The SOVIET Union was a wonderland. In the view of the Orthodox population, the space of the USSR was filled with holy places that were visited as potentially miraculous sanctuaries. These included not only ancient monasteries, but also certain springs, stones or trees, which for the most part were located outside the villages, i.e. outside the inhabited and cultivated space. Such sanctuaries were places of communion with the divine-especially under the Bolshevik regime, when they became a substitute for closed churches. However, the scale of this pilgrimage to the shrines was not constant and depended on the amplitude of the state's anti-religious policy. If in the 1930s, due to the terror and persecution of the Church, even the main shrines were empty, 1 then after the changes that took place in religious policy in the winter of 1943, the old pilgrimage traditions came to life. This applied primarily to the unoccupied (or briefly occupied) territories of the RSFSR, where a small number were subsequently discovered.

Статья впервые опубликована как: Huhn U. Mit Ikonen und Gesang oder: ein Bischof auf der Flucht vor seinem Kirchenvolk. Massenwallfahrten in Russlang unter Stalin und Chruscev//Jahrbuch fur Historische Kommunismusforschung. 2012/Hg. von Ulrich Mahlert u.a. Berlin, 2012. S. 315 - 333.

1. An exception is the remarkable memoirs of V. Vasilevskaya, a Moscow doctor who was secretly baptized in Zagorsk near Moscow in the mid-1930s and participated in pilgrimages (which were passed off as tourist trips) to closed monastic complexes, including Optina Pustyn, and in 1940 to Sarov and Sarov. Diveyevo. See Vasilevskaya V. Ya. Catacombs of the XX century. Memories. Moscow, 2001, pp. 28-30, 74-91.

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churches, despite the fact that in Ukraine and Belarus churches and monasteries opened during the German occupation were not re-closed immediately after the Red Army returned the occupied territories. Because of this unequal distribution of open churches, pilgrimages to revered springs and lakes remained a phenomenon that was mainly characteristic of the RSFSR until the late 1950s.2
The study of the pilgrimages of the end of the war and the post-war period, therefore, has different dimensions and unfolds in the space of interfacing popular piety, the everyday life of the Soviet people and the church policy of the Soviet state. As far as church policy is concerned, at the height of the war, in September 1943, Stalin began a rapprochement with the few remaining metropolitans, after which they, despite the disastrous experience of Stalin's terror of the first war year, began to emphasize their loyalty to the regime. The state and party leadership hoped to improve their reputation in the eyes of the Allies, and at the same time planned to use the Russian Orthodox Church as a tool in designing the post-war order in Europe.3 This could not be achieved without the restoration of church institutions and communities. In October 1943, the "Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church" was created, which - under the leadership of an old NKVD employee, Major G. G. Karpov - was supposed to ensure the opening of individual churches, in order to then carry out a coordinating and controlling function.

Church leaders entered into this kind of" concordat " with the state so that church institutions, restored after many years of repression, could carry out their functions legally. The episcopate believed that only in this state of affairs it is possible to ensure the observance of canonical norms on the part of the flock, because in the years that have passed without the church, the phenomenon of performing the rite of the sacraments by self-appointed clergy (the so-called "unauthorized person") has become widespread.-

2. See the letter of G. Karpov, Chairman of the Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church, to N. Khrushchev dated April 29, 1954 (Russian State Archive of Modern History [hereinafter - RGANI]. F. 5. Op. 16. D. 642. L. 80-84).

3. See Miner S. M. Stalin's Holy War. Religion, Nationalism, and Alliance Politics, 1941 - 1945. Chapel Hill, 2003 (especially parts 2 and h); also Chumachenko T. A. Church and State in Soviet Russia, 1941-1961. Russian Orthodoxy from World War II to the Krushchev years. Amonk, 2002. P. 15 - 86.

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mi"). Despite the fact that the connection of believers with church institutions, or rather with the theological justification of the religious practices of lay believers, was a topic that was discussed a hundred years ago, the church's monopoly on the sacraments was recognized by the overwhelming majority.4 Pilgrimages were carried out precisely in this area, so that, on the one hand, they were a traditional part of the religious life of the Orthodox population, and on the other hand, the state and the episcopate loyal to it did not recognize them as a fundamental religious practice. Although the pilgrimages and processions were impressive and open displays of religious life, the state and party apparatus did not take any punitive actions against them for a decade. The first major pilgrimage can be dated back to 1944, when Orthodox Christians resumed their traditional pilgrimages in the light of changes in church policy that took place in the fall of 1943.5 Gradually, these pilgrimages became widespread, and in the 1950s they could attract up to 20,000 people. It seems paradoxical, but such massive religious processions did take place in the last years of Stalin's rule and were not dispersed by force. It was only when Nikita Khrushchev - with his understanding of the path to building a communist society-launched his campaign to modernize the country that the physical destruction of places where practices considered archaic and "superstitious"were concentrated began. At the same time, he made a turn in the field of religious politics, abandoning the old Stalinist principles.6
In this article, I will try to explain why the leadership of the state and the party tolerated pilgrimages for more than a decade, even though they took certain measures against them. To do this, I describe how the pilgrimages took place in the decade of their heyday (between the end of the war and the beginning

4. См. Freeze G.L. Institutionalizing Piety. The Church and Popular Religion//Imperial Russia. New histories for the empire/Ed. Ransel D. L. Bloomington, 1998. P. 210 - 249.

5. See G. Karpov's report on illegal church activities of April 25, 1949, addressed to the Central Committee of the CPSU (b) (Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History [hereinafter - RGASPI]. F. 17. Op. 132. D. 109. l. 69-77; published in: Beglov A. L. In search of "sinless catacombs". Church Underground in the USSR, Moscow, 2008, p. 292).

6. См. Stone A. B. "Overcoming Peasant's Backwardness". The Krushchev Antireligious Campaign and the Rural Soviet Union//The Russian Review. 2008. Vol. 67. P. 296 - 320.

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anti-religious campaign 1958/59). How did they differ from the marches in pre-revolutionary Russia? Who took part in them and why? What role did the clergy of the Orthodox Church play in them, how did they relate to them, and how did the pilgrims react to this? And how did the campaign to eliminate the pilgrimage go after 1958? I try to answer these questions based on the examples of processions to the closed monastery "Korennaya Pustyn", which is one of the most visited places by pilgrims in the Kursk region of the Central Black Earth region of Russia.

The point of convergence of the sacred

Pilgrimages to the Korennaya Pustyn, which were connected, on the one hand, with pre-revolutionary traditions, on the other hand, inevitably changed their character in the conditions of late Stalinism. If before 1917 large monastic complexes, usually containing the relics of a particular saint, attracted significant masses of pilgrims, then after the Second World War only two monasteries remained open on the territory of the RSFSR, namely, the Holy Trinity Sergius Lavra near Moscow, which was reopened in 1946 as a symbol of alleged Soviet religious freedom, and Pskov-Pechersk Monastery. Thus, at the regional level, places associated with miraculous phenomena of icons or with visions of saints retained special significance as pilgrimage sites.7 This was so because, from the point of view of the practices of Orthodox piety, the sacred is not limited to the church space, but the power of God is considered such precisely because it can be found and work miracles in any place.8 The erection of crosses and the construction of chapels, churches and monasteries marked the recognition of the divine history of salvation, which was manifested in these very places. Accordingly, most of the post-war pilgrimages were made to closed monasteries and nearby holy springs, which are considered to have a reputation as a source of religious worship.,

7. This was the case, for example, in the case of the pilgrimage to St. Nicholas Mountain in the Ulyanovsk region, which took place annually on May 22 on the feast of St. Nicholas. St. Nicholas, as well as in the case of a pilgrimage in Uryupinsk, Stalingrad region, related to the memory of the miraculous finding of the icon of the Mother of God, which took place on June 21. See Karpov's message to Khrushchev (RGANI. f. 5. Op. 16. D. 642. L. 80-84).

8. See Freeze G. L. Institutionalizing Piety. P. 227. (See footnote 4).

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In turn, it was based on the fact that a miraculous icon was found in this place or some kind of vision happened; this is exactly the case with the closed Indigenous desert in the Kursk region. Pressure from the atheist state had a strong impact on this practice: closed monastery complexes were reduced to a certain extent to the starting point of the holy message that they carried: they acquired the status of a geographical place and material evidence of an encounter with the divine. Therefore, it is quite logical that even where there were no longer regular services in consecrated and decorated chapels, churches and cathedrals, pilgrims still continued to gather.

The history of the Indigenous Desert in the Kursk region includes all these aspects. According to legend, during the Tatar invasion at the end of the 13th century, a miraculous icon of the Mother of God "The Sign"was found among the roots of the tree (hence the name). A chapel was originally built in her honor, and later, in the XVI century, a monastery was founded, which received the name "Korennaya Pustyn". At the beginning of the 17th century there was a tradition that most of the days of the year you can spend a lot of time with your friends.-

9. GARF. F. 6991. Op. 2. D. 229. L. 18.

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put the icon in the Kursk Cathedral and move it to the Indigenous Desert only for the summer. Since then, on certain days, the same procession accompanied the icon on its way from Kursk to the monastery in spring and from the monastery to Kursk in September. The processions continued even after the icon of the Sign was removed in 1920 by clergy fleeing from the Bolsheviks, first to Serbia, then to Germany,and finally to America. 10 During the 1930s and up to the German occupation in late autumn 1941, that is, during the period when a sanatorium was located in the monastery building, not a single pilgrimage to the Indigenous Desert was documented. It is also unlikely that the pilgrimages took place during the period when the building was used by the occupying forces. Shortly after the departure of the Wehrmacht from Kursk, a procession of 2,000 (or so) people went to the former monastery for the first time. Since then, the number of pilgrims has increased from year to year: in 1948 there were about 140,000 pilgrims, in 1955 and 1956 - about 20,000. Instead of the miraculous icon of the Sign, pilgrims now carried their own small icons with them. But more importantly, the monastery was no longer accessible to the procession, since its buildings housed a vocational school for agricultural mechanization. 11 Accordingly, the procession was directed to a spring located 150 meters from the former monastery, where pilgrims themselves performed divine services and were washed by the waters of a spring that was considered miraculous. There were also many other differences between the traditional pilgrimages of the pre-revolutionary era and the processions of the 1940s and 1950s.

10. Since 1951, the Icon of the Sign has been located either in a specially built New Indigenous Desert near New York, or in the Orthodox Cathedral of New York under the care of the ROCOR. After the reunification of the ROCOR with the Moscow Patriarchate in 2007, the icon was able to visit Russia for the first time in the winter of 2009, but at the moment it remains in the possession of the still administratively independent ROCOR. См. http://www.korennaya.ru/ikona/doc00010.html.

11. See the report of October 7, 1958, by the Chief Inspector of the Council A. Pashkin to Chairman G. Karpov on the change in the number of pilgrims over the past decade (State Archive of the Russian Federation [hereinafter - GARF]. F. 6991. Op. 2. D. 229. L. 1-5). See also a short passage about the Kursk pilgrimage by A. Beglov (In search of "sinless catacombs", pp. 180-181). However, Beglov, with his emphasis on "illegal church activities", goes a little too far, referring to the pilgrimage to the Korennaya Pustyn as "the most prominent underground pilgrimage in the center of Russia": in fact, for the pilgrims themselves, this was a traditional religious practice, and therefore it could not be associated with the underground in any way.

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How, then, were these pilgrimages connected with church institutions, and how did the clergy of the Kursk Diocese relate to them? Crucial here was the fact that the state and the party required the clergy of the Russian Orthodox Church not to take part in such pilgrimages.

Pilgrimage without Priests: An Attempt at state Regulation under Stalin

Pilgrimages to the Korennaya Pustyn were among the most widespread in the territory of the RSFSR, but by no means the only ones. So, for example, in the city of Uryupinsk in the former Stalingrad (now Volgograd) region, every year on June 21, several thousand pilgrims gathered for the feast of the appearance of the icon of the Mother of God, and in the Ulyanovsk region on St. Nicholas Day, on May 22, pilgrims gathered on a mountain near the village of Surskoye, where

12. GARF. F. 6991. Op. 2. D. 229. L. 24.

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once upon a time there was a vision 13. However, it was not until the late 1940s that the leadership of the party and government began to receive regular reports about these pilgrimages, which are characterized as "illegal" .14 Previously, pilgrimages were very rarely seen by the regional commissioners of the Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church, since they were primarily engaged in monitoring visible church structures.

However, until 1953, Moscow did not show any centralized initiatives to stop pilgrimages. During this period, the pressure exerted by the Russian Orthodox Church Affairs Council on the clergy to prevent them from participating in processions is best documented. Thus, in August 1948, the Synod decided that clergy should not participate in public processions and services, because such actions constitute "a clear violation of the principle of separation of Church and State".15. Since 1948, bishops have been made responsible for ensuring that no officially registered priest participates in pilgrimages in their dioceses. In the context of the general political and cultural climate that was formed in the USSR under A. Zhdanov, the work of the Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church and its leadership came under fire. 16 Officially, the attack was initiated by an article in the party newspaper Pravda, which was published in February 1949 and was called "Saratovskaya Kupel". The article stigmatized the tradition of consecrating water by a clergyman on the feast of the Epiphany of the Lord, which is celebrated annually on January 19. In 1949, in the Volga city of Saratov, several hundred people swam in the ice hole, water

13. See the note of the Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church dated September 24, 1958 in: "To achieve the closure of the so-called 'holy places'". Church under control//Source. Bulletin of the Presidential Archive of the Russian Federation. 1997. N 4. pp. 120-129.

14. See G. Karpov's report on illegal church activities of April 25, 1949, addressed to the Central Committee of the CPSU (b) (RGASPI. f. 7. Op. 132. d. 109. l. 69-77; published in: Beglov A. L. In search of "Sinless catacombs", p. 292). One of the earliest reports to higher authorities about pilgrimages is a message dated 1947, which, significantly, was not related to the Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church, but was sent directly to Stalin, Beria and Zhdanov through the Ministry of Internal Affairs. See the report from the zo of August 1947 about a mass march in the Lviv region caused by " rumors"on the vision of the Mother of God (GARF. F. R-9401. Op. 2. D. 170. L. 344_345). Nothing can be said about the reports transmitted by the secret services.

15. See the minutes of the Synod meeting of August 25, 1948 (GARF. F. 6991. Op. 2. d. 66a. L. 45).

16. См. Chumachenko T.A. Church and State in Soviet Russia, 1941 - 1961. P. 87 - 103.

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in which they considered it curative; several thousand more people watched this "obscurantist ""pornographic" act.17 The church leadership was forced to respond to this scandal by resigning the Saratov bishop. Thus, even the most recent priest should have understood that participation in a church holiday or in a procession that takes place in an open space is no longer acceptable. 18 The Office of the Patriarchate sent out relevant circular letters to individual dioceses, and from there the relevant orders were sent to their places.19
Now anyone who took part in the procession as a priest risked losing their state registration; in view of the obvious shortage of priests, the prevention of such events became an urgent requirement of the diocesan leadership. From the point of view of the State, this ban on participation proved to be an effective means, at least in terms of loosening the link between pilgrimages and the church, although it did not prevent processions as such.20 In all their reports, State commissioners were required to indicate whether "registered clergy" took part in illegal "open-air" marches and in how many cases their registration was cancelled. Back in 1953, a priest from the Kursk diocese named Suslikov21 was subjected to this measure of influence. Using this

Ryabov N. 17 . The Saratovskaya font//Truth. February 19, 1949. p. 3.

18. See Chumachenko T. A. Church and State in Soviet Russia, 1941-1961. P. 87 - 103; see also documents published in the collection: Soviet Life. 1945_1953 / Ed. by E. Zubkov, Moscow, 2003, pp. 664-668.

19. See Patriarch Alexy's epistle to the bishops of December 24, 1949; copy submitted to G. Karpov (GARF. F. 6991. Op. 2. d. 73. L. 35; cit. In: Letters of Patriarch Alexy I to the Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church under the Council of Ministers of the USSR, 1945-1953, vol. 1 / Ed. by N. Krivov, Moscow, 2009, p. 502). In addition, see the telegram of Archbishop Joasaph (Zhurmanov) of Tambov and Michurinsk to the clergy of the Sosnovsky district on the categorical ban on participation in prayer services at springs dated May 17, 1951. Copy submitted to the Commissioner (State Archive of the Tambov region. f. R-5220. Op. 1. D. 109. L. 253).

20. See the report of G. Karpov to the Propaganda Department of the Central Committee of September 8, 1950, concerning the measures he had taken to restrict the activity of the church; here also there is a reference to the ban promulgated by the church authorities on the participation of clergy in pilgrimages (RGASPI. f. 17. Op. 132. D. 285. l. 160-169; here L. 168).

21. See the report for the second half of 1953 dated January 9, 1954, sent to G. Karpov by the Commissioner for the Kursk region (GARF. F. 6991. Op. 1. D. 1141. L. 2-14).

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an effective tool against the church, the Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church in Moscow refused other measures to stop the Kursk pilgrimage: for example, it opposed the proposal of the Executive Committee of the Kursk region, which, on the eve of the march in June 1951, intended to fill up the springs or declare quarantine in the region. Instead, the comrades from Moscow once again appealed to the decision of the Synod of August 1948, asking the Bishop of Kursk to impose a ban on the participation of priests of his diocese in the pilgrimage.22 The priests, as well as the bishop himself, faced an insoluble dilemma: on the one hand, the pilgrimage to the Indigenous Desert was an integral part of the church life of the diocese, on the other hand, participation in it threatened the very possibility of taking care of the flock in the future. Be that as it may, the fact that Bishop Innokenty (Zelnitsky) of Kursk at that time (since 1951) began solving this problem with a confidential conversation with the representative of the Moscow Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Kursk region says a lot about him. In January 1954, the commissioner transmitted the contents of the conversation to the Moscow Council: the bishop complained that "in connection with this procession to Korennaya, he was placed in a very uncomfortable and false position - these days he does not serve and must hide"23. In addition, the bishop was confronted with requests from his parishioners to accept their icons in the Church of the Russian Orthodox Church. in the cathedral before the procession begins, and then on the day of the pilgrimage, solemnly hand over the procession. Just before the beginning of the summer pilgrimage in 1953, parishioners came to him with bread and salt, so that he would bless them. However, according to the commissioner to Moscow, the bishop refused to accept them.24 In the following years, the bishop solved this problem simply: during a particularly large-scale spring pilgrimage, he left for Moscow to visit the Patriarch.25
22. See G. Karpov's letter to the Propaganda Department of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b) Mikhail Suslov (RGASPI. f. 17. Op. 132. d. 497. l. 141-143).

23. Report of January 25, 1954, by Volodin, the Commissioner for the Kursk Region, ACTING Chairman of the Moscow Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church, to Belyshev concerning a conversation with Bishop Innokentiy that took place on January 12, 1954 (GARF. F. 6991. Op. 1. D. 1141. L. 34-36).

24. Ibid. 35.

25. See G. Karpov's report to the Bureau of the Central Committee of the CPSU for the RSFSR and to the Council of Ministers of the RSFSR concerning pilgrimages to the Korennaya Pustyn on July 1, 1956 (GARF. F. 6991. Op. 1. D. 1332. L. 131-132). Also see the report of the authorized representative of the Acting Chairman of the Moscow Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church P. Serednyaku dated June 17, 1958.

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In addition to such direct interference with ecclesiastical autonomy, attempts were sometimes made to intimidate lay people who were going to participate in the pilgrimage. Again and again messages were sent to the Russian Orthodox Church Affairs Council in Moscow from various regions of the RSFSR stating that the chairman of a collective farm or village council, within the limits of his authority, prevented believers from attending church services or taking part in collecting signatures for the opening of a church. The measures taken against local venerated holy springs were also varied. In one case, the chairman of the district executive committee tried to oblige the church council of a village church to set up a guard in the village closest to the spring, which would not allow pilgrims to visit it. Karpov himself described this kind of intimidation in his letter to the Central Committee as "ridiculous"27. An employee of Karpov also spoke about excessively "rude actions", referring to the incident with the chairman of the village Council, who,

on the pilgrimage on June 13 to the Indigenous Desert (GARF. F. 6991. Op. 2. d. 229. L. 6-10).

26. GARF. F. 699 1. Op. 2. D. 229. L. 26.

27. Report of G. Karpov to the Propaganda Department of the Central Committee to Mikhail Suslov dated September 27, 1952 (RGASPI. f. 17. Op. 132. D. 569. L. 234-238).

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When the pilgrims gathered at a spring located in the Voronezh Region, a man urinated into it in front of their eyes. Why state and party bodies in the last years of Stalin's rule did not take any direct measures against the pilgrims, it is difficult to say. Of course, concerns about foreign countries played a role, because due to the foreign policy expectations that the Soviet leadership placed on the church, reports of actions taken against Christians were extremely undesirable. This may seem strange, especially when you consider the beginning of the cold War and the rapidly diminishing desire of the Soviet leadership to pay attention to its reputation in the eyes of former allies. However, in the field of religious politics, the situation was different, since Stalin and his entourage planned to use the church leadership in their geopolitical interests. This included monitoring developments in the Eastern European satellite States, participating in the ecumenical movement, and fighting the Vatican.29 For the same foreign policy reasons, the State Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church was even forbidden to transmit instructions to clergy in writing: so that evidence of permanent restrictions and interference in internal church affairs could not get abroad. 30 Another reason for the surprising tolerance towards these mass processions was, of course, that state and party officials did not consider the pilgrimages dangerous, despite the large number of participants: so far, "almost only middle-aged and elderly women"took part in the pilgrimages, 31 but not young people or representatives of the"village intelligentsia" officials did not see them as any threat to public order or people's loyalty to the system. It is quite possible that Stalin and his entourage, due to the extreme poverty of the country's population, assessed the situation in the countryside as explosive so much that they refrained

28. See the report of G. Utkin (late 1949) (RGASPI. f. 17. Op. 132. D. 111. l. 200-210).

29. Moscow and Eastern Europe. Vlast ' i tserkva v period obshchestvennykh transformatsiy 40 - 50-kh godov XX veka [Power and Church in the period of social transformations of the 40-50s of the XX century].

30. См. Chumachenko T.A. Church and State in Soviet Russia, 1941 - 1961. P. 30 ff.

31. See, for example, G. Karpov's report to the Bureau of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the RSFSR of July 1, 1956 (GARF. F. 6991. Op. 1. D. 1332. L. 131-132).

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for this reason, they refused to take any measures against the faithful and even considered that the pilgrimages serve as a valve that releases steam.32
What motivated the pilgrims and what they expected from the clergy

Pilgrimages were attractive to their participants for various reasons. Given the disastrous post-war poverty and disillusionment that the system was not liberalized and the hated collective farms were not disbanded, 33 the pilgrimages offered a kind of escape from the monotony of everyday life and satisfied the need for self-affirmation. The lavish nature of the amateur services contrasted sharply with the daily routine of working in the collective farm fields, which fell to the lot of women and the few men who managed to return from the war. The few places of leisure that were available in villages (such as reading huts or village clubs)were often empty or abandoned. 34 For this reason, the great pilgrimage was for its participants a significant protest against the regime that gave them so little. Indeed, the procession also implied the recapture of open space through the penetration of religion: an event previously unthinkable, given the experience of the terror of the 1930s. However, the pilgrimages should not be considered as anti-Soviet demonstrations, because their participants primarily sought to gain and transmit spiritual experience. Therefore, the line of conflict was not only between pilgrims and representatives of the state and the party: there were three-way relations, and the official church was also an actor.

32. See various reports to party leaders on the catastrophic situation in the countryside, published in: Sovetskaya Zhizn. 1945 - 1953. First of all, see pp. 213-266.

33. См. Zubkova E. Russia after the War. Hopes, Illusions, and Disappointments, 1945 - 1957. Armonk; New York, 1998. P. 59 - 67.

34. See, for example, the report from the Gorky region of October 1, 1952 (GARF. f. 6991. Op. 1. D. 892. l. 33-43).

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An analysis of the course of the pilgrimage can show how strong the connection between the pilgrimage and the church was, despite the intervention of the authorities, and where the border was drawn. Numerous pilgrims gathered early in the morning in both open churches

35. ATA (Archive of the Tambov Diocese).

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Kursk and there took part in the divine service. In the summer of 1956, when the number of pilgrims was at a record high, about 10,000 people made the 30-kilometer pilgrimage immediately after the service-although they accounted for only half of the 20,000 participants of the summer pilgrimage reported to Moscow, so the rest probably joined them later than 36. in the afternoon, the pilgrims stopped at the only open church on their way to St. John the Baptist. Joachim and Anna in the village of Long. Here, unlike in the city, they could place privately brought icons at the altar and bring them as a gift. But since not all pilgrims could fit in the small village church, many continued on their way to the sacred springs near the river, where they performed their divine services. The morning service in Kursk, where most of the pilgrims gathered, and the open church in the village of Dolgoye, located not far from the monastery, indicate the undoubted connection of the pilgrimage with the church. However, most of the pilgrims seem to have gathered only to hold a prayer service at the springs, where there were no clergy present.

Many parishioners of the Kursk Diocese, however, insisted that their bishop participate in the pilgrimage, or at least that he officially recognize the pilgrimage conducted without clergy. Six months after his summer pilgrimage in 1953, the bishop received a letter from an Orthodox Christian woman in Kursk, informing him of the pilgrims ' disappointment over his maneuvering. This detailed letter gives us a rare opportunity to hear the voice of the usually silent laity. The focus is on the attitude of the clergy to pilgrimage to the springs near the Indigenous Desert. Five years after the introduction of the state ban on the participation of clergy in processions, the author explicitly intends to explain to the bishop how she and her co-religionists experienced the pilgrimage experience and what significance the procession had for them:

Dear Vladyka Innocent, Every year a huge number of worshippers of every image and class accompany the Image of the Queen

36. See G. Karpov's report to the Bureau of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the RSFSR of July 20, 1956 (GARF. F. 6991. Op. 1. D. 1332. L. 131-132).

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Heavenly to the Root Desert. What a glorious journey it is! More than one thousand people sing songs of praise here on the way. More than one person recites the touching words of the akathist learned by heart. [ ... ] Fatigue is not felt, people in old age who fall on the way get up and go again. There are no words to express the feelings that fill our souls at this moment. Some extraordinary whirlwind lifts us up and carries us, carries us forward, there to the Holy Well, to the piles of stones of the ruined altar. Here begins the service, its own mundane simple and may be wrong and rude, but pure and sincere. All night long, if only the wind and rain do not prevent the candles from burning, akathists are chanted here with such deep feeling and inspiration that you want to leave your soul here forever.37
The conduct of the church service and the reading of the Akathist by the laity concerned one critical point, because, on the one hand, the laity were allowed to sing these hymns to the Mother of God privately, but on the other hand, they were considered as quasi-liturgical texts created under the supervision of the Holy Synod, and therefore could not be compiled independently or changed in any way.. But it was not just about the beauty and dignity of the service devised by the laity themselves, held at a spring near the monastery, but about the behavior of the clergy in general. The author of the letter uses very strong words, stating the following:: "Dear Vladyka, This is an unworthy Christian fear - it must be destroyed." At the same time, the author is aware of the risks that priests and lay people who devote themselves to church service are exposed to: "At the moment, their service is not easy (God save them) there is no one who does not understand this, how they risk

37. Copy of Anastasia Zavozgryaeva's letter to Bishop Innokentiy (Zelnitsky), Kursk, early 1954; appendix to the letter of Commissioner Volodin, Acting Chairman of the Council, to Belishev, dated January 25, 1954 (GARF. f. 6991. Op. 1. D. 1141. L. 38-44).

38. О периоде до 1917 г. см. Shevzov V. Between "Popular" and "Official": Akafisty Hymns and Marian Icons in Late Imperial Russia//Letters from Heaven. Popular Religion in Russia and Ukraine/Ed. Himka J. -P. Toronto, 2006. P. 251 - 277. The minutes of Synod meetings after 1943 also contain resolutions on the permissibility or inadmissibility of using newly composed akathists for liturgical purposes in individual dioceses. See, for example, the protocol of June 1, 1948 (GARF. F. 6991. Op. 2. D. 66a. l. 38) and dated July 23, 1953 (GARF. F. 6991. Op. 2. D. 99a. L. 53 sl.).

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and the Lord saves them." Therefore, the author of the letter does not ask the bishop to take part in the procession; she only wants him to at least take a positive view of this self-organized pilgrimage and not condemn it:

It would be painful, Vladyka, to feel that you are not personally with us, even in your heart! We, the parishioners of other churches who attend the cathedral, love you as a pastor, even more as a simple person, value your attention, appreciate your every word, follow your every instruction, and try with all our soul to be pure and obedient as you sincerely wish us to be. But... With regard to the Procession, we ask Vladyka not to be angry with us for our disobedience, but to leave us to our own devices [ ... ] May God bless our dear Vladyka for a correct understanding of the above. Don't judge Anastasia Zavozgryaeva. Kursk 39.

"Destroy this harmful relic forever": campaigns to eradicate pilgrimages under Khrushchev

Only after Stalin's death did the leadership of the state and the party decide to launch a centralized attack against ordinary participants in the pilgrimage. Already at the end of April 1953, Karpov sent a memorandum to Nikita Khrushchev (who at that time held the position of secretary of the Central Committee without any clearly defined field of activity), in which he proposed to create a special commission with the aim of destroying the venerated springs and eliminating pilgrimages.40 Over the next few weeks, the party secretaries of the regions where the pilgrimages were known to have taken place reported to Moscow on the measures being taken to stop them. Nevertheless, the impression was created that it would be enough to conduct an anti-relay-

39. Copy of Anastasia Zavozgryaeva's letter to Bishop Innokenty (Zelnitsky), Kursk, early 1954.

40. See the letter of G. Karpov to N. Khrushchev dated April 29, 1954 (RGANI. f. 5. Op. 16. D. 642. L. 80-84). Russian Church historian Mikhail Shkarovsky briefly touches on this initiative of Karpov, although he gives erroneous information about the sources: M. V. Shkarovsky Russian Orthodox Church under Stalin and Khrushchev. Gosudarstvenno-tserkovnye otnosheniya v 1939-1964 godakh [State - church relations in 1939-1964]. Moscow, 2005, p. 348.

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religious meetings or "scientific-atheistic" lectures, as well as other efforts by regional propaganda departments, coupled with technical instructions from the Moscow center. In any case, the proposal of the secretary of the Kursk Regional Committee to transfer the land on which the source revered by pilgrims was located to the "electromechanical factory"and thereby stop access to it for pilgrims was not implemented. 41 Shortly afterwards, at the end of June 1953, the secretary of the Propaganda Department of the Central Committee noted in a summary of his report to Nikita Khrushchev: "We would consider it possible to limit ourselves to the measures taken by local party organizations." 42
In the summer of the following year, a new step forward was taken: in its resolution of July 7, 1954, which had the title "On major shortcomings in scientific and atheistic propaganda and measures to improve it", the Central Committee of the CPSU unequivocally pointed to the Kursk pilgrimage and concluded that " the celebration of religious holidays, often accompanied by many days of drunkenness [... It causes great damage to the national economy, distracts thousands of people from work, and undermines labor discipline. "43 A few months later, in November 1954, the Central Committee backed down and recognized that" offensive actions against the church, clergy, and religious citizens are incompatible with the party and state line of conducting scientific and atheistic propaganda and propaganda. They contradict the Constitution of the U.S.S.R., which grants Soviet citizens freedom of conscience. " 44 These unintelligible actions are easily explained if one looks behind the scenes of the Central Committee, since two different factions in the party leadership were fighting for the right to determine religious policy: while Nikita Khrushchev insisted on anti-religious measures, Malenkov, Voroshilov, and Molotov viewed the Moscow Patriarchate as a quasi-state institution, which, accordingly, is connected with the interests of the country, and therefore defended church policy of the late Stalin era 45. After two short campaigns in the summer of 1953

41. See the report of the secretary of the Kursk regional Committee to the head of the Central Committee's Department for Science and Culture A. Rumyantsev dated June 2, 1953 (RGANI. f. 5. O. 16. d. 642. L. 93-95).

42. A. Rumyantsev, including N. Khrushchev, June 27, 1953 (RGANI. f. 5. O. 16. d. 642. l. 111-112).

43.See About religion and the Church. Collection of Documents, Moscow, 1965, pp. 71-77.

44. Ibid.

45. See M. V. Shkarovsky, The Russian Orthodox Church under Stalin and Khrushchev, p. 348. On how Stalin planned to use the Moscow Patriarchate for his own purposes.

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The years of 1954 and 1954, which were accompanied by the closure of churches, were a relatively quiet period for the Russian Orthodox Church. Therefore, it is no accident that at this stage - up to 1957 - numerous pilgrimages were observed again. The changes took place after the June 1957 plenum of the Central Committee and were caused by a whole complex of factors: the main role was played by cardinal changes in the party leadership, followed by foreign policy and economic considerations.46 As part of the anti-religious campaign launched, pilgrimages were no longer hindered by the church authorities, but the pilgrims themselves were now under the supervision of state officials. In November 1958, the Central Committee finally adopted a resolution on "measures to stop pilgrimages to the so-called 'holy springs'". Party and executive committees in the regions and republics were now under an ultimatum to use the full range of propaganda measures, warnings and threats related, for example, to prosecution. The local population was forced to vote for filling up nearby springs or for transferring the territories where they were located, for example, to pioneer camps. The party committees of all regions had until June 1, 1959 to report to the Central Committee of the CPSU on the measures taken to implement its resolution 47. In the last days of May 1959, the Central Committee was overwhelmed by a flood of reports about the successful "elimination" of sources in the relevant regions. Nevertheless, the head of the Central Committee's Propaganda Department noted in his final report that in some cases the measures taken could "offend the feelings of believers." This was the case, for example, in the Tambov region, where a summer pig camp was planned to be set up on the territory near the spring. 48 The secretary of the Kursk Regional Executive Committee, for his part, reported on the use of a proven method: exerting pressure on the diocese. To the clergy of " sovilova-

For foreign policy purposes, see Miner S. M. Stalin's Holy War. P. 51-92.

46. Shkarovsky M. V. Russkaya Pravoslavnaya Tserkva pri Stalinu i Khrushchev [Russian Orthodox Church under Stalin and Khrushchev], pp. 352-362. Also see Stone A. B. "Overcoming Peasant's Backwardness". P. 301.

47. See extract from Minutes No. 193 of the meeting of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU of November 28, 1958 ("To achieve the closure of the so-called 'holy places'"). The Church is under control. p. 127).

48. See the joint resolution of the Head of the Propaganda Department of the Central Committee, L. A. Ilyicheva and V. Moscow of July 16, 1959 (RGANI. f. 5. Op. 33. D. 125. L. 132-136). The reports of individual party committees are consolidated in a single act.

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li" not to hold any services on the day of the pilgrimage in the area of the procession movement. In addition, the priests had to read out the corresponding message of Patriarch Alexy, as well as acquaint the flock with the decision of the district executive committee that access to the Indigenous Desert is closed. "According to our observations, these measures were implemented." 49 However, the main reason that in 1959, for the first time in 15 years, a mass pilgrimage did not take place was probably personal agitation at city railway and bus stations, which was also accompanied by threats of force. The secretary could proudly report: "As a result of the work carried out, the pilgrimage to the so-called "holy spring" has been stopped. On July 2, 3, and 4, not a single person was directly at the former source. " 50 However, the optimistic assessment that it would be possible "in this way to permanently eliminate this most harmful relic" could not, of course, be completely correct. However, in the following years, the territory of the Indigenous Desert and the pilgrimage route from Kursk were under special supervision, and coordination of measures to counteract the pilgrimage remained one of the main tasks of the local authorized Council for the affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church. 51 At the same time, the commissioner heard residents of the town of Svoboda talking about "that soon there will be no district authorities here, and then we will again go to the springs, dismantle the fence again and dig up the source"52.

In fact, there were no pilgrimages only where there were a significant number of party and Komsomol activists, as well as government officials, who blocked access to sources and dissuaded pilgrims from participating in processions in a "personal conversation". In other places that were less often the focus of government attention and therefore less tightly controlled, even in 1960, small pilgrimages were made to the area.-

49. Report of the secretary of the Kursk regional Committee of the CPSU I. Dudkin on actions in connection with the resolution of the Central Committee of November 28, 1958 (on measures to stop pilgrimages) of July 8, 1959 (RGANI. f. 5. Op. 33. D.125. L. 123 - 128).

50. Ibid.

51. See the action plan of the Commissioner for the Kursk Region for the first half of 1961 (GARF. f. 6991. Op. 1. D. 1866. L. 1-6); annual report of 1961 (GARF. F. 6991. Op. 1. D.2066. L. 1-34, S. 19). Unfortunately, the data of the Russian Orthodox Church Affairs Council for 1964 is not freely available, so it is impossible to say whether the pilgrimages resumed after Khrushchev's removal from office.

52. See the annual Report for 1962 of February 19, 1963 (GARF. f. 6991. Op. 1. d. 2066. l. 1-34; here l. 19).

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the celebrations followed their traditional routes to what were considered sacred springs and rivers.53
The main mass of pilgrims, for whom the pilgrimage was an opportunity to live their own religious life, was not so much convinced by the presence of agitators and policemen as intimidated. The closure of churches and the prevention of pilgrimages led to the disappearance of visible manifestations of religious activity, but the main ideological goal of the Khrushchev campaign, i.e., the proof of the incompatibility of Soviet socialism and religion, was ultimately not achieved. 54 The rural Soviet Union remained a space in which Soviet collective farmers steadfastly adhered to traditional religious practices and worldviews, and where miracles and the sudden appearance of God's grace were considered possible and widely celebrated.

53. See the report of the Acting Chairman of the Soviet P. Serednyak to the Propaganda Department of the Central Committee of August 13, 1960 (GARF. F. 6991. Op. 1. D. 1747. L. 146-156). So, in June 1960, a group of boo pilgrims walked 70 km from the city of Kirov to the Velikaya River, and no one interrupted them; and in the Tula region, about 3,000 people visited the spring in the village of Tyurten.

54. See Stone A. B. "Overcoming Peasant's Backwardness". P. 311-320. 55. GARF. F. 6991. Op. 2. D. 229. L. 12.

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Conclusion

After the restoration of the institutions of the Russian Orthodox Church in the winter of 1943, pilgrimages to local holy sites experienced a renaissance. As a traditional form of Orthodox religious practice, they could compensate for the still weak connection of rural areas with the church. Pilgrimages and processions created a space where it was possible to meet the sacred. It did not matter whether they were related to objects such as former monasteries, churches, and chapels, or to places such as special revered springs, rivers, or trees that were associated with sacred experiences (such as visions or finding icons) but were not (yet) recognized as official. the church hierarchy. The pilgrimage to the Korennaya Pustyny near Kursk, which is central to this article, should be considered as a mixed form, since now pilgrims could not enter the closed, no longer inaccessible monastery and went to the source located near it. However, this pilgrimage between 1944 and 1958 could have attracted up to 20,000 participants. These processions were among the most numerous on the territory of the RSFSR.

The party and state apparatus monitored these meetings, but as long as Stalin was alive, they did not take any large-scale actions against the Russian Orthodox Church, based on their geostrategic interests. Instead, Moscow functionaries tried to reduce the attraction of pilgrimages by banning clergy from participating in them. The pilgrimage to the Indigenous Desert, however, attracted so many people precisely because its authority was based on pre-revolutionary pilgrimage practices. On the other hand, the monastery was not an actual sacred place, and state intervention with the help of the church was not significant.

Representatives of the official Church had only an indirect relation to the summer mass pilgrimages to the Indigenous Desert. Pilgrims gathered for the morning service in Kursk and marched out together, but when the procession reached its final destination, the clergy were not among them. However, most of the participants seemed to perceive the pilgrimage as fulfilling the Orthodox Church's prescriptions.

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They insisted on the participation of the bishop and other clergy members. Similarly, when the state, with its prescriptions and regulations of religious activity, tried to influence what was considered an important part of Christian life, it encountered resistance from the Orthodox laity. The levers used by State and party functionaries to restrict the freedom of action of the clergy were not very suitable when it came to the laity.

For the participants, the pilgrimage was one of the few opportunities to escape from poverty and daily drudgery. In addition, such mass marches, which were not authorized by the State, contained a certain, albeit unconscious, protest impulse directed against the existing order. Due to the fact that for the majority of peasants and religiously inclined people, the opportunities offered by the state for leisure activities were not attractive (or even inaccessible), the state constantly experienced excessive pressure, taking control of traditional practices of Orthodox piety. Other political regimes have also experienced similar failures in controlling religious practices.56
While the state and party leaders have long witnessed the rise of pilgrimage, they have not been able to come up with a common position. It wavered between initiatives to eliminate religious processions and the perception of them as a steam vent for the part of the population that was considered marginal. The confrontation of various forces behind the scenes of the authorities created a free space that believers could use. Their tenacity-especially in comparison with the pliability of the Orthodox clergy - was a prerequisite for the amazing manifestations of religious life that were mass pilgrimages in the post-war era.

56. См. Zumholz A.M. Volksfrommigkeit und totalitares NS-Regime. Marienerscheinungen in Heede/Emsland 1937 und 1940//Maria und Lourdes. Wunder und Marienerscheinungen in theologischer und kulturwissenschaftlicher Perspektive/Hg. Bernhard Schneider. Miinster, 2008. S. 198 - 223; Smith S. Local Cadres Confront the Supernatural. The Politics of Holy Water (Shenshui) in the PRC, 1949 - 1966//The China Quarterly. 188 (2006). P. 999 - 1022.

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Bibliography

Archive materials

Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History (RGASPI).

F. 17 (Department of Propaganda and Agitation of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b) - Central Committee of the CPSU).

State Archive of the Russian Federation (GARF).

F. 6991 (Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church under the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR).

F. R-9401 ("Special folder" of I. V. Stalin from the materials of the NKVD-MVD Secretariat of the USSR, 1944-1953).

Russian State Archive of Modern History (RGANI).

F. 5 (Department of Propaganda and Agitation of the Central Committee of the Central Committee of the CPSU (B) - Central Committee of the CPSU).

State Archive of the Tambov Region (GATO).

F. R-5220 (Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church).

Published sources

"To achieve the closure of the so-called 'holy places'." Church under control//Source. Bulletin of the Presidential Archive of the Russian Federation. 1997. N 4. pp. 120-129.

Vasilevskaya V. Ya. Catacombs of the XX century. Memories. Moscow, 2001.

About religion and the Church. Collection of documents / Ed. by F. Garkavenko, Moscow, 1965.

Letters of Patriarch Alexy I to the Council for the Affairs of the Russian Orthodox Church under the Council of Ministers of the USSR / Ed. by N. Krivov. 1945-1953 Vol. 1. Moscow, 2009.

Ryabov N. Saratovskaya kupel'//Truth. February 19, 1949. p. 3.

Soviet life. 1945_1953 / Ed. by E. Zubkov, Moscow, 2003.

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