REMEMBRANCE IN TIME - Index of

PRIMATES OF THE ORTHODOX
CHURCH FROM R.S.S.M. AND SOVIET
RELIGIOUS POLITICS DURING 1945 – 1962
Romeo CEMÎRTAN 1
Abstract: The anti-religious politics promoted by the Soviet State during 1945-1962 in RSSM,
whose consequences consisted in dozens of priests or monks being murdered or sent in labour
camps, in hundreds of churches being shut, in thousands of Christians being intimidated for their
religious beliefs, was promoted both by the State competent organs and by the clergymen
infiltrated by KGB in the Orthodox Church’s leading structure. Through analyzing the archive
documents in this study, there is noted that the attitude and the contributions of the Orthodox
Church primates from R.S.S.M towards the persecution of the religious feeling and of the national
traditions by the Soviet authorities during 1945-1962 was anti-national and, many times, contrary
to their status of Church leaders. Intimated or tempted by the worldly, the ecclesiastical hierarchy
presented herein also showed spiritual weakness, forgetting many times that the Church’s reason
of being is to preach the Gospel, as Christ the Saviour asked his Apostles after the Resurrection
and, through them, their followers and the overall Church to share with the people, through the
sacraments, the grace of salvation. However, despite the expectations of the atheist State, the
Orthodox Church’s mission continued, being present and glorious in the souls of the hundreds of
thousands of Moldovans, who remained faithful to the Apostles’ Church and to the Sacred
Fathers.
One of the Russian hierarchy’s multiple preoccupations in early after-War years also
consisted in the setting up of the new dioceses throughout the Baltic Countries and
Bessarabia. This way, invoking the historical and canonical law on the territory annexed
to U.R.S.S., the Russian Church re-establishes the Diocese of Chişinău and in December
1944 sends to the leadership of the diocese the bishop Ieronim Zaharov (December 1944
– February 1947) 2 . With respect to this hierarch’ activity, we found in the files from the
National Archive, a few important mentions for determining the relation between the
Church and the State in R.S.S.M. in early after-War years. The attitude of the bishop
Ieronim towards the leadership of the Soviet State, which is in perfect concordance with
the Russian Church’s general policy in its relations with the atheist State, is clearly
expressed in the telegrams sent by I. V. Stalin at certain anniversaries. For instance, on
the 07.11.1945, Ieronim, the bishop of Chişinău and Moldova, sends a telegram at
Moscow with the following content: “In the happy day wherein we celebrate 28 years
since the Great Revolution of October, the day which was crowned with the eternal and
1
National Muuseum of Etnography and Natural History of Moldavia, Chişinău, Republic of
Moldova.
2
Păcurariu Mircea, Bessarabia, aspects from Church’s and Romanians histories, Iaşi, 1993, p.
125.