Paul
Goble
Staunton, May 15 – Bishop Tikhon
(Shevkunov), long identified as Vladimir Putin’s spiritual advisor and noted
for his numerous outspoken comments on a wide range of subjects (portal-credo.ru/site/?act=topic&id=902),
has been appointed to head the metropolitanate of Pskv and Porkhovsky by the
Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church.
He will presumably be elevated to
the rank of metropolitan, thus putting him in a position to play a far greater
role in church affairs than hitherto --- he has had the relatively minor role
of head of the Patriarcahte’s council on culture, a position he supposedly will
retain – and puts him in a position to run for the position of patriarch once
Kirill passes from the scene.
That possibility has been the
subject of almost all commentary on the bishop’s elevation (e.g., kasparov.ru/material.php?id=5AFA8C21760A2,
svoboda.org/a/29226589.html,
forum-msk.org/material/news/14638502.html,
bbc.com/russian/news-44089827,
ruskline.ru/news_rl/2018/05/14/v_etih_pomeweniyah_reshalas_sudba_russkoj_pravoslavnoj_cerkvi1/, diak-kuraev.livejournal.com/2026704.html
and sobkorr.ru/news/5AFA8C21760A2.html).
And it is certainly not impossible
or even improbable. If Tikhon eventually
becomes patriarch, he could be expected to put his and thus Putin’s mark on the
church. But such a further elevation is some time in the future. The more
interesting question is what does Tikhon’s latest rise say about relations
between the Kremlin and the Patriarchate and Patriarch Kirill.
First and most obvious, it shows
that Putin already has effective control of the church hierarchy. Kirill has
often gone off the reservation as far as the Kremlin is concerned, on issues
having to do with Ukraine and Abkhazia, for example. But Tikhon was elevated by
the hierarchs, a signal to Kirill that he doesn’t control the church as much as
he may think.
Second, it gives Putin yet another
lever to ensure that the Patriarchate and the Patriarch do what the Kremlin
wants, especially as issues surrounding autocephaly for Ukrainian Orthodoxy
highlight the weakness of Moscow within the Orthodox world. Kirill now knows
there is someone the Kremlin would be only too happy to see replace him.
And third, Tikhon’s elevation likely
puts the Orthodox Church on track to support an even more traditional
caesaro-papist traditionalism than even Kirill has been willing to champion. The
stronger Tikhon becomes, the more the Orthodox church can be counted on to
promote the Russian regime’s portion of archaic and obscurantist anti-Westernism.
Those three things, even more than
the distant possibility that Tikhon will one day be patriarch, are the most
important consequences of his elevation this week
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