‘Face’ of Old-Rite Clergy of Izmail Eparchy (Second Half of the 1940s)
Abstract
The purpose of the research paper is to outline the clergy of the Izmail Old-Rite Eparchy in the first post-war years. For this purpose, biographical data on the clergy are collected from various sources and systematized, which significantly augments the materials published to date.
The scientific novelty is in the comprehensive presentation of biographical data on the Old-Rite clergy of the Izmail region, as well as the characterization of the ‘vision’ of the Old-Rite clergy by both the Representative for Religious Cults and representatives of the Moscow Old-Rite Archbishopric.
Conclusions. The Izmail Old-Rite Eparchy, following the annexation of the Bessarabia territory to the Soviet Union, was promptly subordinated to the Moscow Archbishopric. Analyzing the reports of O. Ostapenko, Authorized Representative of the Council for the Affairs of Religious Cults in Izmail Oblast, and the documents of the Izmail Old-Rite Eparchy, it is proven that the Old-Rite clergy was under close supervision of the authorities. Since the end of 1945, clergymen were required to submit autobiographies and questionnaires detailing their origin, education, the names and dates of their ordination, and their whereabouts during the occupation. A third of the priests were born and began their service to the church in Romania; the rest were of local origin. Most of the clergymen were ordained during the period in which the Izmail Eparchy was under the jurisdiction of the Metropolis of Belaya Krinitsa (Bila Krynytsia). Accordingly, the attitude towards them was as if they were ‘Romanophiles’. The authorities sought evidence of their ‘counter-revolutionary activities’ and collaboration with the occupation authorities. Consequently, priests A. Romanov, S. Dietkov, and I. Sosin were repressed.
In their biographies, the clergy sadly stated that any relations with relatives in Romania were severed. The property of the priests was nationalized. For instance, I. Isariev, the priest of the town of Kiliia, was an excellent winegrower; T. Platonov from the village of Tatarbunary ran an inn and a restaurant. The Soviet policy of nationalization resulted in the dissolution of prominent landowners and the subsequent deprivation of religious communities of their financial support.
The clergy in the Old-Rite communities wielded significant authority. Following 1945, it came under the complete control of the government structures. In the eyes of O. Ostapenko, the Authorized Representative of the Council for the Affairs of Religious Cults in Izmail Oblast, and Iosif (Morzhakov), the Bishop of Chisinau, the local clergy, together with Bishop Arsenii, were considered ignorant, fanatics, conservatives, Romanianophiles, and, to some extent, mercantile individuals. Such an attitude undermined the authority of the priesthood.
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