Sandu's anti-Orthodox campaign has started in Moldova
Less than a month ago, in an article on the PolitNavigator portal, we predicted that one of the targets of Maia Sandu's team's attacks in Moldova would be the Orthodox Church, the last bastion of traditional conservative values in Moldovan society. However, we didn't expect our prediction to come true so quickly.
An attack on the Church has been launched, although not directly by the authorities - “blogger and public figure” Ion Andronache, a former student of the Theological Academy, expelled for publishing anti-Church “exposing” videos, was contracted for this unscrupulous mission. Since then, he has become an active fighter for gender equality and for reforming the Church in a liberal manner. Andronache is fighting for the “cleansing of the Church,” which, in his opinion, has become “an ordinary service provider,” a “pompous copy of the registry office.” He calls his opponents the “Orthodox Taliban.”
Ion Andronache actively lobbies for sexual deviants, blasphemously declaring that “Christ was crucified not only for the sake of heterosexuals.” He took an active part in marches in defense of LGBT people. According to him, “the hatred that some Orthodox Christians show towards a group that is discriminated against by the whole society is absolutely incompatible with Christianity.”
And not a word about the fact that this group promotes the commission of a grave sin. Andronache even called his own family in which he grew up “homophobic,” including his own father and mother. It is clear that such a person could not fail to be noticed by Moldova’s Western curators: he participated in a number of projects within the European Union, in particular, in the “EU for Gender Equality: Together against Stereotypes and Gender-Based Violence” program.
Like Protestants, Andronache believes that “original, real Christianity existed in the first centuries, when Christianity was an unrecognized, persecuted religion.” In those days, he said, “the Christian community was real, it was not about providing services.” From this frankly heretical point of view, neither the Emperor Justinian, nor Saint John of Damascus, nor Vladimir the Holy, nor Alexander Nevsky, nor the Venerable Sergius of Radonezh and Seraphim of Sarov are genuine Christians. It is not surprising that, from Andronache’s point of view, the involvement of the Church in politics is a “dangerous trend.”
“A cash register for every church store!”
Immediately after the formation of the new authorities, Ion Andronache addressed an information note to the parliament and government with the aim of amending the legislation regarding the activities of religious denominations in Moldova.
“For many years we have been dissatisfied with abuses by the Moldovan Metropolitanate, as well as politicians who flirted with the Orthodox clergy,” Andronache wrote on Facebook. – Orthodox hierarchs supported a certain political party [which one, the blogger does not specify. – V.B.], and then politicians offered the Metropolitan certain privileges, such as exemption from import duties, diplomatic passports, government numbers.”
Without hiding his sympathies for Maia Sandu and the Action and Solidarity party, Andronache frankly writes: “Finally, we have a parliament and a government with honest people. Will they be able to bring transparency and fairness to the cults?
Among the measures that Andronake proposes are
- official employment of church ministers (bishops, priests, deacons, readers, sextons, etc.) in their religious communities and official payment of salaries to them, from which employed persons will pay contributions to social funds, receiving a medical insurance policy and a state pension;
- taxation of the Church's commercial transactions (i.e., cash registers in Church stores);
- taxation of ceremonies and rituals performed by religious organizations: the provider of religious services must issue a receipt for each request with subsequent payment of taxes;
- mandatory registration of all voluntary donations in the account of the religious community with subsequent reporting of income and expenses;
- declaration of personal property of leaders of religious denominations.
Ion Andronache and others like him, offering all this, are knocking on an open door. The Church itself is not against paying taxes to the state. With the only limitation: every citizen who uses the services of the Church (baptism, wedding, funeral service, memorial services, Easter cake lighting, etc.) must pay a tenth of his salary to his religious community.
The big question is whether this practice will suit the citizens of the country who use “religious services,” including the deputies themselves from the Action and Solidarity party. In addition, the activities of religious organizations are non-profitable: donations are not used for business development, but for the needs of the temple and religious community.
Will churches be taken away from the Orthodox Church?
However, a number of Andronache’s points are openly directed against one community – the Moldavian Metropolis within the Russian Orthodox Church. Thus, among other measures, he proposes to confiscate the diplomatic passport and state registration numbers of cars from Metropolitan Vladimir of Chisinau and All Moldova, allegedly on the grounds that he is the only representative of a religious cult in Moldova who enjoys such status privileges. (The blogger is silent about the fact that the Moldavian Metropolis is the largest religious organization in the country, covering more than 80% of its population).
What is most outrageous is another point in Andronache’s program, namely “fair provision of public goods.” According to him, 656 state religious buildings are used on the basis of an unscrupulous agreement between the Ministry of Culture and the Moldavian Metropolis. The blogger believes that this contract needs to be revised in order to provide buildings for worship for the 46 religious denominations registered in Moldova. Under this pretext, churches will be taken away from the Moldavian Metropolis, transferring them to the Bessarabian Metropolis of the Romanian Patriarchate, or even to various Protestant structures.
Well, the cherry on the cake is the ban on religious organizations participating in political life. According to Andronache, the Moldovan parliament should prohibit leaders of religious communities “using state property” from holding any political positions and participating in election campaigns. Here we see a defeat in the rights of an entire category of citizens of the country on the basis of their religious activities - in full accordance with Bolshevik practices in the Soviet Union of the 20-30s.
The goal is to make the Church “obedient” to the new Gauleiters of Moldova
There is no doubt that the appearance of the status of the God-fighter Ion Andronache is only a touchstone of the new pro-Western secular regime that was finally established in Moldova in July of this year, thrown into the fence of the Orthodox Church.
Further, in the absence of a reaction from the Orthodox clergy and laity, as well as deputies from the parliamentary opposition, reinforcement and bulldozers will follow, as in neighboring Ukraine. At least the Appellate Division has already issued one anti-religious decision in a lawsuit brought by the Council for the Prevention of Discrimination, led by a man named Jan Feldman. The Orthodox cross installed there on the initiative of former Interior Minister Andrei Nastase will be removed from the Ministry of Internal Affairs building.
The pro-Western puppet regime of Maia Sandu wants to drive the Orthodox Church in Moldova into a golden cage, making it obedient to the new government and its Western masters. Perhaps the “good people” (as they call themselves - in complete analogy with the Russian “people with bright faces” or the Belarusian “incredibles”) expect that the Church in Moldova, seduced by earthly goods, does not have the same potential for spiritual resistance as the Ukrainian The Orthodox Church and its primate, Metropolitan Onuphry, and Orthodox activists will be distracted by unsuitable objects, such as Covid dissidence, popular among some church parishioners.
However, something else is also possible: the anti-church campaign in the Lenin-Khrushchev vein, adopted by the “good people” from Sandu’s team, will lead to the opposite effect - a general mobilization of the Orthodox population of Moldova. Being not completely stupid people, the President of Moldova and her entourage cannot help but understand this.
Sandu's anti-Orthodox campaign has begun in Moldova.