Russian Patriarch links rights and Christian ethics
Russian Orthodox Patriarch Alexiy II said on Tuesday European civilisation was threatened by a divorce of human rights from Christian ethics that opened the way to immoral behaviour.
Posted: Tuesday, October 2, 2007, 22:46 (BST)
STRASBOURG - Russian Orthodox Patriarch Alexiy II said on Tuesday European civilisation was threatened by a divorce of human rights from Christian ethics that opened the way to immoral behaviour.
Talking at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe at the start of a visit to France, he defended his opposition to a Gay Pride parade in Moscow. He told a questioner after his speech he had compassion for homosexuals, but gay sex was a sin and gay parades were "propaganda for homosexuality".
Alexiy's speech echoed similar defences of Christianity in Europe by Roman Catholicism's Pope Benedict, who is keen to hold a historic meeting with the Russian prelate. Alexiy told a French newspaper a meeting could take place in a year or two.
"From the very beginning, human rights developed in the context of Christian morality, forming with it a kind of tandem," he said. The Council of Europe's role is to protect human rights, democracy and the rule of law.
"Yet today, there occurs a break between human rights and morality and this break threatens European civilisation," he said . "We can see it in a new generation of rights that contradict morality."
DESTRUCTIVE FORCES
The growing gap between rich and poor and fading ideal of social justice in Russia and elsewhere in Europe was a major problem that required a moral solution, he said.
"In Russia, our Church has many times called to discuss the miserable condition of millions of honest workers whose very few compatriots are extremely rich and glaringly extravagant," he said.
Alexiy also called for the study of religions in school because, he said, many extremists claimed to act on religious grounds. "These destructive forces grow on the soil of religious ignorance and moral scarcity," he said.
The Russian Orthodox Church is the largest in Orthodox Christianity, which claims about 220 million followers. The Vatican, representing 1.1 billion Catholics, wants to work more closely with it to defend Christianity in Europe.
Relations were strained after the collapse of the former Soviet Union in 1991 as the Russian Orthodox Church accused the Catholics of trying to expand their influence there. Recent high-level contacts have been friendlier.
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Added: Wednesday, October 3, 2007, 19:05 (BST)
Re: the Orthodox Church's position on rights and human sexuality: this is a church which frowns on sex even between married men and women, and which exalts celibacy. Sex is for procreation, not pleasure. Married couples often enter seperate monasteries and convents after their children are grown and gone, or live as chaste "brothers and sisters".
People celebrate the feast days of saints whom they are named after and not their own birthdays, because the latter are seen as being reminders of parental "lust". Many Orthodox Christians will not sit with their legs crossed, as this makes the symbol of the Holy Cross below the waist, where bodily functions occur and where reproductive organs are. Women are not supposed to enter churches when menstruating, as they are "unclean".
Given the traditional problems that Orthodoxy has with the human body and human sexuality of any stripe, it is no wonder that it ties human rights to its understanding of Scripture. A sexual free-for-all is not a good thing, but neither in my opinion is a repressive interpretation of Scripture which denigrates the bodies which God has given us, is obsessed with denial and acsetisim, and which makes all passion and joy in life suspect and "anti-spiritual".
Hans Jaeger, Boston USA
Added: Tuesday, October 2, 2007, 23:13 (BST)
Our dialog, internationally, may benefit to focus on defining achievable "Human Rights" for all world inhabitants (including those imprisoned, institutionalized, marginalized, etc.) apart from the moralistic issues inherent in Free Will (a most critical human right). Our Creator had a clear purpose in permitting a life experience in which morality is chosen, not legislated. Obviously, to succeed as a peaceful species, we need to set some boundaries. I believe that human history well elucidates that such boundaries act more as springboards than fences -- creating opportunity and access to such divine aspects as Truth, Trust, Faith, and Love and Becoming (this list to be evolved by humanity in its discovery of Creation/Creator). I think we must beware imposition of any specific faith's values. As for Christianity, Christ clearly stated that we are to be Christlike with one another... not enforce Christlikeness upon the other.
Liam Ream, Cincinnati, OH, USA
