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[Music] On the next stage of my journey exploring the relationship between religion and politics around the world, I head for Russia, the vast land they still refer to as Holy Russia. [Music]

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My first destination is Sergeyev Posad, a magical place, almost a fairy tale place, just an hour and a half outside Moscow. [Music] The monastery at Sergeyev Posad is one of the holiest sites in Russia,

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but on top of that it's played a large part in the history of the nation. Abbot Sergius, who founded the monastery in the 14th century, having seen a vision of the Virgin Mary, is one of the most revered saints of the Russian Orthodox tradition. But he's also seen as an important political figure, a symbol of Russian patriotism.

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Sergius helped to unite the Christian princes of Muscovy to fight back against the Muslim Tatars, ending centuries of Islamic rule. [Music] Again and again the story of Russia is told in terms of repelling the alien invader.

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[Music] Three centuries later, another generation of monks at Sergeyev Posad resisted a two-year siege by Catholic invaders from Poland. [Music]

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The heroic defiance of these monks is now part of national mythology. [Music] Even the communist tyrant Stalin acknowledged the importance of such myths at the time when Russia was fighting back the overwhelming forces of Nazi Germany.

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Stalin reluctantly accepted that the Orthodox Church was integral to Russian identity. [Music] [Russian] The Russian Orthodox faith is the foundation of spiritual life in Russia.

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The Russian Orthodox Church was responsible for the founding of the Russian state and Russian traditions are all based on Russian Orthodoxy. It is the spiritual backbone of our nation. [Music]

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The Russian soul is an Orthodox soul. [Music] Spend any time in Russia and you'll soon come across the idea of the Russian soul. It's an elusive idea, the search for this soul,

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something that is essential and unique to national identity, has been preoccupying Russians for centuries. [Music] Back in the 19th century we had a very good writer, Nikolai Liskov.

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He was mostly a spiritual writer and he was really a motivated Christian, you know. And in one of his writings he had a line, he said that Russia was baptized but it was never spiritually enlightened. And I think this is very much true, you know, and it's still true now. But even when the Russian Orthodox religion was the official religion of Russia,

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most people took the superficial side of it, you know. They took the rites as important, not the substance. The majority of people only come to monasteries like Sergei of Posad at the time of the great festivals like Easter, Christmas and Epiphany,

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times when Christian ritual tends to be fused with popular tradition. [Music] All over Russia at the Feast of Epiphany people gather to collect holy water. The monastery of Sergei of Posad is built on the site of a sacred spring.

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[Music] The religious symbolism of the blessing of holy water refers to the baptism of Christ. [Music] But for most people the main attraction is to obtain water which they believe has special properties,

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including the power to heal. [Music] Intriguingly, the archpriests at Sergei of Posad are at first reluctant for us to film the informal events at the end of the Epiphany service,

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when people come to fill their bottles and buckets with holy water. [Music] Perhaps after the impressive ceremonial this looks too much like mass superstition. [Music]

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If you come to the church and if you start talking to those praying people, even to those old women who are the support of the church, they realize to you as an astonishment that they have never actually read the Bible. They know that the Bible is holy.

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They know that they must have a copy. They know that they must cherish it. It must be kept in a very prestigious and respected place in the house, but that's it. [Music]

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The suspicion that faith in Russia may only be skin deep is reinforced by a recent survey which suggests that although more than 80% of Russians describe themselves as Orthodox Christians, only 5% or so go to church regularly. Many millions of people, perhaps the majority of the population,

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are preoccupied with the brute reality of survival. And certainly 70 years of communism weakened the power of the church to influence individual lives. [Music] For most of the 20th century, the communist rulers defined the church as a barrier to progress

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and did their best to replace it in Russians' minds with atheism. As you travel through Russia, the legacy of communism presents itself at every turn. Now I'm forced to admit the elements of this legacy can seem very impressive. It's often said that for all the things they get wrong,

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dictators can at least get the trains to run on time. I don't know if Russia's communist rulers achieved that, but they certainly knew how to build an underground railway system. The Moscow Metro is amazing.

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Of course, the human suffering of the era was appalling, but here at least you can recognize the organizational skills and the vaulting ambition of the Soviet project. In their attempt to redefine society, the communists were highly selective

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about what they chose to destroy of the past and what they chose to keep. Although the Kremlin had been the fortress of power for generations of Christian czars, the Soviet leaders did not demolish it, but made it their own. And when it suited them, the Soviets could be terrifyingly destructive.

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You probably never guess it at first sight, but this gigantic building, the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour, is only a few years old. It's a stone by stone, icon by icon reconstruction of the cathedral that stood here before the communist period.

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The cathedral was built in the early 19th century to commemorate the defeat of the invasion forces of Napoleon by the Russian army and the Russian winter. But when Stalin came to power, he wanted to replace the cathedral with the biggest and grandest palace of the Soviets, so he blew it up.

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In the worst period of oppression, between 1919 and 1939, just a few hundred of the 46,000 Orthodox churches were allowed to stay open. Many of them were converted into warehouses or industrial premises. Priests were murdered and thousands were sent to labour camps or into exile.

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Only four bishops remained at liberty in the whole of Russia. Although Stalin eased the pressure on the church during the war, his successors, Khrushchev and Brezhnev, tightened the noose once more. Churches were closed again and many of the faithful were arrested.

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And then, in the late 1980s, 70 years of communism seemed to crumble to nothing. The church has been set free, but 70 years of harsh treatment and atheist regimes have left their mark. The resulting inertia still exists today.

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It is our job to conquer the atheist mindset and rediscover our Orthodox roots. But our path is strewn with problems. The extraordinary replica cathedral was put together in less than a decade. There was a lot more steel and concrete than in the original.

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This entire enterprise was paid for not by the church, but by the Russian government. And local businessmen have complained that officials from the Moscow City Council have demanded contributions to help maintain the building. The Orthodox Church has often enjoyed state benefits.

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Even while Russia was under Muslim rule from the 13th century, the church was favoured with immunity from taxation. So, in the new post-communist order, the church has re-established its intimate relationship with authority.

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And as he was for centuries, the Orthodox primate is once again a key figure in the Russian establishment, nurturing the close bond between the head of the church and the head of state. President Vladimir Putin, formerly a colonel in the Soviet security service, the KGB, is now often seen in church.

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Although the post-Soviet constitution of 1990 declared the principle of freedom of religion for all, the Orthodox Church has re-established its uniquely privileged status. To come to the roots of this, we are supposedly a secular country.

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And the church is separated from the state. But ever since communism collapsed, the regime was trying to fill the ideological void that was left. They still believe that people cannot exist without an ideology. And there is no ideology that would present itself, you know,

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except for the ideology of the Russian Christian Church. And you would find that even though formerly the church is still separated from the state, but the Russian Orthodox Church has privileged treatment. But I strongly suspect that the relatively small number of Russians who go to church regularly

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have other things on their minds, more questions of personal faith than high politics. [music] [music fades]