Slavic Native Faith and mono-ideologies

Many Slavic Native Faith practitioners consciously reject Christianity or adopt anti-Christian views.[6] Some also take a hostile stance toward Judaism, which they regard as having spawned Christianity.[7] In general, Judaism is considered the first thought system to have demonised the Earth, identifying it with hell, due to the fact of Jews being people without land of their own.[8] Christianity is considered as a system that destroys morality by casting human responsibility away from the present world and in a transcendent future.[9] Abrahamic religions in general are considered as forces which lead to the destruction of organic peoples.[10] For many Rodnovers, Christianity has to be regarded as a foreign force that is destroying Slavic culture,[11] or as a force that has left Russia under the control of the Jews.[12]

Christianity is also criticised as being anthropocentric, and thus responsible for ecological disruption.[13] In Russia, Rodnovers often criticise Christianity for its claim to have a monopoly on truth; in identifying it as a "mono-ideology", they compare it to Soviet Marxism.[14] Even capitalism is considered a product of Abrahamic religions: the Russian Rodnover leader Dobroslav declared that "nature-swallowing capitalism is an ugly child of the Judeo-Christian civilisation", and that "the only way out is to go back ... from the cult of profit to the cult of life", back to indigenous religions.[15]

Slavic Native Faith practitioners often reject Christian ideas of humility, regarding them as antithetical to a Rodnover emphasis on courage and fighting spirit.[16] In general, Christianity is regarded as a religion of servility (rab) and obligation, and obedience to the priests, while Rodnovery is regarded as freedom of choice and faith in Rod, the principle from which everything descends. Pilkington and Popov report the definition given by Koldun—a Rodnover priest from Krasnodar—of Rodnovery not as "religion" at all, but as "faith". In his view, "religions", in the sense of universalist mass-religions, are ideologies which dissolve the many individualities into amorphous throngs, in which the singular individual identity is lost. On the contrary, "faiths", like Rodnovery, are true knowledge (znat' pravdu), which has to be acquired by the individuals through conscious effort.[17]

Some Russian Rodnovers have however attempted to improve relations with the Orthodox Church, arguing that Russian Orthodoxy had adopted many elements of pre-Christian belief and rites.[18] In this way they argue that Russian Orthodoxy is distinct from other forms of Christianity,[13] and seek to portray it as the "younger brother" of Slavic Native Faith.[19]

The Orthodox Christian Old Believers, a movement that split out from the Russian Orthodox Church during the reform of Patriarch Nikon of Moscow in the seventeenth century, are seen by Rodnovers in a more positive light than the mainstream Russian Orthodox Church, as Old Believers are considered to have elements similar to those of the Slavic Native Faith.[20] Scholars have studied how the Old Believers have preserved Indo-European and early Slavic ideas and practices such as the veneration of fire as a channel to the divine world, the symbolism of the colour red, the search for a "glorious death", and in general the holistic vision of a divine cosmos.[21]

Christians have also been responsible for opposition to Slavic Native Faith, for instance through the establishment of social media groups against the movement.[22] The Russian Orthodox Church has expressed opposition to the growth and spread of Slavic Native Faith across Russia on various occasions.[23] In the 2000 edition of his book Sektovedeniye, Russian Orthodox theologian Alexander Dvorkin recognised that "in today's Russia, neopagan nativistic sects are mushrooming" and that "altogether they represent a notable phenomenon of post-Soviet Russian religious life".[24]

In 2009 there was a well-known public debate between Orthodox Christians and Rodnovers in Kaluga; the former were led by priest Daniel Sysoev and the latter by Vadim Kazakov, head of the Union of Slavic Rodnover Communities.[25] More recently, in November 2014 Patriarch Kirill himself expressed concerns about "attempts to construct a pseudo-Russian neopagan belief" and the well-known priest Vsevolod Chaplin called for Rodnovery's outright ban "on the level of law".[24] In early 2015, the official journal of the Ascension Cathedral of Astrakhan published a polemical piece entitled Adversus paganos in which church authorities complained about the growth of Rodnovery and the fact that "representatives of government and public organisations" spoke of a need to revive "Orthodoxy and the religion of ancient Slavs", leading many young people to join the movement.[25]

In early 2016, at the "International Educational Christmas Readings" in Moscow, Merya ethnofuturistic religious revivals and the spread of Rodnovery among the Russian Armed Forces were discussed as issues of particular concern. A conference explicitly dedicated to counteract the spread of Rodnovery was held in March 2016 at the Magnitogorsk State Technical University; on this occasion, bishop Innokenty of Magnitogorsk and Vekrhneuralsk said that Slavic Native Faith constitutes "a greater threat to the Church than atheism". Vladimir Legoyda, succeeding Vsevolod Chaplin as president of the Synodal Department for Church Charity and Social Ministry, said that the spread of Slavic Native Faith among the military constitutes "a direct challenge to the Church".[23]

Many Rodnover groups organise formal ceremonies of renunciation of Christianity (raskrestitsia, literally "de-Christianisation") and initiation into the community of Slavic Native Faith. Central to the conversion is the adoption by the convert of a new name pertaining to the Slavic tradition (imianarechenie). Generally speaking, the raskrestitsia ceremony symbolises the death and rebirth of the convert into the Rodnover community. Some groups, especially male brotherhoods, practise the cutting of a second "life line" on the palm of the hand of converts, symbolising the new "blood bond" that is formed with other members.[26]