Comments on: Render Unto Caesar…

By: Bryan

Bryan — Mon, 05 May 2008 06:08:55 +0000

It was Пётр, when the Patriarch died he decided not to replace him, and set up the Synod. The old Patriarch had been an ally of Пётр’s sister, София, and he didn’t want to repeat that experience. The Procurators were all nasty, it was in the job description and they had the power of church and state behind them.

Many were corrupt, but most were out and out sadists when they enforced the will of G-d and the Tsar.

It was a popular move when Lenin brought back the Patriarchate.

By: Michael

Michael — Mon, 05 May 2008 05:26:44 +0000

I forget if it was Пётр Вели́кий or one of his successors who set up the Holy Synod, but the Synod’s Procurator functioned effectively as the patriarch (except that, instead of being elected by the bishops, he was appointed by the tsar). And many of them were nasty–К. П. Победоносцев springs immediately to mind…

By: Bryan

Bryan — Sun, 04 May 2008 03:41:37 +0000

It was pretty much the same for the Russian Orthodox Church with a millennium less to do it in.

The second Romanov, Tsar Aleksei was a nasty piece of work when it came to religious controversies. If he decided that a congregation had erred he had them herded into their church and burned it down to prevent the “contagion” from spreading. As the Romanovs were church rather than property boyars, he felt he had more understanding of matters ecclesiastical than the Patriarch.

It was his son, Peter the Great who decided the office of Patriarch was no longer necessary, and it was vacant until the October Revolution.

The results have never been good for religion.

By: Kryten42

Kryten42 — Sun, 04 May 2008 02:45:37 +0000

Agree Michael. 🙂

Thanks Bryan. Interesting indeed! 🙂

“Watch this space?”(tm) 😉

By: Michael

Michael — Sun, 04 May 2008 02:42:49 +0000

*cough*Investiture Controversy*cough* *cough*Theophylact women*cough* *cough*the Babylonian Exile*cough* *cough*St. Thomas à Becket*cough* ...and far too many others to list in full.

By: Bryan

Bryan — Sun, 04 May 2008 00:38:45 +0000

The church always suffers when it becomes involved with the state: you, more than most people, have seen that throughout history.

By: Michael

Michael — Sat, 03 May 2008 23:32:55 +0000

Though I don’t agree with the theology of the people pushing this, I do think they have the truth on their side in that the Republicans certainly, and the Democrats to a considerably lesser extent and fairly recently, have been using Christians and Christianity solely for partisan political purposes–which is both a perversion of both the faith and the Constitution, and also likely to be detrimental to the faith.