The Russian Patriarchate has hosted a round table on the handover of state-owned church properties to the Church. The round table brought together representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church and Moscow museum employees over the long-simmering property dispute in parliament and in society.
The meeting took place in the wake of the recent publication of an open letter from cultural and scientific figures to Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia. The authors of the letter urge the authorities to suspend the handover of state-run historical and cultural properties to the Russian Orthodox Church. A law to this effect, they claim, would damage the country's national legacy and is fraught with a confessional split of society. Being drafted by the Economic Development Ministry, the law is aimed at settling the de facto dispute in the right way. Opening the round table, the Chairman of the Church and Society department in the Moscow Patriarchate Vsevolod Chaplin spoke of the core of the problem:
"Apparently, the legislation is set to change, as more and more properties are being handed back to the Church. Liberal economic views supporters claim that the state should own nothing beyond its scope of activity".
According to Vsevolod Chaplin, the future church property law will apply to buildings already in use by the church and will not apply to museums, archives or libraries. But, in the words of Deputy Culture Minister Andrei Busygin, historical monuments in the museums, even if they stay untouched by law, leave all the same. The Church is reclaiming both real estate properties and what is inside - icons decorated with precious stones or in gilded frames.
Nearly in all cases of church property handover the properties' future maintenance is often a point of concern.
The Tretyakov Gallery Director Irina Lebedeva urged the participants in the round table to feel more responsibility in addressing the property issue:
"We should be guided by a single scale of values, she says. Otherwise, in several years we might regret placing this or that icon in its so-called "historical place" in view of how the society as a whole has benefited from it. Raphael's "Sistine Madonna", commissioned by a monastery, was housed in the monastery for 200 years and became an icon to worship. When the monastery ran into hardships it sold the painting to a Polish king. Now, the question commonly asked is what was more important for humanity - for the canvas to return to the monastery so that the monks could continue to pray to it, or for it to become part of a secular museum and acquire world significance? Irina Lebedeva, the Director of the Tretyakov Gallery, urges the parties involved to set their priorities right and with more wisdom".
Please rate: