A
poll from February 2016 showed that 65% of Americans view Russia
unfavorably and only 30% favorably.
At
first glance this is not all that surprising.
For much of the second half of the 20th hundredyear, the Cold
War with the Soviet Union dominated the
American mind. And the Operation
Mockingbird, CIA-controlled Western media are now trying to convince those in
the States that Russians are madly clamoring for a return to Soviet Communism
in order to drum up fear and hatred against them.
But
what should the American attitude toward Russia be? Should it not be one of friendship, if ‘America’ really
is the beacon of Christianity it claims to be?
For Russia
has been a Christian country for far longer than the [u]nited States have been
on anyone’s political map, being baptized into the Orthodox Church in 988
through the conversion and leadership of St Vladimir. Russia
has in fact just celebrated the 1,000th anniversary of the presence
of Russian monks on the Holy
Mountain, Mt Athos:
. . .
Noting
the 1,000 years since Russian presence at the northeastern Greek
peninsula, Putin classified Mount Athos a
“unique center of Orthodoxy and Christianity” that preserved and expanded
its spiritual traditions and shared values.
“Reviving the values of patriotism, historical
memory, traditional culture, we look forward to strengthening our
relations with Athos. It is encouraging that every year it is visited
by an increasing number of pilgrims from Russia, already
more than 11,000 a year,” he added.
. . .
Source: http://www.pravmir.com/putin-sure-russia-s-ties-with-athos-greece-to-continue-developing/,
accessed 1 June 2016
Furthermore,
Russia
has seen a surge of interest in Christianity since the Soviets fell from power:
The patriarch recalled that by 1991 Russia had only
7,000 operating churches and 22 monasteries. Today [the year 2010--W.G.] the
country has over 30,000 churches and some 1,000 monasteries.
Source: http://sputniknews.com/art_living/20101203/161616486.html,
accessed 7 June 2016
So
what does it mean that so many in ‘Christian’ America
mistrust Russia?
Perhaps
that Christianity isn’t the real religion of the States but rather
‘Americanism’ - the idea that America is the messiah nation, that it is God,
that it will usher in the Golden Age of political and economic blessedness that
fallen mankind has always dreamt of.
Christian elements may be present in the working out of this project
(and they have been), but they are always subordinated to the ends of
strengthening the Kingdom of Man, the system of the world, and not for the sake
of laying up treasure in Heaven.
Here
is what Alexis de Tocqueville wrote in the 1830s about Americans’ thoughts of
the world they live in and of themselves:
The Anglo-Americans acknowledge the absolute moral
authority of the reason of the community, as they acknowledge the political
authority of the mass of citizens; and they hold that public opinion is the
surest arbiter of what is lawful or forbidden, true or false. The majority of
them believe that a man will be led to do what is just and good by following
his own interest rightly understood. They hold that every man is born in
possession of the right of self-government, and that no one has the right of
constraining his fellow-creatures to be happy. They have all a lively faith in
the perfectibility of man; they are of opinion that the effects of the
diffusion of knowledge must necessarily be advantageous, and the consequences
of ignorance fatal; they all consider society as a body in a state of
improvement, humanity as a changing scene, in which nothing is, or ought to be,
permanent; and they admit that what appears to them to be good to-day may be
superseded by something better-to-morrow. I do not give all these opinions as
true, but I quote them as characteristic of the Americans.
The
Anglo-Americans are not only united together by these common opinions, but they
are separated from all other nations by a common feeling of pride. For the last
fifty years no pains have been spared to convince the inhabitants of the United States
that they constitute the only religious, enlightened, and free people. They
perceive that, for the present, their own democratic institutions succeed,
whilst those of other countries fail; hence they conceive an overweening
opinion of their superiority, and they are not very remote from believing
themselves to belong to a distinct race of mankind.
Source: Democracy in America, http://www.gutenberg.org/files/815/815-h/815-h.htm, accessed 7 June 2016
This
‘overweening opinion of [American] superiority’ has only worsened with the
years and is leading to disastrous consequences here and abroad. For pride is opposed to the nature of the
life of the All-Holy Trinity and all that He has made:
. . .
The
Kingdom of God (and all of reality) is hierarchical
by nature. But its hierarchy
is just that – a “sacred” (hieros)
“order” (arche). In the
case of Mary we can see how this hierarchy is not that of the world with its
competition and violence. Mary sings, “You have exalted the humble and meek and
the rich you have sent away empty.” The mere “arche” of the world is measured
by power (and its frequent abuse). The hierarchy of the world (sacred order),
however, is a hierarchy of grace in which self-emptying love is the greatest thing
of all.
The
devotional habits of the Church seek to inculcate in our hearts a proper regard
for this sacred order. The veneration given to the Mother of God, described as
“hyperdulia” by the Fathers (“extreme honor”), teaches us not that she is equal
to God, but that she is greater than I am. For strangely, when I refuse to
grant that any other creature is greater than I am, then I am slowly drawn
towards a heart that will not grant that the Creator Himself is greater. This
gives us the refusal of the contemporary culture to acknowledge the limits of
its own creaturehood. We imagine that we can be anything we want to be and that
we are the creators of our own reality. Such a “creator” can only be found in
the mirror.
There
is a legend, widely cited in the Tradition, that in the great Council of
heaven, before the creation of humanity, the archangel Lucifer saw the
Theotokos and the dignity to which she would be raised. It is said that this
sight stung his pride and provoked his rebellion. He could not bear to think
that a creature who was mere dust could be greater than all the hosts of heaven
(including himself). In his rebellion, his anger was directed less at God and
more at us, for we were the cause of his humiliation. Thus, he became a
“murderer from the beginning” (Joh 8:44).
That
same spirit, unrecognized, breathes in our culture and its rebellion against
the true hierarchy of heaven. The saintless equality of a democratic heaven is,
strangely enough, only a colony of hell. There, only the private light of self
is allowed to shine, no other being permitted to eclipse it.
. . .
Source: Fr
Stephen Freeman, https://blogs.ancientfaith.com/glory2godforallthings/2016/05/27/democracy-kingdom-god/,
accessed 6 June 2016
In
the earthly hell of Christless, Crossless Progress that the American Empire is
trying to establish all across the world - the latest fruit of the New England
Puritans’ idea of the Shining
City on a Hill - only its
light is allowed to shine (and that light is darkness). All others must yield to it or face
destruction. The light of the South has
been much darkened by the American unlight.
Let us all pray that the light of Russia, the light of the Holy
Orthodox Church, will overcome it peacefully in the days ahead.
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