September 11, 2007 (the date of publication in Russian)
Yegor Kholmogorov
THE CHURCH CONSECRATES RUSSIA'S NUCLEAR SHIELD
Russian nuclear weapons protect the world from a new Hiroshima
On September 4, 2007, top Russian scientists and military officers celebrated the sixtieth anniversary of the national nuclear program in Moscow in concert with the Russian Orthodox Church. After a solemn Eucharist in the Military Glory Hall of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, gonfalons with the holy face of Saint Venerable Seraphim of Sarov were presented to specialists from the 12th Chief Department of Russia's Defense Ministry.
This highly specific event was poorly covered by Russian and foreign media. The cadres of the Russian TV are still dominated by persons who react to words "Russian" and "Orthodox" in the same way as a patient with rabies reacts to water.
According to an old saying, as soon as you cross yourself, the implicit evil reveals itself. The accord of the Russian ecclesiastical and scientific communities over the backbone of national security echoed with an outburst of violent hatred from liberal authors. Victor Shenderovich, the once-host of the mocking "Dolls" TV program, plagiarized from the British "Spitting Image", compared the Russian clergy to Pagan worshippers: "After the crash of a Boeing, owned by Nepal's airline, the servicemen of the Katmandu Airport sacrificed two goats right in the hall of the airport, thus exorcizing evil spirits. This example has probably inspired the physicists of Mother Russia. Not surprisingly, the country enters Century XXI with a crucifix on the armor and personal medievalism under the arm. The canine wedding of the church and the state, definitely, is not restricted to the military: it is celebrated by Russians literally under every fence".
Other liberal scribblers alleged that consecration of nuclear weapons discredited the peaceful activity of the Church in 1950-1980s. Meanwhile, any reader of a textbook of contemporary history of the Orthodoxy is perfectly aware of the fact that the Church's involvement in Soviet global “struggle for peace” missions was a compromise, serving for the purpose of survival of the Church as an institution, especially in the times of blatantly cynical ostracism of the Church during the rule of General Secretary Nikita Khrushchev.
The hysteria over the Church's decision to consecrate the strongest of weapons of mass destruction is groundless. The Russian nuclear weapons never killed a single person in a war – on the contrary to the US nuclear potential, used against the civil population of Japan's Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Though the scale of the two tragedies was huge – also due to the failure of the Americans to calculate the whole immediate and potential damage of radiation – it has to be admitted that the death toll of conventional weapons has been scores greater. The definition of the weapons which has not killed anyone and prevented immense casualties of possible global wars since it had emerged as a keystone of global strategic parity, is essentially absurd.
The raging liberal authors are especially hysterical over the choice of Saint Seraphim of Sarov as the patron saint of Russian nuclear weapons. They argued that the town of Sarov became Arzamas-16, the center of national physical science, in the Soviet period, is described as "a mere occasion". However, any person able to apperceive the spiritual reality of the Orthodox faith and the essentials of Orthodox agiopolitics – namely, the implementation of the Bible's saying "Czars rule through me, and sovereigns enact truth through me" – would admit that this choice was made not at all at random.
Lord not only propagates His eternal teaching across the universe but determines historical forms of self-organization of humans into kingdoms, peoples, nations, and countries. This divine policy is exercised both directly, by means of divine miracles, like the manifestation of Christ to Emperor Constantine the Great, and through mediation of Saints, executing His will in the Heavens and on the earth. Such kinds of political miracles have been performed by Our Lady – in particular, saving Moscow from Tamerlane's hordes through the Icon of the Godmother of Vladimir, as well as the liberation of Moscow from Polish troops in 1612 under protection from the Icon of the Godmother of Kazan. Such kinds of miracles have been performed by a multitude of Christ's Saints, martyrs, tsars and priests.
The choice of a particular Saint as the executor of the divine agiopolitical dispensation represents a certain message for each of the mortals. The decision to choose Seraphim for protection of the nuclear potential is a sign of this kind.
Rev. Seraphim of Sarov was a great prophet, who annunciated two great truths to all the Orthodox believers. The first truth identified the eternal vocation of any Orthodox believer, and of the Orthodox Russia as a whole, in acquisition of the Holy Spirit. Thus, the idea of the Sacred Rus acquired new meanings in the age of a liberalistic transformation of global Christendom. Sacred Rus, definitely, does not suggest divinization of Russia in the whole of its apparent existence and not a literary abstraction as well. It is the totality of everything consecrated by the actual grace, of everything that deserves God's blessing.
The second truth, annunciated by Rev. Seraphim, was the truth of the End of the World. Seraphim anticipated the terrific implications of Russia's retreat from Orthodoxy. These prophecies are associated with the Great Mystery of Diveyevo, the mystery of a new arrival of Seraphim to the world in order to preach for human repentance. This Mystery involves the legend about St. Seraphim's groove, dug across the lawn touched by the feet of Our Lady as she manifested herself to him: "As soon as the Antichrist arrives, he will cross every groove except this one".
Orthodox Russians view Seraphim’s Groove as a real place which is inaccessible even for a triumphant Beast. At the same time, it epitomizes the human force and reality which is insurmountable even for rabid Evil. Thus, the present mission of the Saint is to protect the potential, against which any hostile intentions to destroy Russia break apart. This weapon is a political groove which is to be supplied with a spiritual and devotional groove, a groove of true faith and strong adherence to the Orthodox teaching.
Joseph Stalin, the begetter the Russian nuclear potential, once identified the Russian nation as "the most talented nation in the world, which is invincible when it is well armed". He consistently implemented this idea, laying the groundwork for the great military technological potential of the Russians. Therefore, despite the most terrific implications of the revolution, as well as the rule of Stalin himself, his deeds in the upbuilding the backbone of Russia's strength eventually deserved the Church's blessing both in the times of World War II and in the memory of the Orthodox succession, which regards the Russian nuclear complex as a monument of the epoch.
As a Marxist (though with an original theological education), Joseph Stalin made a mistake of a different kind, failing to foresee that even a military power, equipped with most perfect materiel, is exposed to the weapons of psychological warfare, deliberately developed for destruction of both its spiritual and territorial integrity, as well as the whole range of its devastating implications.
Russia's opportunities in the XXI century are guaranteed and protected by two grooves – the physical one, excepting the possibility of military attack from outside, and the spiritual one, destined for a theological deed.
This spiritual weapon is embedded in the capacity of the Russian nation to imbibe itself with the spirit of Orthodox Christianity, and thus acquire endurance to the daemonic fire. Therefore, everything which is identified by Russia's cultural adversary as "clericalization" is a real and true benefit. Faith is to be reinforced with intellectual and moral strength, guaranteeing strategic superiority over the Beast's world order, armored protection from its logical and verbal tricks, a powerful immunity from idolatry of the West and the East. In other words, Russia requires the Orthodoxy's spiritual patronage both in faith and reason.
That is why the ideology of "nuclear Orthodoxy", born in the beginning of the new Millennium, is paving its way through the inertia of the bureaucracy and cynicism of the press, emerging as a domain where the State and the Church are meeting and establishing a new symphonic unity.
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