The Witness of Alexei Navalny

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

I have taken these words of Alexei Navalny from a longer article found on the website Public Orthodoxy. These words of Navalny before the Russian judge who would sentence him to prison are introduced by a rather disquieting question by Inga Leonova. I am certain that everyone is aware of the that Alexei Navalny died recently while serving a sentence in a Siberian prison because of his sustained opposition to the repressive regime in Russia.

"What can we, the Orthodox, make of the fact that one of the strongest Christian sermons in recent years was delivered as the last word in the unjust trial of an opposition leader?"

__________

If you want, I’ll talk to you about God and salvation. I’ll turn up the volume of heartbreak to the maximum, so to speak. The fact is that I am a Christian, which usually rather sets me up as an example for constant ridicule in the Anti-Corruption Foundation, because mostly our people are atheists and I was once quite a militant atheist myself. But now I am a believer, and that helps me a lot in my activities, because everything becomes much, much easier. I think about things less. There are fewer dilemmas in my life, because there is a book in which, in general, it is more or less clearly written what action to take in every situation. It’s not always easy to follow this book, of course, but I am actually trying. And so, as I said, it’s easier for me, probably, than for many others, to engage in politics.

A man recently wrote to me, “Navalny, why does everyone write to you, ‘Hold on, don’t give up, be patient, grit your teeth?’ What do you have to tolerate? You kind of said in the interview that you believe in God. The Bible says, ‘Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled.’ Well, that’s just great for you, isn’t it!” And I thought, how well this man understands me! Because it’s not that I’m fine, but I’ve always thought that this particular commandment is more or less an instruction to activity. And so, while certainly not really enjoying the place where I am, I have no regrets about coming back, or about what I’m doing. It’s fine, because I did the right thing. On the contrary, I feel a real kind of satisfaction. Because at some difficult moment I did as required by the instructions, and did not betray the commandment.

And there’s one more important thing. Without question, this whole Biblical passage—“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled”—comes across as overly theatrical to modern ears. It is assumed that people who say such things are crazy, not to put too fine a point on it—crazy oddbods who sit there alone in their rooms with disheveled hair, attempting to cheer themselves up by any means possible, because they are lonely and not needed by anyone. This is the key point. Our authorities and the system as a whole try to tell these people that they are pathetic loners.

The first priority is to intimidate people, and then to prove to them that they are loners, and to imply that no normal or sane person would adhere to teachings of this kind. This attempt to make people believe that they are loners is highly significant, since it represents one of the goals pursued by the authorities. Luna Lovegood from the Harry Potter books was a remarkable philosopher who said something very wise about this topic. You might remember her saying to Harry Potter, in an attempt to give him courage in the face of adversity; “Well, if I were You-Know-Who… I’d want you to feel cut off from everyone else…” There can be no doubt that our own You-Know-Who in his palace would also want that.

These guards are great chaps, and the guards in my prison are also decent folk, but they don’t talk to me—they have apparently been forbidden to do so. They sometimes come out with stock phrases. This is also very important, because the aim is for me to feel unceasingly lonely. Yet this is not how I feel at all. And I will explain why. This teaching—“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied”—appears somehow esoteric and odd, but in fact it is the central political doctrine in modern Russia. Your Honor, what is it, this phrase or slogan, the most important political slogan in Russia? Where does power lie? Power lies in truth. That is what this teaching is saying. That is how it could be compressed into a Tweet, omitting the unnecessary words such as “for” and “thirst.” This is what it essentially means. And the whole country repeats in many different permutations that power lies in truth, and that whoever holds the truth will be victorious.

^{– Alexey Navalny’s closing remarks in Moscow City Court, February 20, 2021.}

 

He who humbles himself...

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful & Friends in Christ,

Let us flee from the pride of the Pharisee and learn humility from the Publican's tears. Let us cry to our Savior: Have mercy on us, O only merciful One. (Kontakion of the Sunday of the Publican and the Pharisee)

 

At Sunday's Divine Liturgy, we heard the first of four pre-lenten Gospel readings: The Parable of the Publican and the Pharisee (LK. 18:10-14). A parable is a story, and therefore is not based on an actual event, but who would deny that it reveals to us the truth about our relationship with God? That is why, in some of our prayers, we ask the Lord to grant us the spirit of the Publican and the Prodigal even though they were not individual historical characters. And yet these characters - the positive and the negative - are representative of all humanity. The parables are thus timeless sources of revealed Truth. They challenge us today, as they challenged our Lord's contemporaries.

This short parable describes "Two men" that "went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector (or publican)." (LK. 18:10). The Lord continues:

The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, 'God , I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week, I give tithes of all that I get. (v. 11-12)

 

The primary sin of this man who would have been considered "righteous" among his fellow Jews, is that of self-righteousness. True righteousness is God-sourced; but the pharisee's righteousness was self-sourced. Perhaps it is significant that Christ specifically says that he prayed "with himself." His "prayer" to God was a concise formulation of self-praise. He trusted in himself more then he trusted in God. He did the "right things," but in the wrong spirit. The sinners that he encountered on a daily basis only served to affirm him in his own perceived righteousness. The comparisons and contrasts were always to his advantage. He "needed" the sinners that surrounded him! His pride was his downfall. If pride leads to the self apart from God, then pride is the bitter road to nowhere. "For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled." (v. 14)

Of the publican, the Lord offers this short but moving description:

But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, 'God, be merciful to me a sinner!' (v. 13)

 

Aware of his sin, the publican manifests deep, heartfelt repentance. This humble recognition of his sin is, paradoxically, the publican's road back to fellowship with God based on forgiveness and restoration. Empty of pride, there is now "room" for God. Humility is the "mother of the virtues" according to the saints, and this is not the way of the world. Humility demands great trust on our part, for the humble suffer reproach in this world, and our fear of being taken advantage of works against nurturing a humble spirit. Humility is the beginning of God-centeredness as opposed to self-centeredness. "He who humbles himself will be exalted." (v. 14)

We all know the temptation toward self-righteousness and pride. The "rewards" are meaningless, for the exalted self ultimately experiences loneliness and emptiness. The proud person lives and dies alone. Yet, we still find it diffiicult to avoid such temptation. The "world' has driven the thirst for autonomy and its pride-based assumptions into our minds and hearts. To follow the Lord in His humility demands a total reorientation of our accumulated worldly "values" and worldly "wisdom." It means trusting in God, and not in oneself. Great Lent creates the environment wherein we can focus our attention on this never-ending battle for the heart's loyalties and final place of rest. The parable is a wonderful reminder of how we should approach this battle.

The Death of Alexei Navalny

Photo: free.navalny.com

Dear Parish Faithful,

I am sure that most of you have heard that the Russian dissident Alexei Navalny died last Friday while languishing in a Siberian prison near the Arctic circle (a prison that was formerly part of the Soviet Gulag slave labor camps), the victim of an oppressive authoritarian system that is responsible for his death, regardless of what the final "medical" reason behind his death actually is. That is something we may never know. And only God knows what he suffered in that prison for the last three years. 

In an age seemingly devoid of heroes, Navalny happens to be precisely that - a man of great courage and integrity. In short - a real hero. And these powerful virtues are in sharp contrast with the dictator who feared his principled opposition and then persecuted him. After nearly dying from an attempt to poison him, Navalny bravely returned to Russia to resume his role of opposition to the Putin regime. He was immensely popular. But he clearly understood the danger of returning to his home country and putting himself within the grasp of the authorities. As put in a new article in "Foreign Affairs" by the journalists Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan:

For Russian society, confused, depressed, and constantly besieged by an ever more repressive regime, Navalny was a lone unifying figure. Although Russian authorities isolated him in increasingly restrictive layers of confinement since his arrest on his return to Russia in 2021, he continued to have that stature right up to the moment of his death. Navalny’s demise marks a dark new step in Putin’s ruthless pursuit of power. But it also raises a stark challenge for Russia’s opposition, which must now figure out how to sustain the unity he created and seize the movement he left behind.

I do believe that it is "meet and right" to acknowledge Alexei Navalny's tragic death so that we can think about what it means to stand up today for truth and honesty in a time when posturing and rhetoric are being rewarded by a great deal of public opinion. If the word martyrdom means "witness," we can say that Navalny was a martyr, for he was a witness who gave his life for the sake of defending justice and honesty - what we would call "righteousness" -  as did St. John the Forerunner. Like St. John, he boldly stood up to and spoke against a leader who ruled through fear and oppression. The Herods of old have been replaced all through history by latter-day tyrants exhibiting the same dreary traits of corruption and cowardice. They can only respond to strong morally-based opposition by repression and persecution. That is precisely why history judges them as "infamous." But their victims are deeply respected and remembered as heroes and "icons" of goodness and moral integrity. 

I would like to also share a couple of paragraphs from an article by the esteemed journalist and historian, Anne Applebaum, a scholar who has spent most of her professional life studying and writing about totalitarian regimes in which basic civility is cynically trampled on. The article from which this paragraphs is taken, was published on Friday in the Atlantic Monthly and is entitled "Why Russia Killed Navalny."

The enormous contrast between Navalny’s civic courage and the corruption of Putin’s regime will remain. Putin is fighting a bloody, lawless, unnecessary war, in which hundreds of thousands of ordinary Russians have been killed or wounded, for no reason other than to serve his own egotistical vision.

Even behind bars Navalny was a real threat to Putin, because he was living proof that courage is possible, that truth exists, that Russia could be a different kind of country. For a dictator who survives thanks to lies and violence, that kind of challenge was intolerable. Now Putin will be forced to fight against Navalny’s memory, and that is a battle he will never win.

Alexei Navalny was a man of great moral integrity. His untimely death is a tragedy. We hope that it was not in vain. As we exclaim in the Church: Memory Eternal!

 

Lenten Reading List, Part 2

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

Another list of excellent Orthodox reading material for Great Lent meant to supplement Monday's list. This will allow you plenty of time before Great Lent begins on March 18 to purchase whatever book(s)  you may choose. Please contact me if you would like to discuss any of these books with me.

+ The Place of the Heart by Elizabeth Behr-Sigel. The author has been described as the “grandmother” of 20^th c. Orthodox writers. A European lay theologian, Behr-Sigel’s book is subtitled “An Introduction to Orthodox Spirituality.” This is a far-ranging description of how our immensely rich spiritual tradition developed from the Scriptures to the present day. A very rich presentation. Actually, Arch. Ware’s essay on The Power of the Name is included here as an Appendix.

+ Becoming Human by Fr. John Behr. A marvelous and profound meditation – accompanied by iconographic images – on the Person of Christ and how Christ is the link toward our own true humanity. Many great new insights here that Fr. John has put into a short meditative form based on his other scholarly studies of the early Christian tradition. A profound link is made between Christ – the one true human being – and our own emerging humanity after His image.

+  God’s Many-Splendored Image by Nonna Verna Harrison. Verna Harrison is an Orthodox nun, known as Sister Nonna. She is also a highly-respected patristic scholar and theologian. This book explores “theological anthropology for Christian formation.” That sounds rather intimidating, but prominent readers have said that “clarity, simplicity, beauty, and depth” characterize the content and style of this book. A truly wonderful exploration of what it means to be, as a human being, “God’s many-splendored image.” Insightful observations are made in this book about figures ranging from desert fathers to Albert Einstein. Sister Nonna dedicated the book “to all people whom other people have thrown away. It shows that God does not throw away people.” Who would not want to read a book with a dedication like that?

+ The Sayings of the Desert Fathers – The Alphabetical Collection, Benedicta Ward (editor and translator). Here are the multitude of aphorisms, anecdotes and wisdom sayings of the great desert fathers arranged alphabetically (the Gk. alphabet, that is) from the letters Alpha to Omega, and everything in between. These are the words of life from the great pioneers of Christian asceticism and the spiritual life. We read the words of Sts. Anthony the Great, Arsenius, and Macarius the Great and a host of other spiritual guides. An endless source of wisdom that can be read through the years.

+ How To Be A Sinner by Dr. Peter Bouteneff. This is an excellent new book that is endlessly insightful when answering the difficult question: What does it mean when I call myself a sinner? Dr. Bouteneff takes us on a journey down the “royal road,” avoiding a dark, guilt-ridden path of self-lacerating; and a superficial therapeutic approach designed to relieve us of any deep responsibility for our sins. Balanced and honest, this book will surprise you with its probing analysis.

+ Thirty Steps to Heaven by Vasilios Papavassiliou. Fr. Vasilios “walks” us up the Ladder of Divine Ascent by “translating” St. John’s classic monastic text The Ladder of Divine Ascent into a style and analysis that has a layperson living in the world primarily in mind. Yet, his commentary is not “watered down” so as to lose the depth and challenging vision of St. John. Very accessible and very practical for today’s Orthodox Christian. 

+ First Fruits of Prayer – A Forty Day Journey Through the Canon of St. Andrew by Frederica Mathewes-Green. Similar in style and tone to Fr. Vasilios’ book mentioned right above. But here this prolific contemporary Orthodox author takes us through the classic Canon of St. Andrew, chanted on the first four evenings of Great Lent; and then again on the Thursday of the Fifth Week of Great Lent. Fine resource for rhe scriptural content of St. Andrew’s famous work.

 

Also visit our Great Lent Resource Section on our parish website for more books and aids, and join us for the Journey!

Lenten Reading List, Part 1

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

Looking ahead to Great Lent (March 18), I would like to begin recommending some excellent Orthodox literature that would clearly deepen your understanding, and even practice, of this unique liturgical season. Such a list always begins with Great Lent, as you will read below. If you are new to the Orthodox Church, or have not read this book if even a long-standing member of the Church, I consider this book a "must read." 

+  Great Lent - Journey to Pascha by Fr. Alexander Schmemann. Recommended by Arch. Kallistos Ware as the best single volume about Lent in English, this book has become a “classic” that should be read by one and all. After reading this book, you will never approach the Lenten services in exactly the same way. In fact, you just may want to come to church more often during Great Lent. This book includes the great appendix chapter, “Taking Lent Seriously” which you will do even more so after reading this book!

+ The Lenten Spring by Fr. Thomas Hopko. Also already something of a “classic.” This is a series of forty three-four page meditations on a variety of lenten themes. A wonderful use of the Scriptures and the Church’s Lenten hymnography, together with Fr. Hopko’s endless stream of great insights.

+ Prayer: An Encounter With the Living God by Metropolitan Ilarion Alfeyev. A relatively new book by one of today’s most prolific and gifted theologians/spiritual directors. Short straightforward chapters that yield many insights into the practice of serious and effective prayer. Very practical and quite helpful for that very reason.

+ The Passion of Christ by Veselin Kesich. This was my New Testament professor at St. Vladimir’s Seminary. A compact and clearly-written account of the Lord’s death on the Cross. Prof. Kesich walks you through the Lord’s earthly ministry and all of the factors that led to the Lord’s Passion. In only about a hundred pages, this book will illuminate a great deal for you as we move toward Holy Week during Great Lent.

+ The Power of the Name: The Jesus Prayer in Orthodox Spirituality by Archbishop Kallistos Ware. Certainly the best short introduction to the Jesus Prayer by a lifelong student and practitioner of the great “prayer of the heart.” Arch. Ware distills years of study and practice into an unforgettable forty-page treatise. Yes – another classic!

To be continued...