Vol. 51, No. 3 (302) May–June, 2015

The Good Shepherd Giveth His Life

This issue of The Orthodox Word features Part I of the reminiscences of attorney Arkady Kuznetsov about his spiritual father New Hieromartyr Thaddeus (Uspensky) (+1937), a great Russian hierarch, confessor, clairvoyant ascetic, and luminary. During the time period covered in this article, the early 1920s, St. Thaddeus was the archbishop of Astrakhan. This was a perilous time for the Russian Orthodox Church, which was being attacked from without by the new Soviet authority and was being threatened from within by the “renovationist schism,” composed of church liberals intent on “modernizing” Orthodoxy. Being actively supported by the Soviets, the renovationists took over two-thirds of the Orthodox church buildings in Russia during the brief height of their power.

The author's insightful narrative contrasts the otherworldliness of St. Thaddeus with the worldly turmoil caused by the renovationists, and also grants us a revealing look at a difficult period in Russian Church history.