The Soviet-era repression of Christian clerics has led to the posthumous recognition of many new Orthodox saints. But the faithful, it seems, are not interested. They still prefer the quick fix of traditional saints to these humble “new martyrs”, writes Stella Rock.
For the last five years a small Moscow-based NGO, the SOVA Centre for Information and Analysis, has produced an annual report on radical nationalist activity in Russia and the efforts
Between forty and ninety thousand believers paid their respects to the late Patriarch Aleksii II, who died on the morning of 5 December 2008, as he lay in state in
Pilgrims at the St Seraphim Spring in Diveevo (phot.Sandra Reddin)
‘Faith means you don't notice the cold, the hunger, the fact your feet are sore,' an