Inside the Hidden Lives of a Centuries-Old Religious Community in Siberia

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Too bad they are Russian Orthodox. A “life occupied by religion and nature” sounds great. Maybe I should start one for Roman Catholics that doesn’t involve getting accepted to an order for which I’m probably too old and not virginal enough and not interested enough in social justice.
 
What if a unification between the Orthodox and Catholic peoples may be coming (but not just yet)? 🙂

I know your nun comment was tongue in cheek but didn’t Mother Angelica’s mom become a nun? If she can, why not you?
 
I don’t know about her mom.

I am a long way from being able to become a nun at this moment due to an extremely large number of responsibilities and personal things that would need to be sorted out. Just walking off and leaving them to somebody else would not be very nice and I don’t think that’s what God wants me to do. It would also be a form of “running away” and I don’t think an order would take a person who is doing that.
I also am far from certain I feel a call to any religious life.
 
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From the article:
" The Old Believers separated from the Russian Orthodox Church following a set of reforms introduced by Patriarch Nikon in 1652. [The changes, which were made in order to more closely align with the Greek Orthodox churches, included the spelling of Jesus’ name in the prayer books and the number of fingers used to make the sign of the cross. Unwilling to accept the revisions, Old Believers were imprisoned or persecuted. Many went into exile and moved to the isolated plains of Siberia."
So how many fingers do they use? All Eastern Orthodox use 3 fingers to make the sign of the Cross.
Here it says they also separated (schismatic?) From the Russian Orthodox Church (does not say why but I suspect the author of the article knows very little about church rules).
Are we sure their beliefs are not Russian-centric like Dugin? Fr Dugin also spoke against the current bishops in Russia and against ecumenism and against Roman Catholicism as a whole. I doubt this “purified” group would welcome tooany people here unless they get baptized.
I once saw a documentary on a Siberian Russian group, similar to this, who did not identify as Christians. They were just very Russian and close to a more natural way of life. One member was a former CEO from a big city who had frozen his bank accounts and went to live wild in Siberia. He didn’t say he deleted or donated his money just that they were frozen. So… is he planning to maybe one day return?
Like the article also says - “sect”.
 
There is not such as “the” old believers, we speak here mainly about at least two groups:
-old believers who have priests and worship in an old way, live the old lifestyle
-old believers who don´t have priests anymore and have established some sort of “lay priesthood” like many evangelicals (home “liturgies”, gospel readings etc)

There are other rather pagan and russian-ethnizism centric groups, sometimes called “old believers” but this is more an inaccurate term of some authors. But right, he old believers don´t have much interest in new outside followers, just like the Hutterites.

Both groups make the sign of the cross with two fingers. The other orthodox with three, you are right.
They didn´t obey the russian church in their church reform. Intended was the reform to re-establish so-thought more original liturgies (more near to the ancient byzantine style), later being proved as not more authentic or older, but this was not the only reason for the old believers to separate (other theme).
Now, fortunately, the old believers who have priests are in communion with the russian orthodox church, exchanging priests is sometimes happening. Many of them return to russia from south america now as the soviet regime is down.
 
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Too bad they are Russian Orthodox. A “life occupied by religion and nature” sounds great. Maybe I should start one for Roman Catholics that doesn’t involve getting accepted to an order for which I’m probably too old and not virginal enough and not interested enough in social justice.
I have more no´s to religious life than my ten fingers (married, instable health, not called etc) but I always loved this “plain and simple” thing.
I enjoy reading such articles from time to time. Germany is the last country where you can live leaved alone in a forest, but I look forward to establish my “little house on the prairie” at the moment.
 
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