Today, no one needs to prove the need for spiritual, moral and patriotic education of future generations of our citizens. Only a blind person can fail to notice the catastrophic fiasco of the past and present in this area, which have led to the current situation in the country. Today, there are many historical, political, economic studies on the topic of the Great Victory, but few studies on the spiritual reasons for the beginning of that war and the victory in it. Little research on the conclusions that we should have made after the Great Patriotic War in order to prevent the World War III in the future. We are already, in fact, facing the beginning of the World War III! This spirit is seen and felt not only by Orthodox Elders who possess the gift of prophecy, but also by the laity and even secular specialists: political scientists, economists, sociologists and other experts with analytical skills.
It is obvious that we need a well-built and functioning system of spiritual and moral education; not conversations about it, not debates around this topic, not emotions and experiences about lost generations, but a serious contribution of the whole society to its construction and functioning.
Which problem should be called the main one in building this system of education? Of course, it is the lack of spiritual monolithicity and ideological unity of our entire society. And it is not that there are many confessions in our country, but the microscopic nature of our church environment, its disunity and passivity. According to various estimates, only 2-3 percent of Russian citizens are seriously and systematically involved in spiritual life - they pray regularly at home, attend church services, participate in the Sacraments of the Church, try to fulfill God's Commandments, and abstain from mortal sins. At the same time, according to various surveys, 60-70 percent of the population of Russia consider themselves baptized Orthodox Christians.
Therefore, the main goal of building a system of spiritual and moral education can be called a mass change in the consciousness, worldview of a modern Russian Orthodox person. A Christian must become a Christian, not only in words, but also in deeds. This part of civil society must become the main formative force in this system of education. With its help, we need to form a core, around which other peoples wishing to join the Orthodox ecumene can gather, and not only traditionally Orthodox, but others. We see a huge interest in Orthodoxy in Africa, China, India, and in Asia as a whole. In other words, based on the thoughts of Met. Neophytos of Morphou, expressed by him in one of his last interviews, our task now is to "become good students of Orthodox saints."
At the same time, we should not have illusions and we should be realistic, because in the context of history we often observe a cooling of faith, but we should not panic and despair. To think that with the help of a perfect system of spiritual and patriotic education we will radically change the situation, especially in a short time - is very naive and utopian. But we cannot sit idly by! As the Russian proverb says, you are going to die, but sow wheat anyway.
We must appeal to those who can still hear, to those whose hearts have not yet hardened. Based on the words of Father Nikoloz, the beloved disciple of Gabriel of Georgia, who has kept a vow of silence for almost 20 years, we can say: if at least 10 percent of the population of Russia becomes a church people, then Russia will be different!
This monk lives in an apartment in Tbilisi in solitude. And when he was asked how many sincere, real Orthodox people there are in Georgia, and almost 100 percent of the population is baptized there, he answered in writing: If there were at least 10 percent Orthodox Christians in Georgia, then Georgia would be different.
There is another explanation for this figure. During the time of Equal-to-the-Apostles Emperor Constantine, at the very beginning of his reign, Christians in the empire were only about 10 percent. But they had a fiery faith and a great determination to follow Christ until death! They were united, active, had great love for God and people, were ready for great sacrifices. And through these people, our spiritual ancestors, Christ changed the entire world of that time! This approach was effective and already in the 4th century, in a fairly short time, more than half of the inhabitants of the Roman Empire became Christians.
Therefore, the two main tasks of building a system of spiritual and moral education are the spiritual enlightenment of already baptized Russian people, as well as the baptism of those Russians who are not yet baptized, but are in the spiritual darkness of atheism, agnosticism, paganism, sectarianism or even Islam. Unfortunately, it is now becoming a common occurrence for Russians to convert to Islam.
We need to remember that patriotic education must be tightly linked to spiritual and moral education, and be dependent on it. Because it is clear that spirituality and morality must come first; a patriot without a soul is an oxymoron, although there are plenty of such cases now...
According to Blessed Augustine, when God is first, then everything else falls into place. And his teacher, St. Ambrose of Milan, pointed out the following hierarchy of values:
1. God
2. Fatherland
3. Family
4. All the others.
Indeed, if the Lord is in the first place in your heart, God is everything to you, then it is not surprising that such a Great Martyr as St. George the Victorious appeared, who refused a military career and service to the Roman Empire for the sake of Christ. If for you the Fatherland is in the second place according to this hierarchy, and family is in the third place, then it is impossible for you to make the great mistake of Yanukovych, the then acting president of Ukraine, who, saving his family, abandoned the country entrusted to him to drown in blood. And as a result of this logic, if you truly love your family, then you will not prefer it to helping other people. Let us recall the words of Paul the Apostle: "But if any provideth not for his own, and especially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel"
Well, and of course, such a person always puts himself in the last place in such a hierarchy of values. This is how the Great Victory or Holy Victory, as the Elder, Archimandrite Vlasiy (Peregontsev) spoke about it, became possible. After the tragedy of 1941, people remembered their Orthodox roots and put themselves in last place, and God in first place, the Fatherland in second. Moreover, even in the then peaceful year of 1937, during a non-anonymous census, more than half of the country's residents called themselves faithfuls. In this spiritual revival, in this mass repentance of the people, are the reasons for the Victory, the reasons for mass heroism. But, unfortunately, this period was short-lived, after the war we again began to plunge into the swamp of atheism and religious indifference, and today, 35 years after the opening of churches and the legalization of religion, despite the abundance of churches, this period essentially continues. Now we see the materializing of the words of the St. Seraphim of Viritsa that the times will come when not persecution, but material abundance, a consumer paradise will turn more people away from the Church.
So, what can we do now to build a system of spiritual and moral education, what means do we have and what might its basic contours look like?
There are currently about 40,000 regular schools and about 40,000 priests in Russia. This is symbolic. It would be ideal to assign a priest to each school to teach the "Fundamentals of Orthodox Culture" and to provide spiritual guidance to children outside the school walls. But this is impossible. The most realistic option is to send to schools those church people who graduated from seminaries and church courses but never became priests. To do this, they must not only teach the "Fundamentals..." course, but also be educators for children; not nominal ones, like the deputy head teacher for education, but real ones. That is, they must work with children 24/7 with appropriate funding from the state! Otherwise, we will have a very hypocritical and bad situation of profanation of education itself - often people far from the Church, who were simply assigned to this course by the principal due to their specialization (teachers of history, Russian language and literature, social studies) will teach children church life! This will only push many away from the faith!
Most likely, we will not have enough graduates of seminaries and church courses for all schools. Then the Church can prepare more personnel and from among church people, this is fundamental. I am sure that we will find 40,000 people with pedagogical education or with pedagogical abilities!
If we talk about money, then the expenses for the state are minimal. Even if we take a salary of 50,000 rubles per month, then per month we get only 2 billion rubles. Per year it comes out to only 24 billion rubles! For comparison, according to TASS, the expenses for financing programs for the development of physical culture and sports in our country amount to 64.4 billion rubles in 2024. Is the development of sports really more important to us than spiritual and patriotic education?
If we talk about the content of the educational program, it should be more practical than theoretical. Through such a church educator, schoolchildren should first of all not receive a mass of knowledge about God, but perceive the very spirit of the Tradition of the Church, absorb the Divine energy that should emanate from it. For such a blessed enlightenment of the souls of children and adolescents, it is necessary not only to teach lessons within the walls of the school, but also to go with them on pilgrimages, pray at services, introduce them to the Sacraments of the Church, touch the holy relics, communicate with spiritual people - with monks, priests and bishops who will pass on their living spiritual experience.
Many may find these proposals utopian, but in fact they can be implemented, if there is political will and our desire to cooperate with the authorities on this path, as well as the desire to get out of our comfort zone. After all, to have a dialogue with the world, we need to spend a lot of effort, resources, energy, learn to speak in a language they understand, but without going to extremes, looking for a golden mean. On this path there will be mistakes and disappointments, periods of personal falls and rises, times of despondency and laziness, but also growth in patience, humility and love!
We will have to build this system in any case, and I believe that it will be built - either before the World War III or after it. But already now we all need to prepare ourselves for this historical endeavor of raising true Christians and patriots of our Motherland!
Most likely, this will happen after the war, because our society is still incredibly deaf to the preaching of the word of God, and the preaching itself often sounds very quiet and timid.
I would like to finish with the words of the Neophytos of Morphou, who was acquainted with many Elders-prophets, and to whom the Saint Paisios of Mount Athos himself predicted at the age of 18 his future episcopacy and future martyrdom precisely during the World War III (the Metropolitan himself is still alive). He said this:“We are now in a time of God’s wrath, and I think that anyone who does not understand this and is now trying to give solutions to social, political or even church problems is deeply mistaken. Fire is approaching. Gather in your parishes, in your monasteries, in your homes… We must first be nourished by the Orthodox faith ourselves, and then the Chinese, Indians, Africans will be waiting for us – many of them will want, although not all, to receive this Orthodox faith. Even the Germans, as the prophets say, will ask us for the Orthodox faith… Our task now is to become good students of the Orthodox saints.”
Автор статьи: Максим Анатольевич Злобин, православный христианский миссионер, публицист, выпускник аспирантуры Московской духовной академии.
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