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Moscow Ecumenical Center Moscow Ecumenical Center. What is the purpose of this center? The Moscow Ecumenical Center is a place of people. The Ecumenical Center has existed for 30 years.

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We have been a catacomb church. In the last years, when there was religious freedom in our country, we were not able to organize any events because there was no such status. We organized this center to arrange round tables, to have a dialogue.

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Our Ecumenical Center has always been a creative union. We have talents, poets, artists. We wanted them to have a stage, a hall where they can put their paintings, engravings. So this center has a character of a Christian place,

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where apart from the church, where members of the Christian community go, they could show themselves as talents, their creative power. Because in our country such Christian clubs are still a novelty. Our life is concentrated either in the church or in the secular world.

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We would like to have a spiritual union, which could be a place of meeting young talents. What is the main point of the Ecumenical Faith? How is it expressed? The main point is the desire for unity.

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We all recognize the One God. We know that the Father is the Father of all people. We want to remind our brothers, sisters, Christians of all the Confessions. We understand our unity as a unity of many kinds.

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The historically established Confessions, Catholicism, Protestantism, Orthodoxy. At the very beginning, the church was one, and then there were tragic divisions. But today, centuries-old traditions, Eastern, Western, and so on, exist. And the Ecumenical Faith does not aim to unite them.

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We want everything good that is in Orthodoxy, the icon, the liturgy, the Western churches, everything to remain. But we want to eliminate barriers, eliminate hostility, so that the Confessions can enrich each other.

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We are looking for what unites us, not what separates us. You are the leader of this society. How did it happen? What led you to work for reconciliation of all the Confessions in Russia? I was born in Riga.

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Many nations have always lived in Riga, and there have always been churches of different Confessions. I was baptized in the early years of my life, but I turned to the Church when I was 30. I read the Gospel and thought about the fate of Christianity, the church.

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I realized that the church is not one, that sometimes there are conflicts, there were religious wars, that this is not a normal situation. Communism became a natural and understandable purpose for me.

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I began to pray for unity, and unificationists appeared. We began to gather in small groups in Riga, Moscow, Zhytomyr and other cities. And little by little, this movement began from such a small group. And these groups still exist in these places?

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Yes, of course, and in other places. But we must remember that we have never sought a rigid structure, so as not to duplicate the Church, so that people remain free in such brotherhood. There is no hierarchy?

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No, no. We have our leaders, our authorities, but this is natural. But they are not in such a rigid sense as bureaucrats or bureaucratic hierarchies. And of course, we are united not only by our organization, but also by our call. The magazine that we have been producing for more than 20 years,

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now we have a book, a call, which is already in the set, and we hope to publish it soon. Can you tell me what is the essence of this magazine, the central idea? The central idea is to give information to Christians and all people of good will

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that Jesus Christ called us to unity. The second point is to remind people of the initiatives that are taking place in our country and in other states. Prayers for unity, some meetings, interfaith meetings, and so on.

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And of course, this is our theological-philosophical basis. And of course, it is written poetically, lyrically, sometimes it is written purely as a historical work, sometimes it is written as a manifesto. Nevertheless, in general, this book hopes to help people to find Jesus Christ as their Savior

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and to live forever in unity, to pray for unity and to live in unity, in unity of the Church. And how is this unity expressed in Moscow, let's say, in your society? You said that you gather, how often do you gather? And how is this evening organized?

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Yes, we have several times a year big evenings, let's say, Christmas, Easter, our September meetings, when we celebrate the next anniversary of our Ecumenism. And then, together with us, in different cities of Russia and other states, including, we know that in England, in Italy, in France, in Poland, in Latvia, Christians gather at the same time for a similar spiritual unity.

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This tradition is called the Cup of Peace, and we experience it as a spiritual communion. Because you know that Christians cannot participate in intercommunion yet, and we, in order not to violate the canonical right of any church, in order not to lead a new ritual, a new heresy or a new confession, we experience it spiritually.

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Because we know that we have such a blessing. These meetings, of course, give a great impulse and a great resonance. Also, this year, in the Church of St. Ludovik in Moscow, for the first time, there was an inter-confessional prayer, in this octave, in Nigeria, a prayer for the unity of Christians.

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There were, one might say, good forces participating. From the Orthodox Church, the Metropolitan Kirill, participated in the blessing of the Orthodox Church. From the Catholics, Archbishop Tadeusz Kondraszewicz participated. From the Baptists, the Christian publicist Vladimir Ovin participated.

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And our ecumenical. How does the Orthodox Church relate to your society? You know, our history is quite long, already the third decade, and I must say that the Orthodox Church does not have a single point of view.

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The patriarchs who were in this period did not react in any way. We do not know what kind of reaction there was to our existence. When there were repressions and arrests in the 1980s, the Orthodox Church, and other denominations, did not defend us.

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The people who were here in the Soviet Union, of course, did not speak up. This is a fear. Our foreign brothers, including the Keston College, stood up for us, whom we are very grateful to,

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because he did a great job in defending all the persecuted, including the ecumenical. But in recent years, some of the Orthodox people have been very sympathetic to us. In particular, I know that Father Gleb Yakunin does not join our group, but nevertheless, he is very sympathetic, kind, and he himself is a very ecumenical thinker.

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So, Gleb Yakunin, we think, is our man. Also, Father Mark Smirnov, a famous TV and radio journalist, he made several programs on Moscow television, on Radio Liberty, on ecumenism. And, of course, personal friendship and mutual sympathy with Father Alexander Menin connected us.

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His spiritual children often came to our meetings, and he blessed them. Do you think that there is a lot of intolerance between believers of different denominations in Russia? Unfortunately, the situation has now become more acute. The situation of separatism, mutual aggressiveness, unfortunately, often has a purely materialistic, commercial nature.

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This is a struggle for the temples, a struggle for the parishes, these scandalous disputes, who owns what, there is very little spirituality. But this is what ordinary believers and young people are infected with, and this is very sad. So today, as it was at the beginning of our movement, we again remained in the minority.

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Such a fundamental ecumenism today no one wants to profess, because they are afraid that the memory or some other groups will attack such people who recognize ecumenism. The foreign church, unfortunately, considers ecumenism heresy. And the situation is very complicated, but we always came from our motto, the motto of our movement,

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the love of the truth. If we see the truth in the convergence of Christians, in the love that Jesus Christ showed, then the approval of the world or people who do not understand us, does not decide for us. We are still guided by God, and not by the conjuncture that exists today. But in fact, the situation in our country has become anti-ecumenical in the last two years.

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This is a noise, these are the voices that are heard. But among the intelligentsia, among the thinkers, the right-thinking Christians, there are a lot of sympathizers of ecumenism. This is said by reviews of publications. From time to time we manage to publish something, some journalist, some newspaper, magazine, television, radio,

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sometimes they pass some information about us, and I and my friends receive a lot of positive letters and phone calls. And we feel that our cause is also needed. Yes, it means that there is an important role for the ecumenical society now. But it is not yet possible to say that ecumenism has triumphed.

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Today there is a confrontation between the church and the word ecumenism, for many it is a curse. How can we help you in the West, or support you? Is it possible or not? I think that we should be together, we should realize that we are doing one thing. Because the borders separating the East and the West are still human borders.

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And first of all, of course, it is mutual prayer. We can unite our September cups of peace together and invite more and more people to participate in these spiritual events. And Great Britain, and Europe, and so on. This is the most important thing.

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Because we always started as prayer brothers. And still, we understand prayer deeply. It is meditation, contemplation. It is not just a prayer.

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We immerse ourselves in prayer, and we try to go out of prayer as others. So we invite everyone to participate in such prayer. And from this principle, we have noticed many times great fruits, great results. Although they were not always so massive, they could not always be counted or weighed.

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But they were in our hearts, our life, our mentality changed. For we realized that the closer we are to God, the closer we are to each other. This is the first moment. And on the earthly level, on the practical level, I think that we just need to maintain contacts.

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I know that in Great Britain there are people who gather in community groups. We would be glad to maintain contacts with such groups. We would be glad to accept them in our country. We would be glad to meet them in London, in other countries.

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Maybe some ecumenical meetings, traditional ones, so that the British, Russians and other representatives of Europe could participate. This could be done in Moscow, London, other cities. Let it be small initiatives at first.

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And let this resonance be not so global. But you know, Christians always start small. And the Lord never demanded very large masses. He always said that we should not be afraid, that we are not physically strong yet.

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The main thing is that we are strong in spirit. So, prayer, contacts. We will find something that we can do. If we have some interesting artists, we can make an exhibition.

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If you have some interesting ensemble, we can make a festival of Christian art, Christian music. We can invite you, your ensemble, to participate in our scene. Of course, it is difficult to solve this in terms of formalities, financial moments. But I think, if we are brothers, we can come up with something.

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We can unite our efforts. Thank you, Sandra. Can you tell me a little bit more about your personal path to this faith, to ecumenism? How did it happen that you found it so deeply?

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I think it is a calling. And when a person feels that he has to follow this, he does not doubt anymore. I had other doubts. I am not a religious person, I am not a person of high level.

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I do not want to talk about these problems with the representatives of the Church, with people who are not fit. Because it is very easy to mislead a person who is not fit. He will think that it is a good idea, but then it will turn out to be some kind of fantasy. That is why I have dedicated many years to a lonely life.

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I did not hurry to the department, I did not hurry to speak. But when it matured, then I spoke without fear. I spoke what I thought, and I still do not regret it. Because people respond.

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At the same time, I want to emphasize that Christianity is not an ideology, it is a way of life. It is very important for us that our brothers and sisters are named. In the late 60s and early 70s, I had a lot of contacts with people from Bohemia. With people who were called hippies.

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And thank God, many of them were freed from alcoholism, from drug addiction. This is a big trouble in our century. Especially in our century, this moment is felt. That religion is often understood as a thrill, as a kind of pleasure.

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And we try to enjoy it, as a kind of Christian hedonism. But we would like to remember that Christ did not say that there would be Christianity without Christ. We remind this. Of course, we cannot demand that all people live like saints, live absolutely right.

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There is a very large range. There are such vocations that live like monks. There are those who live in families. There are different options.

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But we always remind that Christ helps us to become new people. Today, in a month, in a year, this is another matter. But the tendency, the perspective is such that Christianity does not become another ideology. Now in our country, we see that very often there is a change of ideology.

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And a person, without changing his inner essence, just changed the Serb from a young man to a Christian. And he is doing it with the same aggressiveness, with the same moral debauchery. And, by the way, this can be a big disappointment for people who are seriously looking for it. They will see in the church again some new nomenclature.

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Not red, but, let's say, white. And there will be disappointment. Yes, it means that the Spirit of God must be embodied in the essence of humanity. Without it, it will be just a name.

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You can wear a cross, but you should have Christ in your heart. Thank you. Some questions. What are the main tasks of the Cossack movement from a religious point of view?

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I understand that many of you believe in Orthodoxy. What are your tasks from a religious point of view? Here we have no more tasks, but problems. There are not enough priests.

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Nobody works with the Cossacks. The priests come to us, to the army, for a short time, on a business trip. Therefore, the main task now is to find suitable Cossacks who would have the desire to become priests, to learn, and to send them to the training. Excuse me, I'll be right back.

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How many believers do you think there are among the troops? Unfortunately, not so many. For 70 years of the atheistic education, they have done their job. But there are encouraging moments here.

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This is the desire of the Cossacks to believe. The Cossack customs are traditionally based on Orthodoxy. There were a few Cossacks who were Muslims, a few Buddhists, but Orthodoxy is the basis of Cossackism. The Cossacks have a desire.

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We are working on this now. We are creating Cossack communities. We invite priests to the places where we have un-Cossack communities. In summer, we have water baptism in the river, in winter, in the Kupel.

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But the problem is that there are not enough priests. This is not only in our country. What is your attitude to the non-Orthodox Confessions and other religions? We did not have a choice.

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Orthodoxy is the faith of our ancestors. We have nothing to choose. But we have a tolerant attitude to the other religions, Muslims, Buddhists. If this is the faith of a certain people, then I think it is only in favor of this people.

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Since they accepted Islam and Buddhism, it is their right to believe in the faith of their ancestors. Where are the Cossack troops? These are the traditional 13 Cossack troops, as they were before 1917. Don, Kuban, Tersk, Ural, Orenburg, Siberia, Semirechnaya, Yeniseysk, Irkutsk, Zabaykalsk, Amur, and Ussuriysk.

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Thank you. Does this machine record better that way around? Or does it record better that way around? Thank you.

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Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

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Thank you. Thank you. .