Orthodox Parishes Research Articles

Spór o jurysdykcję nad parafiami w województwie białostockim jako element konfliktu między Polskim Autokefalicznym Kościołem Prawosławnym a Patriarchatem Moskiewskim

The article presents an analysis of the jurisdiction conflict in the Polish Autocephalous Orthodox Church (PAKP) in the Bialystok province in 1944–46. After the border changes imposed after World War II, only four Orthodox deaneries were in the area. The majority of the clergy rejected the authority of Bishop Tymoteusz from the PAKP and subordinated to the Archbishop Bazyli of Minsk. In consequence, Patriarch of Moscow Alexei (Simanski) took over the canonical jurisdiction of all parishes in Bialystok. However, the strong position of the Ministry of Public Administration led to the restoration of Polish sovereignty over Orthodox parishes in this area.

Urban and Rural Population in the Barnaul Parishes in the Second Half of the 18th - 19th Centuries

The article focuses on the analysis of the size of Orthodox parishes in Barnaul as well as the dynamics of the proportion of urban and rural population in the second half of the 18th - 19th centuries. It is concluded that there were four Orthodox parishes in Barnaul. By the end of the 18th century, the population of 24 villages was attributed to them, from 1808 - 29, by the mid-20s of the 19th century the parish territory reached its maximum size and included 33 villages. The population of rural areas in urban parishes increased during the first half of the 19th century. The indicator reached its maximum values by 1846 (51.6%). The increase was associated both with an increase in the number of villages assigned to the churches of Barnaul, and with an increase in the number of inhabitants in them. Since the end of the 1840s, with the beginning of active church building in Altai, the “area” and the number of rural population in urban parishes began to decline. The urban population was unevenly distributed between parishes. The proportion of the townspeople of the Peter and Paul Church among other parishes of Barnaul until 1860 was more than 70%, later it decreased to 34%. The clergy, built in the 1860s of the Intercession Church, "served" an average of 32% of the city's population. In the first half of the 19th century, 17% and 9% of the townspeople were assigned to the Zakharievskaya and Odigitrievskaya churches. In subsequent years, the figures were 27% and 7%.

The Relations between the Russian Orthodox Church and the Soviet State in Central Asia in the 1940s - Mid 1960s (Illustrated by the Example of the Tashkent Deanery)

In this article the author examines state-church relations in Central Asia in the 1940s - mid 1960s illustrated by the example of the Tashkent Deanery during the period of the development of the Russian Orthodox Church under the patronage of the institute of state commissioners for the Russian Orthodox Church. On the basis of an analysis of unpublished archival sources, the author describes the process of reconstruction of parishes on the territory of the Tashkent and Central Asian dioceses, analyzes the economic and property relations between the state and the church, and the financial activities of the Orthodox parishes of the Tashkent deanery. The author focuses on issues related to the staff of Orthodox priests assigned to parishes, their level of education. The author briefly touches on the problem of Catholics and representatives of the Armenian Gregorian Church, who were not allowed to establish houses of prayer. The article provides statistics of the rituals requested in Tashkent in the context of the Assumption Cathedral and the Alexander Nevsky Church. The author comes to the conclusion that the demand for Orthodox rituals in the churches of Tashkent was associated with the high proportion of the Russian population living in the capital.

“Priest” Jan Lewiarz – an Organiser and Restorer of the Orthodox Church in South-Eastern Poland

The purpose of the article is to present the activities of Jan Lewiarz as the organiser and restorer of the Orthodox Church in south-eastern Poland. There are several versions of the biography of Jan Lewiarz, which do not make it possible to say whether he actually was ordained a priest. However, he became one of the most important people in the Orthodox Church in Poland. His activity, joined with close cooperation with state authorities, led to the taking over of many properties and temples which belonged to the Greek Orthodox Church. Many of them became the basis for the creation of new Orthodox parishes in south-eastern Poland.

Letters of Orthodox Priests about the German Occupation of Estonia during the First World War

During the invasion of the Baltic provinces between 1915 and 1918, a large swathe of territory and its population fell under German control: this included Orthodox parishes and their priests. The clergy and laity thus had to face many new challenges: the behaviour of occupation forces, material deprivations, and the actions of Lutheran clerical and secular elites in the new context. This article focuses on the response to the advance of the German armies in 1915 and 1916 into the Baltic. On the one hand, the article addresses the preparation and execution of the evacuation of the clergy and the rhetoric that underpinned the process of evacuation. On the other hand, it examines the problem of the church life under occupation. As evident from the sermons and articles published in the ecclesiastical press, the Germans represented a major threat to the Orthodox faith, clergy, and church property. Thus most Orthodox institutions were evacuated from the Baltic in 1915. Finally, the article discusses the position of the Orthodox Church during German occupation of the Estonian islands seized by the imperial German navy on 3 November 1917 from the perspective of parish priests. The article is based on the letters written by priests to the bishop of Riga and provides a complex picture of the German occupation, much of which differs from the representation of Germans in Russian war propaganda. Most priests represented the German forces as being relatively respectful towards churches and the clergy: their main complaint against the soldiers was the seizure of food, horses, and property, with the concomitant disruptions and discomforts this caused. The more serious threat to Orthodoxy, according to this evidence, came not from Germans but from the Lutheran clergy, who allegedly used the opportunity afforded by the invasion to undermine the Orthodox Church’s position. This publication will provide a unique insight into religion under occupation during the First World War, revealing the difficulties of maintaining everyday religious life in a multiconfessional region during and after invasion.

Религиозность и удовлетворенность жизнью: опрос православных приходов

Многочисленные зарубежные исследования показывают, что религиозность тесно связана с уровнем субъективного благополучия. Однако спорным остается вопрос, каким образом проявляется эта связь. С одной стороны, повлиять может социальный капитал (социальные сети), который человек получает в религиозных организациях. С другой стороны, отмечается влияние собственно самой религии, благодаря которой человек обретает смысл жизни и лучше справляется с трудными жизненными ситуациями. В нашей работе мы попытались оценить, как религиозность, воцерковленность респондента, его включенность в общину влияют на уровень субъективного благополучия. Исследование основано на данных массового опроса прихожан 12 приходов Русской православной церкви, расположенных в разных типах населенных пунктов и в разных регионах России.
 Благодарность. Статья подготовлена в рамках проекта «"Невидимая религия" Т. Лукмана: истоки концепции и возможности применения для анализа современного русского православия» при поддержке Фонда Развития ПСТГУ.

Anti-renovationist opposition in the Orthodox Church in the territory of Donetsk region (1922 – 1925)

The historical circumstances of theorganizational development of the Renovatonist movement in the Orthodox Church in Donbas remain one of the less investigated pages of the Ukrainian Local Church history.
 Even though the problem of the Ukrainian Church history of the interwar period has been studied by manyresearchers, a large number of questions exist which require elaboration. Nowadays based on the earlier unknown material, it is possible to widen the general picture of the mentioned events.
 That`s why the main purpose of the article is to figure out a holistic picture based on a comprehensive analysis of historical sources and scientific literature, as well as the grounds of the anti-renewal opposition's struggle against the reformation and organizational development of theRenovatonist movement in the Orthodox Church in the territory of Donetsk province in 1922 – 1925. The originality of the article involves an attempt to research the events of Donbas Church history without traditional historical clichés, and in this case, all the trends of Ukrainian ecclesiastic life of that time should be considered. In our strong opinion ignoring the deep needs of interecсlesiastic life’s normalization led to a Church split. With the help of the atheistic government, theRenovation movement achieved its institutiona organization. The characteristic issue of the religious life in Donbas was its relative conservatism. That was the main cause of the slow development pace of the reformationally oriented Ukrainian Orthodox Autocephalous Synodal Church. Moreover, while speaking about the Synodal Church should be taken into consideration the demonstratively loyal attitude of the Ukrainian Renovationist clerks to the atheistic government. That`s why despite the renovational hierarchs` attempts to the complete curtailment of church reforms the Synodal Church in Donetsk region could cover only a third of the Orthodox parishes on the land’s territory. These circumstances testify to the lack of awareness of the scope of the problem of the national church reformation by the hierarchs of the Synodal Church. The history of the organizational development of the Donbas Renovatonist movement proves the need for the introduction of modern methods of missionary activity against the backdrop of the implementation of a strategy of implementation of current church reforms to effectively develop local Orthodox eparchies.
 In conclusion, it`s worth mentioning that nowadays the research of Donbas church history of the interwar period is complicated by the difficult political situation in the region. Unfortunately, the material of the Lugansk and Donetsk archives is unavailable for Ukrainian researches, but gradual actualization of this problem makes the strong prospects for its fast research in the future.

Causes of Child Mortality in Yekaterinburg at the Turn of the 20th Century: Classification Experience

This article aims to identify the main causes of child mortality in late imperial urban Russia with reference to Yekaterinburg, a peripheral but economically developed and rapidly growing regional centre characterised by the typical problems of European cities of the turn of the twentieth century, such as overpopulation, very basic sanitation, and lack of medical personnel and infrastructure. The research is done with reference to records of child deaths from the church books of two Orthodox parishes in Yekaterinburg, i.e. Ascension and Epiphany between 1880 and 1919, comprising 7187 records, which are an integral part of the Ural Population Project database (URAPP). The authors divide the records in accordance with the international historical death causes classification developed by European historical demographers, including 1) deaths caused by infections; 2) noncommunicable diseases; 3) causes described by outdated popular terms; 4) deaths caused by external factors; 5) illegible records; 6) missing causes. The study reveals a low involvement of professional physicians in the mortality registration: fewer than 4 % of child deaths were certified by doctors. In Yekaterinburg, this duty was performed by the clergy, and in contrast to European cities of the turn of the twentieth century, an indication of the specific cause of death was stated in almost all the records. The analysis of the Yekaterinburg data shows that infectious diseases accounted for to 65 % of child deaths; diseases described by means of obsolete terms caused 28 % of child deaths; and noncommunicable diseases accounted for 7 % of deaths among young Yekaterinburg residents. Deaths due to external causes amounted to less than one percent.

THE SPECIFICITY OF THE LOCAL SURNAME SYSTEM IN BIELSK IN PODLASIE REGION AT THE TURN OF THE 19TH AND 20TH CENTURIES IN CONDITIONS OF CONFESSIONAL (ORTHODOX-CATHOLIC) DIVERSITY

This paper presents surnames, excerpted from the metrical records of the Orthodox and Catholic parishes of Bielsk (Podlasie region) from the years 1895-1904. Attention is focused on the differences, resulting from confessional belonging of the residents. The most significant divergences include: the popularity of individual surname-forming suffixes and different ways of adaptaing anthroponyms to the standards of the Russian language.

Episodes from the confessional history of Alaska: Nikolay Ziorov’s missionary service

The paper deals with one of the outstanding hierarchs of the late 19th - early 20th century - Nikolay (Ziorov) and his missionary activity in Alaska. It is noteworthy that the peculiarity of his Ministry was that a diverse national staff distinguished all three departments that he led (Aleutian, Taurida, Warsaw and Privislenskaya), so he had to defend the rights of the Orthodox population and to try to harmonize interethnic relations at the level of his ideas. The path of Nikolay (Ziorov)’s Episcopal Ministry began with the appointment in 1891 to the Aleutian diocese, which was responsible for all Orthodox parishes in North America, including Alaska. When Nikolay (Ziorov) arrived in the United States, the local Church Department was located in San Francisco, which made it impossible for the Bishop to have a regular presence in Alaska. Moreover, even the possibility of moving the Department to Alaska was not considered acceptable, since the conversion of the Uniate population living in other States was seen as more promising perspective for the Hierarch at that time. It is established that the Bishop traveled a lot in Alaska, advocated for the rights of the Orthodox population, had a diary and appealed to central and regional authorities. At the initiative of the Minister, the sacred texts were translated into the languages of the indigenous peoples of the region. The views that Nikolay (Ziorov) developed while serving in North America were continued in his later work in other dioceses. Largely, this affected inter-ethnic and inter-religious relations. In both Taurida and Warsaw dioceses, he positioned himself as a defender of the Orthodox faith among the gentile environment. It is shown that Nikolay (Ziorov) used the methods of missionary work, developed in Alaska, later in Taurida and the Kingdom of Poland.

A.V.Kartashev on the Relationship between Russian Orthodox Parishes in Western Europe and the Moscow Patriarchate in the 1920s — 1930s

The author carries out a discourse analysis of journalistic articles by well-known Russian emigrant historian, theologian, and public figure Anton Kartashev in order to understand his attitude to the schisms of the Russian Orthodox Church caused by the Russian Revolution, and to clarify his methods for shaping his readers’ perceptions of these events. This analysis reveals a complex correlation of political, religious, and historical argumentation. From the very beginning, political arguments were pushed into the background by a statement of apolitism, which initially extended to Russian emigrants. Subsequently, he abandoned apolitism as a principle of activity in exile in order to consistently pursue a policy of intransigence with the Bolsheviks. Political argumentation remained in the background compared to historical and religious facets, since the church should not interfere in politics. He consistently historicized contemporary experiences, based on a historical perspective, to give an assessment of the political orientation and concrete actions of the hierarchs. This created an illusory opportunity to maintain the legal subordination to the Moscow Patriarchate, which increasingly depended on the Bolshevik regime. He saw the post-revolutionary history of the Russian Orthodox Church as a series of schisms that weakened it. This gradually brought a precise religious argument to the forefront in substantiating specific measures to preserve the canonical structure of Western European parishes headed by the Metropolitan Eulogius, at the break with the Synod of Bishops in Sremski Karlovtsi and with the Moscow Patriarchate.

«В больной Европе жить духовно интереснее, чем в здоровой и сытой Америке»: Письма А.В. Карташева Е.И. Новицкому, 1948–1951 гг.

This publication includes letters from Anton V. Kartashev, a renowned historian, a professor at St. Sergius Orthodox Theological Institute (Institut de théologie orthodoxe Saint-Serge) in Paris, sent to his friend Evgenii I. Novitskii, who had moved from France to the USA not long before. In the introduction, the publisher describes the context, in which the letters were written, which makes it possible to better understand their meaning and value as a historical source. The letters characterize Anton Kartashev’s attitude of towards the idea of reuniting Russian Orthodox parishes in emigration, which were under the jurisdiction of different church organizations. The historian considered it possible to unite them under the seniority of Metropolitan Anastasii (Gribanovskii) and under the jurisdiction of the Patriarchate of Constantinople but doubted the fulfilment of this possibility due to the accumulated canonical contradictions. Particular attention is paid to the relations between the Russian Exarchate in Western Europe and the Russian Orthodox Greek Catholic Church in the United States, as well as the possibility of educating graduates of St. Tikhon’s Theological Seminary (Pennsylvania) at the institute. In addition to the information about the persons and events mentioned in the correspondence, the commentary includes fragments from letters of the historian’s wife, Pavla P. Kartasheva, which reveal the nuances of what was sometimes only briefly reported by her husband. Among the latter there are the demarcation between the generations of “fathers” and “sons” at the institute, which led to the departure of young professors to America, and the trip of the Kartashevs to Italy.

The restauration of the Reval suffragan diocese in 1917 and the election of the bishop as an expression of ‘church revolution’ in the Riga diocese

Abstract: The restauration of the Reval suffragan diocese in 1917 and the election of the bishop as an expression of ‘church revolution’ in the Riga diocese
 This article focuses on the creation of the Reval suffragan diocese in 1917 and the election of Pavel Kulbusch as the first bishop of Estonian descent. The article reconstructs the course of historical events on the basis of documents from the Russian State Historical Archive and provides a framework for understanding the events via the concept of ‘church revolution’ proposed by the historian Pavel Rogoznyi. The case of the Reval suffragan diocese complements the argument of Rogoznyi and suggests that processes in the Russian borderlands also contributed to the ‘church revolution’. While demands for Estonian and Latvian suffragan bishops had already been put forward by Governor Shakhovskoi in the 1890s and by the Riga diocesan council in 1905, it was only in 1917 that some of these projects were given institutional form. The Orthodox assembly of the Riga diocese in August of 1917 in Tartu elected the parish priest Pavel Kulbusch from St Petersburg as bishop of Reval. The process of consecrating the new bishop took several months due to the church hierarchy’s resistance to his candidature, primarily due to his ethnic origin. The documents published in this issue suggest that the institutions formed during 1917, including the diocese council (soviet) and the representative assemblies of the diocese, and the activity of nationalist Orthodox priests (such as Antoni Laar, who mobilised the Orthodox parishes in support of the bishop) rendered the formation of Reval diocese successful compared to several similar initiatives in other dioceses. The article argues that the institutions and practices formed during 1917 and the martyrdom of Bishop Platon in 1919 paved the way for the separation of the Estonian Church from the Moscow patriarchate in 1923.
 The translated and published documents accompanying the article are kept in the Russian State Historical Archive (in St Petersburg) and include the decrees of the Most Holy Synod; decisions made by the delegates of the congress of the ecclesiastical and secular representatives of the Riga diocese and the Temporary Council of the Riga Diocese; and individual and collective petitions in regards to restoring the suffragan diocese in Tallinn.

Changes in the Religious Situation in Ukraine (1985—2019): Ethnocultural Implications

In the process of disintegration of the Soviet Union and development of the independent Ukrainian State (1985–2019), the Ukrainian Orthodoxy underwent radical changes, which influenced the ethnocultural development of the Ukrainian society. Accession of Kyiv Metropolia by Moscow was abolished and its previous status restored. The Unification Council established the Local Orthodox Church, which was later granted tomos of Autocephaly by the Ecumenical Patriarchate. The topical tasks of the Church consist in its recognition by other Orthodox churches and its engagement in the unification process of Orthodox parishes of the Moscow Patriarchate. The intensity of further differentiation depends largely on the new government of Ukraine. For modern Ukrainian society, the main ethnocultural consequences of changes in the religious situation are as follows: 1) the appearance of Ukrainian national religious organizations; 2) the full-fledged functioning of the Ukrainian language in the religious life; 3) the revival of rituals and traditions associated with the religious life that were banned in the USSR or forgotten; 4) formation of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church on the basis of Kyiv Metropolia and its acquisition of the highest canonical status in Ukraine. Changes that took place in the religious sphere contributed to the reverse Ukrainization of the Ukrainian ethnos after the long process of Russification, as well as to the political and ethnocultural consolidation of the Ukrainian nation. The impact of these changes on the modern ethnocultural development of the Ukrainian society, which took place from the mid-1980s till today, should be considered positive and corresponding to the national interests of Ukraine. These shifts in the religious situation contribute to the process of overcoming consequences of the religious, political, economic, and ethnocultural domination of Moscow in Ukraine.

Preconditions of the formation and organizational development of the Mariupol eparchy of the Ukrainian Orthodox Autocephalous Synodal Church in 1922 – 1937

The historical circumstancesof the organizational development of the Renovatonist movement in the Orthodox Church in Donbass still remain one of the less investigated pages of the Ukrainian Local Church history. Despite the fact thatthe problem of Ukrainian Church history of interwar period has been studied by many researchers, a large number of questions exist which require elaboration. Nowadays on the basis of the earlier unknown material it is possible to widen the general picture of the mentioned events. That`s why the main purpose of the article is to figure out the circumstances of the organizational development of the Renovatonist movement in the Orthodox Church in Mariupol region during the first decades of the Soviet rule in Ukraine. 
 The originality of the article involves an attempt to research the events of Donbass Church history without traditional historicalclichés, and in this case all the trends of Ukrainian ecclesiastic life of that time should be considered. In our strong opinion ignoring the deep needs of interecсlesiastic life’s normalization led to a Church split. With help of the atheistic government the Renovationist movement achieved its institutional organization. The characteristic issue of the religious life in Donbass was its relative conservatism. That was the main cause of the slow development pace of the reformationally oriented Ukrainian Orthodox Autocephalous Synodal Church. Moreover, while speaking about the Synodal Church should be taken into consideration the demonstratively loyal attitude of the Ukrainian Renovationist hierarchs to the atheistic government. That`s why despite the renovationist hierarchs` attempts to minimize the reformative tendencies the Synodal Church in Mariupol region could cover only half of the Orthodox parishes on the land’s territory. The Mariupol eparchy was one of the biggest in Donbass.
 In conclusion it`s worth mentioning that nowadays the research of Donbass church history of interwar period is complicated by the difficult political situation in the region. Unfortunately the material of the Lugansk and Donetsk archives is unavailable for Ukrainian researches, but gradual actualization of this problem makes the strong prospects for its fast research in future.

A Context-Grounded Approach to Religious Freedom: The Case of Orthodoxy in the Moldovan Republic

This paper explores the relationship between human rights and social analysis within the main historical and theoretical perspectives adopted by social sciences. In particular, religious freedom will be analysed as one of the central issues in the recent engagement of the social sciences with human rights. After examining current narratives and mainstream approaches of the social sciences towards the right to religious freedom, this article will then underline the importance of a social epistemology which goes beyond a normative and legal perspective, bridging the gap between the framework of human rights and the social roles of religion in context. Within this framework, religious freedom represents a social construct, whose perception, definition and implementation dynamically evolves according to its influence, at different levels, in the lived dimension of social relations. The second part of the article proposes a context-grounded analysis of religious freedom in the Republic of Moldova. This case study is characterised by the impressive growth of Orthodoxy after the demise of the Soviet Union and by a complex and contradictory political approach towards religious freedom, both as a legal standard and as a concept. Emerging through the analysis of local political narratives and some preliminary ethnographical observations, the social importance of religion will be investigated both as a governmental instrument and as an embodied means of dealing with widespread socio-economic insecurity, creating tensions between religious rootedness and religious freedom. The local debate on religious freedom will then be related to the influence of geopolitical borders, the topic of traditional identity and the religious form of adaptation to the ineffectiveness of the new secular local policies, with orthodox institutions and parishes having new socio-political roles at both a global and local scale.

Cerkiew prawosławna na Podlasiu do końca XVI wieku

The article presents the outline of the history of Orthodox Church In the region of Podlasie until the end of 16-th century. The jurisdiction of Podlasie orthodox parishes , their founders and the number of churches were being analysed.

Обзор миссионерской деятельности Пекинской духовной миссии (вторая половина XIX – начало XX века)

The article studies the place and role of the Russian Orthodox Mission as a tool of religious propaganda in China in the second half of the 19th – early 20th centuries. Heretofore, the primary goals were to fulfill the functions of the Russian diplomatic mission in China and to conduct research in the field of oriental studies and the natural sciences, which in its turn excluded the possibility of its missionary tasks. In the second half of the 19th century the Russian Orthodox Mission had to transfer diplomatic and military intelligence functions to the Russian embassy in China that was opened in 1861. This circumstance forced the Mission to search for new directions of development and eventually focus on missionary work. The structure of the Russian Orthodox Mission was gradually transformed, adapting to the needs of pastoral activity. Its financial and material-technical base strengthened, the staff of missionaries expanded, the system of Orthodox parishes, church schools, monastery cloisters and courtyards become more complicated. In order to involve the indigenous people in the religious propaganda and to significantly increase the number of newly baptized Chinese, from the second half of the 19th till early 20th centuries the Mission developed the network of missionary offices, mills and schools in the six largest and densely populated provinces of central China. Despite the fact that the Mission worked in extremely unfavorable conditions, mostly caused by the political games of the great powers for influence in the Far East, Russian Orthodox Church achieved undoubted success. The growth of the Mission was interrupted by the outbreak of the First World War, following a reduction in funding and a number of other circumstances. As a result, the activity of the Russian Orthodox Mission in China was gradually decreasing in 1914–1917.

At the Origins of the Latvian Orthodox Church: from the “Russian Faith” to Autocephalous Tendencies

The issue of the genesis of the national movement among the Latvian Orthodox population is considered. On the example of the fate of the leaders of the movement for Latvian church independence from Russian Orthodoxy - priest Janis Namnieks and prominent lawyer Janis Davis - the reasons for the appearance of this movement are established, the reasons for the failure of its supporters in 1920 are revealed. It was established that, contrary to popular belief, supporters of an early separation from the Russian Orthodox Church quickly moved from supporting the imperial authorities to the maximum displacement of the “Russian factor” from the life of the Orthodox in the new state - Latvia. It is emphasized that the lack of consolidated support of the secular authorities, the influence of the bishop who came from Russia, the ethnic Latvian John (Pommers), postponed this process for 15 years, and therefore, Latvian Orthodoxy did not go along the beaten path of their Estonian brothers. The attention to the emergence of a historiographic tradition of studying autocephalous tendencies among Latvian Orthodox parishes is paid. A comparison is made of the source base, which was used by researchers to build their own concepts. In addition to research papers and published sources, the article is based on materials from Latvian and Russian archives.

Передумови утворення та організаційний розвиток Сталінської єпархії Української Православної Автокефальної Синодальної Церкви 1922 – 1937 рр.

The historical circumstances of the organizational development of the Renovatonist movement in the Orthodox Church in Donbass still remains one of the less investigated pages of the Ukrainian Local Church history. Despite the fact that the problem of Ukrainian Church history of interwar period has been studied by many researchers, a large number of questions exist which require elaboration. Nowadays on the basis of the earlier unknown material it is possible to expand the general picture of the mentioned events. That`s why the main purpose of the article is to figure out the circumstances of the organizational development of the Renovatonist movement in the Orthodox Church in Stalinian region during the first decades of the Soviet rule in Ukraine. The originality of the article involves an attempt to research the events of Donbass Church history without traditional historical clichés, and in this case all the trends of Ukrainian church life of that time should be considered. In our strong opinion ignoring the deep needs of interecсlesiastic life normalization led to a Church split. With help of the atheistic government the Renovationist movement achieved its institutional organization. The characteristic issue of the religious life in Donbass was its relative conservatism. That was the main cause of the slow development pace of the reformationally oriented Ukrainian Orthodox Autocephalous Synodal Church. Moreover, when speaking about the Synodal Church should be taken into consideration the demonstratively loyal attitude of the Ukrainian Renovationist hierarchs to the atheistic government. That`s why despite the renovationist hierarchs` attempts to minimize the reformatic tendencies the Synodal Church in Stalinian region could cover only a 1/5 part of the Orthodox parishes on the territory of the land. In conclusion it`s worth to mention that nowadays the researching of Donbass church history of interwar period is complicated by the difficult political situation in the region. Unfortunately the material of the Lugansk and Donetsk archives is unavailable for Ukrainian researches, but gradual actualization of this problem makes the strong prospects for its fast research in future.