ABSTRACT
With its enhanced public presence, the Russian Orthodox Church sets out its strategies for establishing itself as a “moral entrepreneur” and a post-Soviet moral mentor. It works in collaboration with the state to invent new traditions, such as the National Day of the Family and the raising of monuments of saints in the urban environment. Orthodox family values, the state’s pro-natalist policy, and the construction of national identity are in synergy, forged through historical imagination. Instead of being “dug out of the ashes” intact, Orthodoxy is being rediscovered and reinvented.
Diverse religious practices are united by the concepts of power and national consolidation. Religious power is the foundation upon which heterogeneous ethical discourses, negative moralizing, and disciplinary practices unfold. The conservative values such as obedience and humility reflect the strong influence of monastic religiosity on the lay environment. In turn, the empowerment of women is an aspect within the struggle for power and discipline in Orthodox communities. Women are empowered through active participation in important liturgical and charitable practices. Under the conditions of continued social change, the aspirations of the clergy to impose unitary Orthodox morals are confronted with the reality of multiple moralities that are located between the poles of negative moralizing at one end and the search for good on the other. The ethic of Orthodox virtue is interwoven with and disputed by the ideas inherited from socialism. However, striving for good is the main ethos, explicitly discussed and shared in religious communities. Together with the principles of shared moral imperatives, these are the pillars around which the identity of Orthodox parishes is consolidated.
