ROMAN LUNKIN

The Russian state’s policy on religious education has become a mirror image of its sweeping control over all social initiatives and non-governmental organizations. While theology is now an academic subject in secular institutions of higher education, it is theological education oriented towards the Russian Orthodox Church that has seen rapid development in practice. Educational institutions founded by other faiths and denominations—above all, Protestants—function under the pressure of constant inspections, and have even faced closure. The campaign against such institutions forms a logical part of the state’s policy of restricting non-Orthodox mission, banning worship services in private homes, and barring Protestant church construction. It would be strange, after all, if the authorities looked kindly upon Christians receiving higher theological education unimpeded, while at the same time placing fines on them and confiscating their property. 

So far, the most prominent closure has been that of the Evangelical Christian-Baptist Union’s Moscow Theological Seminary in 2019. This seminary is the oldest institution of its kind, having grown out of theological courses conducted for pastors in the 1970s by the Soviet-era All-Union Council of Evangelical ChristiansBaptists. During the 1990s, the seminary became a leading Protestant educational institution and a flagship of Baptist education in Russia. It has provided study courses to pastors from all over the country. 

In October 2018 an inspection by Rosobrnadzor [Russia’s federal education inspectorate] identified legal violations in the work of the seminary. On 2 July 2019 Rosobrnadzor suspended the seminary’s educational license until  10 September. The seminary had already had its activities suspended for 60 days in January 2019, on the grounds that it had failed to rectify earlier violations. [Editor’s note: On 18 September on-site inspectors at first found no fault with the seminary, but they were overruled by their superiors, seminary staff member Alexey Markevich told the East-West Church Report. He expects a court to consider revoking the seminary’s license.] 

The misdemeanors of which the Moscow Theological Seminary stands accused are purely bureaucratic. They include incorrect formulation of curricula and activities, insufficient teaching qualifications, and health and safety violations, which have become significantly stricter in recent years. Seminary representatives insisted in court that they had rectified all of these, and that it was their right to draw up their religious educational programs as they wished—all to no avail. 

Religious educational institutions such as the Moscow Theological Seminary typically hold a license to conduct educational activity. Such a license grants the right to organize educational processes and to accept students, all under the legal framework of “Education and Training of Ministers and Religious Personnel.” 

In contrast to a license, a certificate of state accreditation confirms that the activity of a particular higher educational institution conforms to federal educational standards; educational programs may also be accredited individually. Accreditation also grants the right to issue government recognized diplomas.1 

The Russian Orthodox Church’s only educational institution whose teaching of secular subjects has been awarded state accreditation is St. Tikhon’s Orthodox University in Moscow. The Church’s Moscow and St. Petersburg Theological Academies have been accredited to teach and award bachelor’s and master’s degrees in theology, as has its Sts. Cyril and Methodius School of Graduate Studies in Moscow. The political decision to introduce theology into secular education was taken back in 2009, during a meeting between Patriarch Kirill and then-President Dmitry Medvedev. In practice, however, theology became an academic specialty only in 2015. Its standards were drawn up in consultation with the Russian Orthodox Church; Protestant representatives were not invited to discuss the issue.2 

In the interests of fairness, it should be pointed out that most Protestant institutions of higher education have not attempted to obtain accreditation for their theology teaching, as they usually lack personnel qualified to teach secular subjects. Educational institutions belonging to the Seventhday Adventist Church are notable exceptions here. In 2016 the Adventists’ Zaoksky Christian Institute of Humanities and Economics in Tula Region to the south of Moscow was accredited to teach a number of secular subjects to bachelor’s level, in addition to theology. Zaoksky Adventist University was similarly accredited in 2019. This occurred not only due to the political loyalty of Adventist leaders, but also because the Zaoksky educational complex has become established as an institution teaching secular subjects to a high standard. State accreditation of theology at Zaoksky should not be considered a Protestant breakthrough into theological teaching in the secular sphere, however. Adventist theology is quite specific, and differs from the general Evangelical worldview uniting most other Protestants.3

Semi-underground

If a Protestant institution of higher education has its license suspended or annulled, it is forced to scale back its activities. The maximum it can do is to teach religion in the form of courses or seminars to people who are already followers of the associated church. While this does not require a license, churches must avoid using terms such as “institute,” “academy,” or “seminary,” as these imply study by a wider circle of students. Instead, courses and seminars must take the form of “Sunday school,” as this is fully covered by “teaching religion to existing followers.” Anything more is deemed to be “religious education,” which requires a license under Russian law. Petr Mitskevich—head of Russia’s main EvangelicalChristian Baptist Union and rector of its beleaguered Moscow seminary—has suggested to this author that churches are consequently forced to conduct Bible courses semiunderground, just as in Soviet times. 

Mitskevich’s Baptist seminary is not alone. The Pentecostal Eurasian Theological Seminary in Moscow also had its license suspended in August 2018. In November 2018 the Baptists’ North Caucasus Bible Institute was fined 150,000 rubles [approximately $2,300] and prohibited from accepting students.4 In the same month, the largest Protestant higher educational institution in southern Russia—the Kuban Evangelical Christian University in Krasnodar—also had its license suspended. Some have been more fortunate. Both the Moscow seminary and theological institute under the Pentecostal union led by Bishop Eduard Grabovenko succeeded in passing all inspections. St. Petersburg Christian University and the Baptists’ Novosibirsk Biblical-Theological Seminary have also held onto their licenses, as has the Theological Institute of the Evangelical-Lutheran Church of Ingria in St. Petersburg. 

While the picture therefore appears mixed, the recent actions by Rosobrnadzor were not the first attempt to “regulate” the sphere of Protestant education. In the early 2000s the courts began to prosecute churches for holding religious study without a license. In 2008 a regional court even ruled to dissolve a Methodist church in the western city of Smolensk for operating a Sunday school. [Editor’s note: Prosecutors judged that the use of sea creature symbols—“five points—whale or starfish; four points—dolphin or octopus; three points—fish; two points—shark”—amounted to a formal grading system, therefore requiring a license.] Russia’s Supreme Court overturned this decision, however, affirming that teaching religion to existing followers does not require a license.5 

The fact that a number of Protestant institutions of higher education were prosecuted in 2018-19 might be blamed in part upon their administrators. Rosobrnadzor bureaucrats expect documentation to be drawn up by the experts they have recommended. Protestant institutions like the Moscow Baptist Seminary insist on their independence, however, and thus have ended up adopting a confrontational approach. Nevertheless, there is also an atmosphere of suspicion when it comes to non-Orthodox—and especially Protestant—churches. Discrimination is finding particular practical expression in two areas of the state’s religious policy: restriction of missionary activity and the right to hold property.  

“Missionary tax”

The so-called Yarovaya Law—a packet of legislation sponsored by member of parliament Irina Yarovaya in 2016—introduced control over missionary activity [in the broad sense of advocating religious ideas] through fines for engaging in such activity without authorization or on residential premises. In the course of the past three years, human rights’ defenders on Russia’s presidential Human Rights Council have repeatedly asked for these provisions to be reviewed. However, they have not been able to win a clear response from either the Constitutional or Supreme Courts, which promised to issue practical guidelines on this legislation. According to the Moscow-based Sova Center for Information and Analysis, some 460 persons had been prosecuted for “illegal missionary activity” as of late 2018, with fines paid amounting to $125,000.6 Fines are levied for a myriad of reasons: failure to notify the authorities in advance of religious gatherings; distribution of religious literature; preaching in public places; river baptisms; a children’s playground next to a church; the absence of signage with the full, legal church name on buildings where worship takes place. Most frequently hit by this distinctive Russian “missionary tax” are Baptists and Pentecostals.

Property problems

Attempts to confiscate properties used for worship on the grounds that they are not being used for their legally designated purpose—or at least to ban religious gatherings on residential premises—are also becoming more frequent. This comes on top of an established practice according to which the state blocks Protestants from constructing designated houses of worship, obstructs the return of historical houses of worship, and does not allow private homes to be re-classified as places of worship. In 2018 a Pentecostal church was thus demolished in Novorossiisk, while in the nearby settlement of Verkhnebakansk a Baptist community was prohibited from gathering at a private residence in 2019.7 (Even prior to the Yarovaya Law, a Pentecostal church was demolished in the Moscow neighborhood of Novokosino.)8 Similar situations have arisen in Krasnodar and Oryol Regions, as well as the Republic of Tatarstan. In Tula, the authorities are moving to demolish two churches belonging to Baptists and Pentecostals. The Council of Churches of Evangelical Christians-Baptists— whose communities have declined to register with the state since Soviet times—is a particular target, and faces massive fines.9

While the Yarovaya Law is applied broadly in most Russian regions, local officials prefer not to apply the 2010 law On Restitution of Property of Religious Significance to Religious Organizations to churches other than the Russian Orthodox Church. Catholics are most affected. Despite decades of requests, the building of Sts. Peter and Paul Catholic Church in Moscow has not been returned, even though a court recognized the building’s religious significance in 2017. 

The authorities have also refused to return churches to Catholic communities in Barnaul, Belgorod, Blagoveshchensk, Chita, Kaliningrad, Kirov, Krasnoyarsk, and Smolensk. Such refusals are formally ascribed to budget constraints, but there is in fact a lack of political will to return these churches to Catholics [as demonstrated by the fact that the historical Catholic chapel in Belgorod was “returned” to the Russian Orthodox Church].10 The authorities have also failed to return historically Lutheran churches in Krasnodar and Smolensk to the EvangelicalLutheran Church in Russia headed by Archbishop Dietrich Brauer. For unclear reasons, a particular situation has arisen in Crimea, where the Church staked its claim to historical Lutheran churches after the 2014 annexation. Yet the authorities there are refusing to return them in Simferopol, Sudak, Yalta, and also Evpatoria, where the historical Lutheran church is now on territory belonging to the Russian Defense Ministry.11 During 2017-18, however, the authorities did transfer churches in Moscow and Yaroslavl into the ownership of the Evangelical-Lutheran Church in Russia. 

Baptists and other Evangelicals have very few historical houses of worship. Even so, Baptists in Kaliningrad Region were refused the building used for worship there until 1945. Mitskevich’s Baptist Union has failed to obtain—and even to obtain access to—the building in St. Petersburg where the Evangelical community of Ivan Prokhanov gathered in the early years of the 20th century. There is not even discussion about compensation for houses of worship demolished during the Soviet period (usually private homes), not least because gatherings in private homes today would result in fines and bans under the Yarovaya Law. 

So-called “traditional” faiths may also have problems. Old Believers are unable to get back their historical property in Kirov, St. Petersburg, and Saratov, for instance, as well as Moscow, where local officials refused their August 2019 request to hold a prayer service outside the historical Dormition Old Believer Church on Marxist Street.12 In Sochi, an Old Believer church under construction was sealed in June 2019 when it became apparent that it would be taller than a nearby educational center whose patron is one Vladimir Putin; it is now under threat of demolition.13 The largest branch of the Old Believers were promised support, however, after President Putin visited their Moscow complex of Rogozhskoye in 2017; the restoration of that complex has attracted government assistance. 

It is clear from these religious policy trends that officials often understand protection of the Russian Orthodox Church as necessitating discrimination of other religious communities. State representatives are also irritated by the independent stance of many churches. The Baptist Union, for example, publicly defended its members in November 2018 by condemning the authorities’ “operation of intimidation” when a pastor in Tatarstan was fined for performing baptisms in a local river.14

In a recent interview with this author, Baptist Union leader Petr Mitskevich characterized what is happening in the following terms:

Any law can result in benefit or harm, and unfortunately the Yarovaya Law has brought much harm; it has in essence become an anti-missionary law that has instilled fear among believers and created problems for churches. I am a doctor by profession, and I often think about how not to cause harm but instead to help. Yet the first thought of our security agencies is usually to look for guilt and a concrete reason why someone may be prosecuted. The Church’s calling is to spread faith—that is what missionary activity is about. Yet how often are we not healed, helped, or warned here, but forced into a corner straight away, as when Rosobrnadzor suspended the activity of our Moscow Theological Seminary in early 2019. 

Our country must try to walk the path of prayer with God and trust for one another, but we are ruled by suspicion, fear, and doubt. There is no desire for reconciliation; everyone is shut away from everyone else behind iron doors. The Yarovaya Law has become a law of intimidation that can be used at any moment against any preacher, whereas there should be an enlightened and respectful attitude towards religious believers.

Periodically, the author hears from Protestant ministers that the problems faced by one or another church depend upon its leaders’ attitude towards the Kremlin. In practice, however, churches belonging to those unions whose leaders are most loyal to the authorities do not avoid fines and bans. Congregations belonging to the Pentecostal union headed by Bishop Sergei Ryakhovsky are a striking example. Bishop Ryakhovsky participates in numerous official events and travels with delegations of religious leaders to help children in Syria, yet the Eurasian Theological Seminary belonging to his union was still closed, and its pastors have been fined under the Yarovaya Law. 

Members of the Baptist Union are becoming much more vocal in their demands for freedom of conscience. A 31 July 2019 open letter from the Verkhnebakansk congregation states: “Such lawlessness is happening because the authorities do not hear us and do not wish to conduct interconfessional dialogue.”15 Soviet authorities refused to allow such believers to attend institutions of higher education. As a result, Evangelicals in the Soviet period were characteristically straightforward and lacking in formal education. Further education cannot be taken away from the post-Soviet generation of Protestants, however. As active citizens, they are ready to fight for their theology and place in Russian society,

Notes 

1. Victoria Arnold, “Russia: Obstructions to Protestant theological education ‘systemic, intentional’?”, Forum 18, 25 March 2019, http://www.forum18.org/archive.php?article_id=2465. 
2.  [In Russian] “Dmitrii Medvedev podderzhal predlozhenie of prepodavanii v shkolakh osnov religioznoi kul’tury i svetskoi etiki,” Office of the President of Russia, 21 July 2009, http:// kremlin.ru/events/president/news/4864; [in Russian], Svetlana Solodovnik, “Teologiia v svetskikh vuzakh,” Sova, 28 October 2015, https://www.sova-center.ru/religion/publications/2015/10/d33126/.
3. https://zda.zau.ru/about/1.
4. Arnold, ibid.
5. Geraldine Fagan, “Russia: Methodist church dissolved for having Sunday school,” Forum 18, 26 March 2008, http://www.forum18.org/archive.php?article_id=1104; Geraldine Fagan, “Russia: Reprieve for Methodist Sunday school–but for who else?”, Forum 18, 30 June 2008, http://www.forum18.org/archive.php?article_id=1151.
6.  [In Russian] “Opublikovany dannye o primenenii stat’i o «nezakonnom» missionerstve za pervoe polugodie 2018 goda,” Sova, 24 October 2018, https://www.sova-center.ru/religion/news/harassment/intervention/2018/10/d40192. 
7. [In Russian] “V Rossii vlasti snesli zdanie piatidesiatnicheskoi tserkvi,” Invictory, 19 March 2018, https://www.invictory.org/news/society/6989-v-rossii-vlasti-snesli-zdanie-pyatidesyatnicheskoj-tserkvi; [In Russian] “V Novorossiiske sorvano prazdnichnoe bogosluzhenie baptistov,” Sova, 8 April 2019, https://www.sova-center.ru/religion/news/harassment/intervention/2019/04/d40861/.
8.  Felix Corley and Geraldine Fagan, “Russia: Shock at Moscow church demolition,” Forum 18, 6 September 2012, http://www.forum18.org/archive.php?article_id=1738.
9.  [In Russian] “Obrashchenie Tul’skoi tserkvi MSTs EKhB,” Council of Churches of Evangelical Christians-Baptists, 1 March 2019, http://iucecb.com/news/20190301-1605.
10. Geraldine Fagan, Believing in Russia—Religious Policy after Communism (Abingdon and New York: Routledge, 2013), 89-90.
11. Roman Lunkin, “Religious Politics in Crimea 2014-2016,” East-West Church and Ministry Report, vol. 25, no. 2 (2017), 7-10.
12. [In Russian] “Vlasti Moskvy ne razreshili staroobriadtsam provesti moleben u zdaniia byvshego khrama,” Sova, 26 August 2019, https://www.sova-center.ru/religion/news/harassment/places-for-prayer/2019/08/d41386/.
13.  [In Russian] “Eto i nazyvaetsia ‘zazhravshaiasia putinskaia elitka’,” Deacon Andrei Kuraev’s blog, 1 June 2019, https://diak-kuraev.livejournal.com/2456113.html.
14.  [In Russian] “Otrkytoe zaiavlenie Rossiiskogo Soiuza evangel’skikh Khristian-baptistov,” Russian Evangelical Christian-Baptist Union, 28 November 2018, https://baptist. org.ru/news/main/view/article/1485287.
15.  [In Russian] “Otkrytoe informatsionnoe pis’mo,” Russian Evangelical Christian-Baptist Union, 31 July 2019, https://baptist.org.ru/news/main/view/article/1512752.

Roman Lunkin heads the Center for the Study of Religion and Society at the Institute of Europe of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow).