‘Faith makes life simpler,’ wrote Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, shortly before his suspicious death in an Arctic penal colony.
The new paperback edition of his autobiography, Patriot – first published shortly after his death in February 2024 – is set to bring Navalny’s courage and commitment to wider audiences around the world.
Navalny tells of his Christian faith, and his project to memorise Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount in several languages while in prison.
The 47-year-old campaigner and blogger has been described as “the most prominent face of Russian opposition to President Vladimir Putin.” Navalny had survived poisoning attacks and years in some of Russia’s most notorious jails. His group had exposed corruption in many parts of the Russian state, including involving President Putin.
Last year in February, Navalny fell silent. Prison authorities say he had gone for a walk, had lost consciousness and died. His supporters, and many people and governments around the world are more sceptical.
In Patriot, Navalny writes movingly of his Christian faith. He said, “I have always thought, and said openly, that being a believer makes it easier to live your life and, to an even greater extent, engage in opposition politics. Faith makes life simpler.”
While in prison, Navalny sought to memorise the 111 verses of the Sermon on the Mount – in Russian, English, French and Latin. He writes, “After an intricate covert operation extending over two months, I managed to acquire 111 cards that my press secretary, Kira, had made for me. Each has on one side the number of the verse, and the other the text in four languages.”
He challenges his readers, “Are you a disciple of the religion whose founder sacrificed himself for others, paying the price for their sins? Do you believe in the immortality of the soul and the rest of the cool stuff? If you can honestly answer yes, what is there left for you to worry about?”
In the final words of his poignant autobiography, Navalny writes, “My job is to seek the Kingdom of God and his righteousness and leave it to Jesus and the rest of his family to deal with everything else. They won’t let me down and will sort out all my headaches. As they say in prison here: they will take my punches for me.”
Alexei Navalny’s widow, Yulia, continues the opposition to Vladimir Putin, refusing to call him ‘President,’ because she does not accept the legitimacy of his election. Earlier this year, she spoke at events in the UK, including the ‘Truth Tellers’ conference in London, hosted by Reuters editor-in-chief Alessandra Galloni, vice chancellor of Durham University Karen O’Brien and distinguished editor and journalist Tina Brown.
Rev Peter Crumpler is a Church of England minister in St Albans, Herts, UK, and a former communications director with the CofE.
