A person who has decided to follow Christ and become a true Christian needs to carefully read the Gospel and understand that hostility from relatives and close ones toward any true Christian’s faith is not unusual. Our Lord Jesus Christ…
We should not presume to take God’s judgment into our hands. We do not know who will perish or who will be saved—that is God’s domain: “There is one lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy.”(James 4:12) We…
The Russian Orthodox Old Believer Church is the modern name for the Church founded by Christ Himself. In the Creed, we profess: “I believe… in one holy, catholic, and apostolic Church.” By this, we affirm that we preserve the same…
We believe and confess that an Orthodox priest, in relation to a heretical bishop, is by no means “lesser,” but—by virtue of his belonging to the True Church of Christ and his authority to bind and loose sins—he is “greater”…
The Holy Fathers call schismatics (heretics of the second rank) those who introduce novelties into Church tradition, thereby separating themselves from the unity of faith. The Orthodox Old Believers not only introduced no novelties but actively resisted the innovations attempted…
The medieval Russian concept was slightly different and more comprehensive in its original form. Its essence can be summarized as follows: the First Rome, the Orthodox kingdom, fell into heresy; the Second Rome (Constantinople) fell to the Turks; now the…
It is quite common to hear statements like this: “I am Orthodox, baptized, but I don’t go to church. I don’t trust priests. But I believe in God in my soul. I wear a cross. I’ve been taught not to…
–UNDER CONSTRUCTION– Introduction Three hundred years ago, Russia professed a single Christian, Orthodox faith and formed a single true Orthodox Church. At that time, there were no heresies, no schisms, no divisions within the Russian Church. For more than six…
From the Baptism of Rus Old Belief is, by definition, inseparably linked to history. Old Believers have always been distinguished by a profound historical memory. For them, not only recently glorified Russian saints but also the biblical patriarchs and prophets…
By George Neminuschy Foreword In this article, we shall attempt to uncover and articulate a direct link between the original attribute of Christ’s Church—its catholicity, or sobornost—and that which is referred to as communal life when speaking of Old Belief.…