Daily Archives: October 9, 2015

The Death of the New World Disorder

Life has taught me that love is stronger than hate. I know that evil is a powerful force, but I firmly believe that goodness will triumph even though at times it is long in coming and puts human patience and faith to hard tests.

Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna, sister of Tsar Nicholas II,
25 Chapters of My Life, p.12

Recent anti-Russian Western rhetoric has been so absurd that it is actually amusing. Now the CIA-controlled Nobel Institute has awarded a Nobel Prize for Literature to a leading Belarussian atheist Russophobe! And as regards Syria, we have heard all the usual NATO propaganda (= lies), that Russia is ‘weak’, that Russia is aggressive (that coming from the USA which created the Middle East mess with its oil-greedy invasions and blood-soaked revolutions!), that Russia’s mission (at the request of the Syrian government) ‘complicates matters’ (it only complicates the Western policy of ensuring that the war in Syria never ceases), that a Russian missile landed in Iran, that Russian planes invaded Turkish air space, that many of its missions have been totally ineffective, that bombs missed targets (unlike US bombs in Afghanistan which did indeed destroy the hospital they were aimed at) etc etc.

All this when, apparently, ‘the Russian economy is in tatters’, words said by President Obama, whose own economy has $18 trillion dollars of debt, money that will never be repaid, not to mention his tens of millions of citizens who live in extreme poverty. In the UK, with its failed infrastructure of potholed roads, inefficient and vastly overpriced railways and other privatized utilities and underfunded health and education systems, such words sound especially ironic. Particularly to those who have to feed themselves in foodbanks, after successive UK governments wasted £35 billion in Washington’s futile war in Afghanistan, which is now, just as in 2001, largely Taliban-controlled. In other words, we are once more hearing all the usual US-issued inanities which the Western media are paid to repeat. There are none so venal as Western journalists.

Clearly, the Western elite supports Islamist terrorism, which it set up and armed in 1980s Afghanistan. However, the Western elite already openly supported, financed and praised terrorism in pre-1917 Russia. As for support for Islamism, Great Britain supported it in the Ottoman Empire in the 19th century Balkans, even invading Russia together with Turkish forces in the so-called Crimean War. True, during the First Western War, Great Britain fought against Turkey at Gallipoli – but only in order to stop Russia from freeing Constantinople and liberating that final corner of Europe from Turkish occupation.

The Western elite has a very long and consistent history of fighting against Christianity, from the barbarian Normans in Sicily and England, from the pagan Crusades and the Teutonic Knights, until today. The Christians of the Middle East, deserted by the West, just as those of Bulgaria 150 years ago, look desperately to resurgent Russia for freedom amid the beheadings and crucifixions carried out by the Turkish/Saudi/Qatari-funded terrorists. When your head is being chopped off, it is of no importance whether your executioners are $500 million, CIA-trained ‘moderate terrorists’ or Turkish-trained ‘extremist terrorists’.

What is happening? We have been granted a brief respite from the coming of Antichrist, whose advent has been under preparation by the Western elite for 1,000 years, but with vastly accelerated rapidity in the last 100 years. A miracle has happened – not that the elite can see this, for its hearts have been blinded by hatred and jealousy. The Apocalypse is for later. It is not that we need more time to preach Christ to the majority of the demented elite, which in its pride has become almost impervious to the Gospel, it is that we need more time to preach Christ to the six billion who do not belong to the Western world and have not yet been poisoned by its toxic wells of atheism.

The Western elite has isolated itself in its pride and taken masses of Western people into its propaganda, brainwashing them through its imposed cult of ugliness and obesity, of tattoos and dressing in rags. But we are not the masses, we are Christians. And when the Establishment and its mob call out ‘To the lions’, we shall go with joy, thus joining the noble Christians of Libya and Syria and Iraq. The New World Disorder that has been imposed on us since 1989 and lasted a generation is now clearly crumbling. The resurgence of the Christian Empire, centred in Russia just as before 1917, is thwarting the plans of the Western atheists and their masters. That is why they are so angry and so full of poisonous words and deeds. They so much fear the New World Order of the renascent Christian Empire that they are even starting to believe their own propaganda.

Our Hope for a Russian Orthodox Church in Norwich (Update 7)

The Update

Can all our generous donors please pay their pledges, which are now required, to our charitable trust: East of England Orthodox Church (Registered Charity No 1081707).

Bank: Natwest
Account Name: East of England Orthodox Church
Sort Code: 60 08 17
Account No: 13674013
IBAN: GB18NWBK60081713674013
IBAN BIC: NWBKGB2L

May God bless you for having considered the Russian Orthodox Community in Norwich in your almsgiving.

Fr Andrew
9 October 2015

History

In the East of England there is at present only one multinational and multilingual church faithful to Russian Orthodoxy with its own urban premises. This is St John’s Church in Colchester. God willing and with your support, we have now been able to buy a second one, in Norwich, exactly 60 miles, 100 kilometres, to the north of Colchester.

Why Norwich? For the last four years I have been visiting Norwich and some of the 200 Russian Orthodox there, mainly recent immigrants from the Baltic States, especially from Estonia. I have baptized several in their homes, married couples in Colchester, buried, blessed houses, listened to confessions, visiting every few weeks, sometimes twice a month and am Orthodox chaplain at Norwich Prison.

We thought of dedicating our community to St Alexander Nevsky. We attempted to begin liturgies using the Greek Orthodox church building in Norwich, but were impeded. How are our people and English people and others interested in the witness of the Russian Orthodox Church, to be cared for pastorally? Only from a church building. And such life is required not only by Russian speakers, but also by Romanian, Bulgarian and English Orthodox. Most of our regular parishioners, only one of whom has a car, live within easy walking distance of this building.

On Friday 8 May, Fr Andrew saw a leasehold property for sale on the rightmove website for £50,000 at 134, Oak Street, Norwich. It measures 88 square metres externally and is at present used as offices and rooms for a cultural centre. It has electricity, heating and water and is in very good condition. It is so cheap because it is leasehold, in other words, you have to pay £100 rent per month for the ground it is built on. This amount is fixed until 2032. The lease itself is even longer – it lasts until 2047.

On Wednesday 13 May we organized a visit to these premises, attended by 9 local Russian Orthodox.

By Friday 15 May, Orthodox in Norwich had generously promised to donate £5,250.

On Monday 18 May Fr Andrew received Archbishop Mark’s blessing to buy the building if possible, meaning we could start obtaining pledges to donate.

On Thursday 21 May we heard from the surveyor that it would cost £3,000-£5,000 to knock down the internal walls and make good the floor and ceiling, so we could use this building as a church. This was lower than Fr Andrew had estimated.

On Wednesday 27 May we heard that our offer of £42,500 had been accepted. However, since conversion and furnishing costs will come to £12,500, this meant that we would need £55,000 in all.

On Friday 29 May we submitted the planning application for change of use from offices to a place of worship. This, we were told then, would take at least 6-8 weeks but should result in a positive answer.

On Wednesday 3 June we launched an internet appeal for £55,000 in order to set up our own church in Norwich.

By Wednesday 29 July, eight weeks after the appeal launch, total gifts and pledges had reached £55,000.

On Tuesday 29 September, after over three and a half months!, we finally received planning permission to convert the building into an Orthodox church.

We are now waiting for legal documents to be exchanged. Once this has happened we can start building work to transform the building into an Orthodox church. At last a permanent home for Russian Orthodoxy in Norwich after over thirty years of struggles. Thank you!