« Who seeks will always find».

A well-known proverb can be completely questioned when it comes to searching for communities of Old Believers or the phone numbers of priests. The Old Believer Church, seemingly ready to preach "outside", in fact remains just as closed from society and ... from themselves. One song, remember? - it is sung: "And yet I am looking for you around the world, again I am looking for you around the world, looking for you among other people's spaces and centuries." Remaining isolated, we risk losing those who are looking for their path to the temple...

In Search of the Lost Temple

• How to contact the community in Orekhovo-Zuevo?
• Where can I find the nearest Old Believer priest to Priob?
• Is there a church of the Russian Orthodox Church in Nizhny Tagil?

With these and other similar questions - among which, for example, once was this: "Where can one be saved from the destruction of the world?" I get called fairly regularly. Different people call - both their own, the Old Believers, who perceive me, a journalist, as a kind of encyclopedic reference book with all the necessary information, and strangers - those who never knew me, did not see me, but found my data in the Ural Old Believer newspaper “Community ”, which, fortunately, has become popular not only among believers, or somewhere on the Internet.

It turns out that contacting me is incommensurably easier than finding, say, the contacts of the priest Leonty Pimenov or any other Old Believer pastor, or the address of the community of some Nizhny Novgorod or Siberian church. For several years, diligently responding to each such appeal - both from prisoners of one of the Udmurt colonies, and from a "truth-seeking" (non-Nikonian - he emphasized!) priest from near Nizhny Novgorod - I spared no time and effort to help people organize them feedback. Alas, not always - and, frankly, very rarely - it was possible to do this directly.

But, let’s say, in order not to “kill” the hope of a seeker, for example, a community somewhere in the south of Russia, one had to give either the contacts of a priest in Rostov-on-Don, or, corny, the telephone number of the reception of the Moscow Metropolis of the Old Believer Church. “We don’t distribute such data,” one parishioner, with a heavy sigh, once gave me the answer that he was given by phone in the historical center of the Old Believers in Moscow, when he asked to contact one of our priests.

In the Old Believers through the narrow gates

And I suddenly realized that the Russian Orthodox Old Believer Church, although it declares openness and accessibility, remains, if not as inaccessible as in the years of first tsarist and later Soviet power, then clearly not with wide open doors for everyone and needy.

Those who come are not expelled from us and warmly received, as far as possible in communication with non-believers, but such meetings, it turns out, are designed only for those who live or are already close to the Old Believer church or active community, and what if not? If a person is hundreds of kilometers from the nearest corner of God, if he has only a random phone at hand, seen in a newspaper or on an Old Believer website that he accidentally met, but there is a desire to find out about one of the Old Believers, who is nearby, to come, chat, in a word, take the first step?

And here is a more symptomatic story that literally screams about the problem. The Ural Old Believer Sergiy Obikhod tells it: “In 2013, I lived and worked in a large Siberian city, where I met a guy, I will call him Alexei, who was very interested in the Old Believers. We met with him in a cafe. Seeing serious intentions and a keen interest in faith, I invited him to gather together for prayer. He agreed and on Sundays and holidays they began to pray at my house. Several times I tried to establish communication with the local community of the ROCC, called up the chairman, asked to be informed when and where they pray. There was no response for a long time. Then, when they finally told me the address of the prayer house, I asked if I could come along with the guest? And got rejected. The chairman said: “Aleksey would be better off going to the priest first.” So “politely” refused. It turns out that a person who is interested in the Old Believers cannot communicate or pray live with the Old Believers?! But I couldn’t tell Alexei, they say, I’m going to pray with others, but you’ll excuse me.

Thank God, Alexei often travels to Chelyabinsk now. The temple in Miass is “only” 100 kilometers away. The doors of this temple are open to everyone, which is very pleasing. And on the feast of Easter today, my friend managed to pray in the church, to talk a little with the priest. Alexei's wife wants to be baptized, and then they get married. I hope that later they will be able to come to pray in the community of their city. It is not entirely clear why a person who wants to join the Church cannot pray with everyone. Things like this confuse and infuriate me. Caution is a good quality, but within reasonable limits. We have no right to doom the Old Believers to isolation. What kind of sermon can be discussed under such conditions?! If in the first centuries believers behaved this way, what would be left of the gospel of Christ? Agree that this case makes you think seriously. We need to talk about this, including with the clergy. And, probably, not to allow such an attitude towards those who want to be with us "...

Openness policy

And how can one not remember the deceased, who spoke with regret, in fact, all about the same thing, and emphasized that the vast majority of Old Believer churches are located on the outskirts of cities or in such remote rural places that finding them is already akin to a great feat. And to get through, sometimes, is an unrealistic task. Of course, not at all because “the phone does not answer” - it is not, this phone, in the public domain! And who needs him in the "closed"? I don’t think that it happened on purpose, but our communities and temples, formally open to people who are interested from the outside, remain de facto closed in the global sense of the word. But there was no one guide, and probably never will be.

About Orekhovo-Zuevo, I started not by chance. Last August, it became necessary for several Christians to find the coordinates of this community and personally contact the rector. And what do you think? I spent an hour and a half in these, as it turned out later, futile searches, I found some contact numbers on the Internet, which, it turned out, had not been active for a long time. I’m even afraid to imagine what it’s like to look for Old Believer communities that are not closed from all bespriests, Pomeranians or chapels, but Belokrinitsky who are in excellent contact with the world, say, somewhere in the Far East. Alas, we, the ROCC, have not developed any kind of our own contact center, where one could quickly get the necessary telephone numbers and addresses of churches, contact and discuss everything that is needed with brothers of the same faith.

I remember how in February 2014, when problems had already begun in neighboring Ukraine, I tried, through newspaper business, to find contacts for the community of our Church in Mama Ruska, in Crimea. I called all the phones available on the network, wrote to all available Internet addresses, and everything turned out to be in vain - no answer, no “good health”. And this despite the fact that I always have the Internet, mobile and landline communications at hand, in a word, there is everything that, it would seem, could at any time provide a connection with any community in the country and even beyond its borders. Alas, all this is useless when there are no reference books, no virtual version of a kind of "yellow pages of the Old Believer Church" with one or another much-needed contact information. And, most likely, “on the ground” they don’t even know about this, believing that if they don’t get a call, it means that no one has such a need.

Of course, I understand that it’s easier for me personally and, probably, it’s often much more important to find certain data than an old woman from some village, but experience shows that older people, among whom there are many active, traveling a lot or ready to decide what -Something church questions not by phone, but in person, communications are also necessary. The past time has taught us all to the fact that there are no Old Believers “on the surface”, but why is it that even now, during the time of openness and freedom of religion, many “ours” for some reason live by the same principles of seclusion, secrecy, although this is not always useful us and those who seek us. By doing this, we ourselves cut off this modern, capable of working for us without anyone's constant participation, the element of preaching and what is called "You are welcome"! I feel that they will object to me: they say, whoever seeks will always find. But, excuse me, what efforts, obstacles?!

I also foresee that the main argument in the publication or non-publication of contact details will be that, they say, many churches of the Russian Orthodox Church keep ancient objects of religious meaning, so it’s not worth giving phone numbers and addresses to potential intruders on purpose. Well, there is a rational grain in this, but then it remains only to wish everyone who will someday seek the necessary contacts of communities and parishes - their own and others - good luck in solving puzzles and correctly hitting the sky with a finger.

There is an exit?

And yet, I personally really hope that the rubric "" on the portal "Russian Faith" will be able to fill the existing vacuum and become a full-fledged reference book with all the necessary information about communities and churches. But for this to be possible, the will of the diocesan bishops, deans, rectors and chairmen of the communities is necessary, on which in this case everything literally depends.

In the meantime, we have what we have: the former isolation, the lack of complete reference information about ourselves, and those who are looking for us to no avail. Although, what do we sinners have to do with it ??? They are looking for God… How would we then, because of this closeness, not have to answer for our deeds. Or rather, for inaction.

Editorial:

The section "" of the site "Russian Faith" is dedicated to the existing communities and temples of all Old Believer agreements. Business cards of the Russian Orthodox Old Believer Church and the Russian Old Orthodox Church are being filled in now. In the future - the Old Orthodox Pomeranian Church, Fedoseevsky consent and much more. Also here you can learn about the Old Believer communities and churches located outside of Russia and the CIS countries.

Encyclopedic dictionary of winged words and expressions Serov Vadim Vasilyevich

Who seeks will always find!

Who seeks will always find!

From the song "Merry Wind", written by the composer Isaac Dunayevsky to the poet's verses Vasily Ivanovich Lebedev-Kumach(1898-1949) for the film "Children of Captain Grant" (1936):

Who is used to fighting for victory,

Let them sing along with us:

"Who is cheerful - he laughs,

Who wants - he will achieve.

Who seeks will always find".

The original source is a Latin proverb: Qui quaerit, reperit[qui kve-rit, reparit] - Who seeks, finds.

Quoted as a playful encouragement of someone's search, effort, etc.