishing to enter theological seminaries and academies is significantly higher than the number of students these schools can take in. For example, more than 5,000 students currently study at the St. Tikhon Orthodox University in Moscow.

Because of this, when people speak of the “post-Christian era”, this does not apply at all to the Russian Orthodox Church, which is currently flourishing.

Russia Today has posted what it says it the last interview with Patriarch Alexy here. The news service says today that “Alexy II will be remembered as the first Patriarch of a new Russia. He led the revival of the Russian Orthodox Church after Soviet repression, and united it with congregations abroad after the 90 year split which followed the Bolshevik Revolution.”

Many news accounts also repeat the charge that Patriarch Alexy was a collaborator with the Soviet secret police, something the Russian Church denies. For a another view, see “A Man of Saintly Compromise” by Dimitry Babich on Russia Profile.

When in the years of perestroika the church became “rehabilitated,” Alexy vigorously embraced democracy and the opportunities which it offered to the church. In 1989 he was elected to the Congress of People’s Deputies, the Soviet Union’s first and last democratically-elected parliament. He became a member of the boards of the first Soviet charity organizations. Later, opponents would accuse him of bringing the church too close to the state. But bringing the church and the society closer to each other without having more or less friendly relations with the state was impossible, especially in the years of Vladimir Putin’s presidency.

“In fact, the degree of the Russian Orthodox Church’s involvement in state affairs is exaggerated,” said Alexei Makarkin, the vice-president of the Moscow-based Center for Political Technologies. “I would rather speak about a kind of cooperation that benefitted both sides. Some church hierarchs made overtures to the state, but the state never shared power with them, using the church for its own agenda.”

Comments
Welcome to mreligion comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
Questions about the Red Cross
The Remedy, the Claremont Institute‘s blog, links to an article in the Los Angeles Times by Richard M. Walden, head of Operation USA, that raises concerns about how the Red Cross spends the money it receives for specific disasters. Walden levels some important and serious charges against the Red Cross, and may or may not be convincing depending on if you approve of the Red Cross’ fund-raising precedents and other activities. But Walden is undeniably right is when he raises...
Breathing with one lung?
Bishop Hilarion (Alfeyev) of Vienna and Austria, the Russian Orthodox Church’s representative to the European Union, is once again urging a Roman Catholic-Orthodox alliance bat secularism, liberalism and relativism in Europe — and lands outside it. “The social and ethical teachings of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches are extremely close, in many cases practically identical,” Bishop Hilarion said. “Why, then, should we not be able to reveal our unity on all these major issues urbi et orbi?” Since the election...
Submerged subsidiarity
Because too much has already been said about the recent gulf hurricanes, I won’t put in my two cents. I will, however, direct the reader to the most insightful take on this situation that I have yet to stumble across. As you read it, think again about the importance of the definitions of the words we use, such as ‘responsibility’ and ‘authority’ as are discussed in the mentioned article. ...
Fab labbing, Fu-Fu, and the ovine entrepreneur
The BBC reports today a great illustration of human creativity and the intersection of technology and subsidiarity. MIT has set up what they called Fab Labs (Fabrication Labs) in what many might consider the least likely places for technological invention. These Labs consist of basic tools and software than enable people in sometimes remote and rural locations to invent and fabricate the technology they need in their daily work. MIT professor Neil Gershenfeld: In a world of Fab Labs, you...
Hurricane relief – Small organizations to the rescue
In the wake of overwhelming need of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, thankfully a number of us are voicing irritation with the inquiry, “How important do you think that faith-based organizations are to helping people”? Before ANY organization — government agency of any kind or national nonprofit — made a move, faith organizations had already moved. In San Antonio, where several Russian students were among New Orleans evacuees, Victory Fellowship, a faith-based, privately funded substance abuse treatment program, simply did the...
The right pass at the right time
If you haven’t heard of this story yet, read about what Notre Dame head football coach Charlie Weis did this past weekend. His expression passion for a dying boy, 10-year-old Montana Mazurkiewicz, transcends sports. Weis honored a promise to Montana despite the fact that he is a first-year coach in the big business of college football, in what might be the most scrutinized and storied programs in the country. In a personal visit to the boy last week, in addition...
The nose of a camel: The federal government and education
Federal involvement in education has grown steadily throughout the nation’s history, encroaching on what is still viewed by American’s as mostly a state and local responsibility. Kevin Schmiesing looks at a new book that examines U.S. education policy, the red tape and bureaucracy that has resulted, and the opposition to federal control that arose from parochial school administrators. Read the full text here. ...
CAFTA, prudence, and volleyball
After receiving some responses to a previous post (CAFTA/Culture of Life: Enemies?), I thought I would post the the exchange with my most recent dissatisfied critic. Here’s to volleying! (I have edited the emails for confidentiality.) Mr. Phelps, It was with great interest that I recently read your blog entry “CAFTA/Culture of Life: Enemies?” as for some strange reason it recently appeared on the Google Alerts. I found it amusing how you worked John Paul’s teachings in without actually quoting...
Spendthrift republicans
A wonderful piece by Deroy Murdock today on NRO. Though most fiscal conservatives understandably vote Republican, the record substantiates the theory that spending is less responsible when Congress is dominated by one party—either party—than when each party has enough votes to frustrate the other. Others have drawn attention to the problem of Republican pork, but Murdock does so in an especially devastating way. ...
Journalism professor calls for Helter Skelter
In 1969 Charles Manson and his gang set out to ignite a race war that pitted the wealthy white establishment against underprivileged blacks. The apocalyptic battle would be called “Helter Skelter,” after the Beatles’ song written by Paul McCartney. The white Manson reasoned that America’s angry black population would eventually win this war; at which time he and his group would emerge from their Mojave Desert hideout to assume leadership over what he perceived to be an inferior race. es...
Related Classification
Copyright 2023-2025 - www.mreligion.com All Rights Reserved