I went up to the northern suburbs of Moscow, sort of Neasden-ish area but less cultured-looking, to see the Moscow Times and came upon this, the lovely Church of Faith, Hope, Love and Their Mother Sophia (at least that is how I translated the name!). The Orthodox Church, which embodies an unworldly faith in what I really think is profound wisdom, has been one of the conduits of cultural history in Russia since the middle ages. One recent aspect of that cultural history, if "cultural" is the right word, is the Soviet tradition of officiousness, rudeness and contempt for the public. If you want a bit of time-travel back to the cleaner, simpler world when the proletariat were in charge, go into a church. You will have old ladies bustling about telling you not to do this, not to sit there, not to take photographs and so on. When you point out that they are selling photographs, the walnut-shaped shrew with the headscarf on will get angry in a peculiarly shrivelled, nasty sort of way. When you ask, why? the hatred for reason and equality will boil within your benighted babushka almost visibly. Both the Orthodox and the Victorious Proletariat believe(d) in absolute authority--which is possibly why they didn't get on. Like Stalin (see next section below), Orthodoxy has produced many spectacular buildings, but almost as many horrible people.
Wednesday, 6 June 2007
Doing the decorating
I went up to the northern suburbs of Moscow, sort of Neasden-ish area but less cultured-looking, to see the Moscow Times and came upon this, the lovely Church of Faith, Hope, Love and Their Mother Sophia (at least that is how I translated the name!). The Orthodox Church, which embodies an unworldly faith in what I really think is profound wisdom, has been one of the conduits of cultural history in Russia since the middle ages. One recent aspect of that cultural history, if "cultural" is the right word, is the Soviet tradition of officiousness, rudeness and contempt for the public. If you want a bit of time-travel back to the cleaner, simpler world when the proletariat were in charge, go into a church. You will have old ladies bustling about telling you not to do this, not to sit there, not to take photographs and so on. When you point out that they are selling photographs, the walnut-shaped shrew with the headscarf on will get angry in a peculiarly shrivelled, nasty sort of way. When you ask, why? the hatred for reason and equality will boil within your benighted babushka almost visibly. Both the Orthodox and the Victorious Proletariat believe(d) in absolute authority--which is possibly why they didn't get on. Like Stalin (see next section below), Orthodoxy has produced many spectacular buildings, but almost as many horrible people.
