The Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia (), also called Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia or ROCOR, or Russian Orthodox Church Abroad (ROCA), is a semi-autonomous part of the Russian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate). Currently, the position of First-Hierarch of the ROCOR is occupied by Metropolitan Nicholas (Olhovsky).
The ROCOR was established in the early 1920s as a de facto independent ecclesiastical jurisdiction of Eastern Orthodoxy, initially due to lack of regular liaison between the central church authority in Moscow and some bishops due to their voluntary exile after the Russian Civil War. These bishops migrated with other Russians to Western European cities and nations, including Paris and other parts of France, and to the United States and other western countries. Later these bishops rejected the Moscow Patriarchate's unconditional political loyalty to the Bolshevik regime in the USSR. This loyalty was formally promulgated by the Declaration of 20 July 1927 of Metropolitan Sergius (Stragorodsky), deputy Patriarchal locum tenens. Metropolitan Anthony (Khrapovitsky), of Kiev and Galicia, was the founding First-Hierarch of the ROCOR.
After 80 years of separation followed by the fall of the Soviet Union, on 17 May 2007, the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia officially signed the Act of Canonical Communion with the Moscow Patriarchate, restoring the canonical link between the churches.
The ROCOR jurisdiction has around 400 parishes worldwide and an estimated membership of more than 400,000 people. Of these, 199 parishes and 10 monasteries are in the United States; they have 23,727 adherents and around 9,879 regular church attendees. The ROCOR has 13 hierarchs, with male and female monasteries in the United States, Canada, and the Americas; Australia, New Zealand, and Western Europe.
History Precursors and early history
In May 1919, during the Russian Revolution, the White military forces under General Anton Denikin were achieving the apex of their military success. In the Russian city of Stavropol, then controlled by the White Army, a group of Russian bishops organized an ecclesiastical administration body, the Temporary Higher Church Administration in Southeastern Russia (). On 7 November (20 November) 1920, Tikhon, Patriarch of Moscow, his Synod, and the Supreme Church Council in Moscow issued a joint resolution, No. 362, instructing all Russian Orthodox Christian bishops, should they be unable to maintain liaison with the Supreme Church Administration in Moscow, to seek protection and guidance by organizing among themselves. The resolution was interpreted as effectively legitimizing the Temporary Higher Church Administration, and served as the legal basis for the eventual establishment of a completely independent church body.Положение о Русской Православной Церкви Заграницей : "Пр. 1. Русская Православная Церковь заграницей есть неразрывная часть поместной Российской Православной Церкви, временно самоуправляющаяся на соборных началах до упразднения в России безбожной власти, в соответствии с Постановлением Св. Патриарха, Св. Синода и Высшего Церковного Совета Российской Церкви от 7/20 ноября 1920 г. за № 362. [...] Пр. 4. Русская Православная Церковь заграницей в своей внутренней жизни и управлении руководствуется: Священным Писанием и Священным Преданием, священными канонами и церковными законами, правилами и благочестивыми обычаями Поместной Российской Православной Церкви и, в частности, — Постановлением Святейшего Патриарха, Свящ. Синода и Высшего Церковного Совета Православной Российской Церкви от 7/20 ноября 1920 года № 362, [...]"
In November 1920, after the final defeat of the Russian Army in South Russia, a number of Russian bishops evacuated from Crimea to Constantinople, then occupied by British, French, and Italian forces. After learning that General Pyotr Wrangel intended to keep his army, they likewise decided to keep the Russian ecclesiastical organization as a separate entity abroad. The Temporary Church Authority met on 19 November 1920 aboard the ship Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich (), presided over by Metropolitan Antony (Khrapovitsky). Metropolitan Antony and Bishop Benjamin (Fedchenkov) were appointed to examine the canonicity of the organization. On 2 December 1920, they received permission from Metropolitan Dorotheos of Prousa, Locum Tenens of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, to establish "for the purpose of the service of the population [...] and to oversee the ecclesiastic life of Russian colonies in Orthodox countries a temporary committee (epitropia) under the authority of the Ecumenical Patriarchate"; the committee was called the Temporary Higher Church Administration Abroad (THCAA).
In Karlovci On 14 February 1921, Metropolitan Antony (Khrapovitsky) settled in the town of Sremski Karlovci, Serbia (then within the Kingdom of Yugoslavia), where he was given the palace of former Patriarchs of Karlovci (the Patriarchate of Karlovci had been abolished in 1920)."Загранична црква у Сремским Карловцима: Из тајних архива УДБЕ: РУСКА ЕМИГРАЦИЈА У ЈУГОСЛАВИЈИ 1918–1941." // Politika, 23 December 2017, p. 22. In the next months, at the invitation of Patriarch Dimitrije of Serbia, the other eight bishops of the THCAA, including Anastasius (Gribanovsky) and Benjamin (Fedchenkov), as well as numerous priests and monks, relocated to Serbia."Прихваћен позив патријарха Димитрија: Из тајних архива УДБЕ: РУСКА ЕМИГРАЦИЈА У ЈУГОСЛАВИЈИ 1918–1941." // Politika, 21 December 2017, p. 25. On 31 August 1921, the Council of Bishops of the Serbian Church passed a resolution, effective from 3 October, recognizing the THCAA as an administratively independent jurisdiction for exiled Russian clergy outside the Kingdom of Yugoslavia (SHS), as well as for those Russian clergy in the Kingdom who were not in parish or state educational service. The THCAA jurisdiction was subsequently extended to hearing divorce cases of exiled Russians.
With the agreement of Patriarch Dimitrije of Serbia, between 21 November and 2 December 1921, the "General assembly of representatives of the Russian Church abroad" () took place in Sremski Karlovci. It was later renamed as the "First All-Diaspora Council" and was presided over by Metropolitan Anthony.
The council established the "Supreme Ecclesiastic Administration Abroad" (SEAA), composed of a patriarchal Locum Tenens, a Synod of Bishops, and a Church Council. The Council decided to appoint Metropolitan Anthony as the Locum Tenens, but he declined to accept the position without permission from Moscow, and instead identified as the President of the SEAA. The Council adopted a number of resolutions and appeals (missives), with the two most notable ones being addressed to the flock of the Russian Orthodox Church "in diaspora and exile" («Чадам Русской Православной Церкви, в рассеянии и изгнании сущим») and to the 1922 International Conference in Genoa. The former, adopted with a majority of votes (but not unanimously, Metropolitan Eulogius Georgiyevsky being the most prominent critic of such specific political declarations), expressly proclaimed a political goal of restoring monarchy in Russia with a tsar from the House of Romanov."[...] И ныне пусть неусыпно пламенеет молитва наша – да укажет Господь пути спасения и строительства родной земли; да даст защиту Вере и Церкви и всей земле русской и да осенит он сердце народное; да вернет на всероссийский Престол Помазанника, сильного любовью народа, законного православного Царя из Дома Романовых. [...]" (Протоиерей Аркадий Маковецкий. Белая Церковь: Вдали от атеистического террора: Питер, 2009, , pp. 31–32). The appeal to the Genoa Conference, which was published in 1922, called on the world powers to intervene and "help banish Bolshevism" from Russia.Протоиерей Аркадий Маковецкий. Белая Церковь: Вдали от атеистического террора: Питер, 2009, , p. 35. The majority of the Council members secretly decided to request that Grand Duke Nicholas Nikolaevich head up the Russian monarchist movement in exile. (But, pursuant to the laws of the Russian Empire, the seniormost surviving male member of the Romanovs was Kirill Vladimirovich, and in August 1924 he proclaimed himself as the Russian Emperor in exile.)"У вртлогу политичке борбе: Из тајних архива УДБЕ: РУСКА ЕМИГРАЦИЈА У ЈУГОСЛАВИЈИ 1918–1941." // Politika, 15 January 2018, p. 22.
Patriarch Tikhon addressed a decree of 5 May 1922 to Metropolitan Eulogius Georgiyevsky, abolishing the SEAA and declaring the political decisions of the Karlovci Council to be against the position of the Russian Church. Tikhon appointed Metropolitan Eulogius as administrator for the "Russian orthodox churches abroad".Протоиерей Аркадий Маковецкий. Белая Церковь: Вдали от атеистического террора: Питер, 2009, , p. 38. Meeting in Sremski Karlovci on 2 September 1922, pursuant to Tikhon's decree, the Council of Bishops abolished the SEAA, in its place forming the Temporary Holy Synod of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, with Metropolitan Anthony as its head by virtue of seniority. This Synod exercised direct authority over Russian parishes in the Balkans, the Middle East, and the Far East.
In North America, however, a conflict developed among bishops who did not recognize the authority of the Synod, led by Metropolitan Platon (Rozhdestvensky); this group formed the American Metropolia, the predecessor to the OCA. In Western Europe, Metropolitan Eulogius (Georgievsky), based in Paris from late 1922, did likewise, stating that the Synod was merely "a moral authority." Metropolitan Eulogius later broke off from the ROC, and in February 1931 joined the Ecumenical Patriarchate. This seminal act formed the Patriarchal Exarchate for Orthodox Parishes of Russian Tradition in Western Europe.
On 5 September 1927, the Council of Bishops in Sremski Karlovci, presided over by Metropolitan Anthony, decreed a formal break of liaison with the "Moscow church authority." They rejected a demand by Metropolitan Sergius (Stragorodsky) of Nizhny Novgorod, who was acting on behalf of Locum Tenens (Metropolitan Peter of Krutitsy, imprisoned then in the Soviet Gulag, where he later died), to declare political loyalty to the Soviet authorities. The Council of Bishops said that the church administration in Moscow, headed by Metropolitan Sergius (Stragorodsky), was "enslaved by the godless Soviet power that has deprived it of freedom in its expression of will and canonical governance of the Church."Митрополит Антоний (Храповицкий). Избранные труды. Письма. Материалы. Moscow: ПСТГУ, 2007, р. 786: "«Заграничная часть Всероссийской Церкви должна прекратить сношения с Московской церковной властью ввиду невозможности нормальных сношений с нею и ввиду порабощения её безбожной советской властью, лишающей её свободы в своих волеизъявлениях и каноническом управлении Церковью»".
While rejecting both the Bolsheviks and the de facto head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Metropolitan Sergius (who in 1943 would be elected as Patriarch), the ROCOR continued to nominally recognize the authority of the imprisoned Metropolitan Peter of Krutitsy. On September 9, the Council stated: "The part of the Russian Church that finds itself abroad considers itself an inseparable, spiritually united branch of the great Russian Church. It doesn't separate itself from its Mother Church and doesn't consider itself autocephalous."РПЦЗ: КРАТКАЯ ИСТОРИЧЕСКАЯ СПРАВКА : «Заграничная часть Русской Церкви почитает себя неразрывною, духовно-единою ветвью великой Русской Церкви. Она не отделяет себя от своей Матери-Церкви и не считает себя автокефальною». Meanwhile, inside the USSR, Metropolitan Sergius' Declaration caused a schism among the flock of the patriarch's church. Many dissenting believers broke ties with Metropolitan Sergius.