Russian Church Before the Face of the Dominating Evil

The message of Metropolitan Sergius, who became the deputy locum tenens of the patriarchal throne from November 16/29, 1927, as we saw in Chapter 7, immediately aroused many objections and protests. If such protests in large numbers came from the most remote places, then they were especially acute in the Petrograd diocese. On December 12, in the new style, a delegation from Petrograd arrived in Moscow to see Metropolitan Sergius. We do not know the names of all the delegates. The...
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The message of Metropolitan Sergius, who became the deputy locum tenens of the patriarchal throne from November 16/29, 1927, as we saw in Chapter 7, immediately aroused many objections and protests. If such protests in large numbers came from the most remote places, then they were especially acute in the Petrograd diocese. On December 12, in the new style, a delegation from Petrograd arrived in Moscow to see Metropolitan Sergius. We do not know the names of all the delegates. The handwritten note I have only mentions that it included professors and that it was headed by Bishop Dimitriy (Lyubimov). The delegates talked and fiercely argued with Metropolitan Sergius, but left him empty-handed. /// On March 14/27, 1928, a meeting of the Synod took place, at which Metropolitan Joseph and seven other bishops who disagreed with Metropolitan Sergius were dismissed from their chairs and banned from ministry. They did not recognize the force behind this decree, as a result of which the difference of opinion turned into a state of canonical division. /// "What, besides independence and self-dependence, attracts our Orthodox Christians the most to the Russian Church Abroad?" The speaker writes and answers: "Of course, firm standing in Orthodoxy. of age-old customs: there is a decline in monastic life, the divine service is often carelessly conducted, the sacrament of Confession is neglected, many pious rites are almost completely forgotten, parish life is completely absent.