Petrograd progressive clergy's group and the Soviet confessional policy of the period of the Civil War

Authors

  • Mikhail Yur'evich Krapivin St. Petersburg State University

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.21638/11701/spbu02.2020.204

Abstract

In June-July 1919, informal consultations between representatives of the authorities and a group of "progressive" Orthodox clergy were held in the premises of the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Council. They discussed the possibility of publishing on behalf of the invited persons an appeal condemning the actions of the White Guards and interventionists, as well as expressing solidarity with the Bolsheviks in their struggle against external enemies. Meetings with the clergy were organized by the leadership of the so-called the Common sub-department of the Petrograd city department of justice. This kind of initiative contradicted the state policy in the religious issue. At the same time, it corresponded to the directives of the Secret Department of the Cheka. The article describes the course and results of the “private meeting” of the summer of 1919, analyzes the proposals made by its participants, and the variants of the text of the final document discussed at the meetings. In the end, most of the invitees felt that the clergy’s performance with a politicized declaration was contrary to the Decree on the separation of church and state and therefore unacceptable. The history of the “consultations” that once took place in the Common sub-department unexpectedly became the subject of a “discussion” that unfolded in the spring and summer of 1921 between investigators of the Petrograd Provincial Cheka and a participant in the “private meetings” of 1919, one of the leaders of the renewal schism in the Russian Church A.I. Boyarsky. The struggle to establish the truth turned for the archpriest criminal prosecution and prison sentences.

Keywords:

Civil war, Orthodox Russian Church, Petrograd “Committee of Orthodox Clergy, sympathetic to the new order and actively helping it”, The “initiative group” of progressive clergy, Petrograd Soviet of Workers and Red Army Deputies, The Common sub-department of the Petrograd city department of justice, Detskoselskoye District Political Bureau, Petrograd Provincial Cheka, priest / archpriest A.I. Boyarsky

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Author Biography

Mikhail Yur'evich Krapivin, St. Petersburg State University

Doctor in History, Professor

References

Литература

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Published

2023-12-28

How to Cite

Krapivin, M. Y. . (2023). Petrograd progressive clergy’s group and the Soviet confessional policy of the period of the Civil War. Vestnik of Saint Petersburg University. History, 65(2), 392–408. https://doi.org/10.21638/11701/spbu02.2020.204

Issue

Vol. 65 No. 2 (2020)

Section

History of Russia

License

Articles of "Vestnik of Saint Petersburg University. History" are open access distributed under the terms of the License Agreement with Saint Petersburg State University, which permits to the authors unrestricted distribution and self-archiving free of charge.