Broadcast of the program "Church and the World" dated February 23, 2013

Interview of Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeev of Volokolamsk with Rector of Moscow State University V.A. Sadovnichim on the air of the program "Church and Peace". Education and the Church: how does science relate to religion?

Lord: Hello dear brothers and sisters! You are watching the program "Church and Peace". Today we will talk about the church and education. And I'm visiting Rector of Moscow State University Viktor Sadovnichy. Hello Viktor Antonovich!

Sadovnichy: Hello sir! I wanted to talk with you for a long time about a lot of issues that concern both the university community and the scientific community, and these are old questions, but, nevertheless, they do not leave society, they do. I have such a tradition, I adhere to it - every year I give a lecture to freshmen. These are 7,000 first-year students, and I tell them about some outstanding person of Moscow University, a scientist, and I wanted to remember three of them today. This is the father PaulFlorensky. Outstanding mathematician, inventor, scientist. But he became a priest and his works are simply outstanding works, linking science, set theory, the concept of imaginary, with faith in God, with religion. The second one is Dmitry Fedorovich Egorov. This is also a mathematician, who in the last years of his life gave a lot of strength to faith, was repressed, died in prison. And this, of course, is such an example of a professor at Moscow University, a scientist, an outstanding scientist. And of course, Ivan Alexandrovich Ilyin, our professor. Actually, his dissertation on the teachings of Hegel, the concreteness of God and man are also in this field of interest.

I once wrote the work "Science as a metaphor" and tried to discuss these issues in this work - science and religion.

And I quoted Hawking there - he is an outstanding physicist. He said that belief in the big bang theory and the expanding universe does not conflict with belief in God.

Lord: You mentioned several people at once. If we talk about Hawking, then this is an interesting example of a person who is both a scientist and a popularizer of science, and who in his books just shows that there are various theories of the origin of the Universe, the development of the Universe. None of them is contrary to faith in God. Hawking is not a believer, but his most popular book, A Brief History of Time, actually ends every chapter with the question of whether there is a God or not.

This is an interesting example of a person who, despite a very serious illness, continues scientific research, continues to popularize science and continues to search for answers to eternal questions being. And those people whom you mentioned - Florensky, Egorov, Ilyin - these are, of course, those outstanding personalities who, in their own experience, both scientific and life, combined these two components - scientific and religious. And in Florensky, for example, all this was very naturally combined. He was a person of genius, an extraordinary person, and for him the scientific search naturally ended in a religious search. And what he created in his writings is a very unusual synthesis of scientific and religious worldviews.

And the examples that you gave just show that there are no contradictions between science and religion.

What was given to us in Soviet time– that science banishes religion, that science proves that there is no God… The example of these and very many people just shows that everything is the other way around. Faith is a personal choice. But if a person has made such a choice, then no scientific knowledge can turn him away from this choice. Little knowledge leads away from God, and great knowledge, on the contrary, leads to God.

Sadovnichy: Science, in principle, is also faith. You have to believe in your result, you have to assume something, which may seem incredible, but in the end becomes a reality. Well, you more deeply generalized that a person has an inner world. He believes in something, this is his personal conviction, his personal spiritual life, and there are absolutely no contradictions here.

We can cite a huge number of scientists who were also believers and made wonderful, outstanding scientific discoveries.

And if this opposition is largely artificial.

Lord: It is no coincidence that the three people you mentioned - two of them ended their lives in the camps, and one of them ended their life in exile. That is, all three, each in their own way, suffered for their faith. And this was due to the fact that faith was artificially deleted from people's lives. To be a believer meant to challenge the atheistic state, the atheistic authority. And the authorities did not want to put up with the existence of religion. But they proceeded from the fact that religion should die out, and were sure that religion is a relic of the past. That as science develops, as the socialist system advances more and more, religion will disappear by itself. And you and I survived that era, and now we live in an era when the significance of religion is not only not diminished, it is increasing. We see this in the Arab world, where there is a significant rise in Islam, and Islam not only in its traditional form, but also in very radical expressions. We see that religion continues to exist, and perhaps even more and more becomes a factor in political life. And we see that religion occupies a very important place in the minds and hearts of people.

And if we talk about the education system, then we understand more and more that education, divorced from upbringing, divorced from morality, will not bring the fruits that education should bring, educating not just a person as the owner of a certain amount of knowledge, but a person, as a person, a person as a citizen, a person capable of sacrificing himself for the sake of some higher ideals.

And here religion is a very powerful ally of the education system, because it just helps to fill all this educational process some higher meaning.

Sadovnichy: That period of unbelief, which you mentioned, was certainly difficult, but still society did not agree with this, and there are many examples of this. I remember my baptism, or rather, I don’t remember it, I remember it from stories. Parents are ordinary people, in the morning the child was taken to church, baptized. I think that that period was not easy, and, of course, we must speak about it with regret. But now is a new time, and new realities, and we, in my opinion, have already made one mistake. At the beginning of the 90s, they were carried away by the fact that His Majesty the market, His Majesty the career of a person decides everything, does everything, determines, and most importantly, open these trajectories and forget about everything that accompanies this. A young man is a very rich soul. He seeks, he is formed, he is determined in his future life. And having crossed out the element of upbringing, the element of attitude to our fatherland, to our homeland, to our history, we certainly did a lot wrong. And now, thank God, times are a little different, and public opinion is turning, and other beliefs and other theories in society are winning, but it is very difficult to turn this vector around among the youth. And, probably, now one of the main tasks - I completely agree with this - is to pay attention to this with all the efforts of our educational institution, at school, at universities, and the whole society. Pay attention to the fact that a person, first of all, must be rich internally.

Lord: This mistake, which you mentioned, and which consists in imposing on a young person the ideals of a consumer society, of course, has very difficult and disastrous consequences for the souls of young people.

It must be said frankly that both the ideals that are often introduced through the media and the ideals that exist among the youth do not lead anywhere. young man. Just by a consumer attitude to life, a person cannot acquire either happiness, or inner peace, or any kind of goal-setting in his activity. .

Like, a career is something that can accompany a person. Material success is something that can accompany a person. But when it becomes an end in itself, then a person ceases to understand why he lives. And this inner core, this inner motivation, disappears from a person, especially when it comes to, for example, some acts of self-sacrifice that are inevitably required from a person. And then a person asks himself: why should I sacrifice myself, why should I sacrifice anything at all, if I can get all this for myself, if I can live in accordance with this consumer ideal, why should I sacrifice something ? And then the whole value system collapses. The very concept of values ​​disappears. After all consumer society teaches a person that there are no absolute moral values, that all moral norms are relative. That each person can establish a scale of moral values ​​for himself and follow it, as long as it does not violate the rights of other people. And the solidarity that has held people together for centuries, and which was based on the fact that people had common values, common ideas about absolute norms, is now disappearing. And this, of course, is also the role of the university.

A university is not only an educational institution where people acquire this or that knowledge in the field of mathematics, physics, literature, and in other areas. But the university is also the place where people should be educated, where they should receive the leaven for their entire subsequent life. And of course, it is no accident that the university and the Church have a lot of common tasks. And the presence of a church at a university becomes quite natural, as at Moscow University, where with your help, with your direct participation, the historical church of St. Tatiana was restored, which today has become a center of attraction for so many students.

And this is quite natural, and I am deeply convinced that this in no way violates either the secular nature of the state or the secular nature of the university, because secular is not a synonym for atheism. Secular is a synonym for, let's say, the right to choose for a person. But in our country we know very well how many people have made a choice in favor of Christianity, in favor of the Orthodox Church. And these people should have the right to confess their religious choice not just as some kind of private and personal matter, but also to confess it both in civil society and in their professional duties.

Sadovnichy A: Young people are also now looking. So I meet them at the Olympiads, at various forums, it is clear that they, too, would like to be internally richer. They just need to be given the opportunity. You correctly said that the task of the university is to give this opportunity to develop internally. The university is a secular educational institution, this is understandable, but now we are talking about the main thing, about what a person is, how he is formed. Man is an amazing creature created by God, nature, nature or God - this is the same dispute, or not a dispute, but a discussion. But, nevertheless, this is an amazing and the only creature that belongs to such a perfect creature, and of course, he needs to do everything so that he has the opportunity to live so that he becomes perfection. This is the task of the university as well. And that's why you remembered the temple of the Holy Martyr Tatyana.

It was a difficult time and a difficult choice. It was just a time, there was still a time when the attitude to the decision to transfer the temple, to place the temple, to restore university traditions was perceived both by the authorities at that time, and by certain sections of society, brought up in such an atheistic vein, very aggressively. And just down to threats. It seems to me that this was a very correct decision of Moscow University, and I decided to recreate Tatyana's temple at Moscow University and thereby restore tradition and history.

This temple has been the core of the spiritual and moral life of the university for centuries. And when all this was cut short, the university felt that there was nothing to replace it. And it is good that now the temple exists magnificently. Students and professors go there. Our birthday - Tatiana's Day - we always meet in the morning in the temple. And this great tradition. This is what unites all people. We seem to feel better, richer, more confident, calmer, when we live like this at the university as a close-knit family, a corporation, and everyone believes in their ideals, but the fact that it managed to somehow enrich each person is a success. And I think that the church served as an example of the reconstruction of churches in other universities in Russia. We are happy about it.

Lord: Our common task– is to educate a person who is whole and holistic.

Sadovnichy: Yes.

Lord: And in order for this to happen, it is necessary not only to acquire knowledge in professional areas, but also to educate the personality of a person. And here, of course, the presence of a temple in a secular university is a very important component. So I studied at Oxford. This is a secular university. But in every college there are temples, services are held there. In some cases, students, regardless of their beliefs, participate in them. Even some traditions have been preserved. Well, for example, in many colleges, dinner begins with a prayer at Latin. Believe it or not, you must stand up and listen to this prayer. And no one thinks that by doing so, something is being imposed on someone. It is a natural part of academic life. But more importantly, such centers of religiosity and spirituality, which now exist in many secular educational institutions, stop young people from bad deeds, they help them become better, and they play a huge moral and educational role. And I would also like to say that the presence of a temple in a university does not contradict not only the secular nature of the state, but also its multi-confessional nature, since now we also have Islamic universities in our country. I visited the Islamic University in Kazan and met with our Muslim students. There are centers of worship of God belonging to other confessions. And we all exist in the world, and this is quite natural.

The exclusion of religion from public life is unnatural.

And the peaceful coexistence of religions, including within the framework of one educational institution, within the framework of one university, is quite natural.

I would like to thank you, Viktor Antonovich, for being a guest of our program, wish you success, Moscow University, and God bless our students and our professors!

Sadovnichy: Thank you, thank you, my lord!

Lord: The guest of our program was the rector of Moscow State University Viktor Antonovich Sadovnichy. Stay with us.

Baptism in itself, without spiritual life, is not saving. This is just a seed that can germinate and bear fruit, or it can dry up and die. How to raise a child after Baptism? About it small selection recommendations of one of the Orthodox fathers. Initially, they were collected for themselves, and not for publication. These are not always personal thoughts, sometimes they are quotes from books that the author of the note found useful.

Education and moral education

1. Orthodoxy is interesting for a child. It is interesting not only with a decorated temple, a bewitching ceremony, unusual clothes, singing and other things. Orthodoxy is interesting by the teaching itself, because it teaches that spiritual world it is the same reality as our earthly world, and this spiritual world is nearby, it is simply invisible.
2. An example of faith for children is their parents. The smoldering faith of parents is unable to inflame the hearts of their children with ardent faith in God. In a child, the fire of faith does not flare up from the rules (they help the faith not to die out), but from the spirit of faith and love that surrounds him. He must recognize Christ not from a picture book, but from the mood, the way of thinking, from the way of life, the mutual relations of family members.
3. First of all, it is necessary to give the child not only knowledge about God (assimilation of religious truths), but Knowledge of God (perception of God by an inner feeling). The child should be taught (incl. own example) turn to God (with gratitude, request, repentance) and evaluate any situation from the point of view of the will of God, expressed in the Gospel. The very word "religion" means not a simple concept of God, but a living relationship with Him. The task of religious leadership is to help the child maintain the right relationship between himself and God, to prevent the temptations of sensuality and pride from developing.
4. Do not scare the child with God. At the same time, we can say that his behavior is unpleasant (disgusting) to God, that God created us for love and goodness, and we ourselves strive to be unhappy and turn away from the Heavenly Father. It can be explained that any sin deprives us of divine grace and we become defenseless against evil.
5. Try to give the child a harmonious knowledge of God, that the Creator of the Universe is not just a “good magician” who fulfills any desire, that He has His own will, that He is wise and never makes mistakes, never ceases to be good, even if we cannot accommodate His will. God respects our will, but we must humbly accept His will and not grumble.
6. FROM early childhood explain to the child that death is not the end, death is the door to another world; that there is physical death, but there is spiritual death - unwillingness to know God and fulfill His will, expressed in His Commandments. Explain that the souls of all people are immortal, only our bodies are temporarily mortal.
7. It is important to give the child not just speculative, but active faith. If we have unbelieving relatives, then we should not torture ourselves with questions about their fate, but pray for them. If someone close to you has died, then you need to help him with prayer, and not just torment yourself with grief, because his soul really needs our help!
8. Need to get ahead moral education rational-informational.
9. Evaluate the behavior of children through the prism of the Commandments of God. Learn them with them. In case of violation, explain what commandment of God they violated, what sin they committed. The child must realize that by his deeds he pleases and grieves not only his parents, but also God.
10. It makes sense to make pilgrimage trips only with church pilgrimage services, whose guides can competently expound the church doctrine.
11. Firmly stop the lies of the child. Emphasize that the first liar is the devil.
12. It is important to develop in children the skills of spiritual security, system of moral evaluations.
13. Teaching a child the Christian forgiveness of offenses does not exclude the ability to fight back, to stand up for others, because it is difficult to apply the concept of “forgiveness” to a coward.
14. Mercy is nurtured through sacrifice. You can start small - give away unnecessary toys. It is important to give the child the opportunity to be in a situation where someone expects mercy from them or needs their mercy, and not just cramming "Blessed are the merciful ...".
15. As the English writer Chesterton once remarked, the child's religious upbringing begins not when the father begins to tell him about God, but when the mother teaches him to say "thank you" for a deliciously baked pie. The soul must learn to be grateful.
16. Do not hide difficult questions from your child, especially from a teenager. If you do not help to find a balanced answer, then those who have fallen away from the Church or the theomachists will do it for you in a favorable perspective. Explain that the Church is analogous to a hospital, and one of God's names is Physician. And it is unreasonable on our part to judge others because they are not sick with the same passions as we are.

spiritual reading

1. The Gospel should be read daily. Teaching the fundamentals of the faith has long been the responsibility of the father. It is desirable to build it into a nightly tradition. In our time, there are many benefits for the religious education of children.
2. It is useful to read the lives of the saints, adapted for children. The child should not be a passive listener; after reading, one should discuss what has been read, ask questions. It is important to show the saints not as legendary heroes of bygone times, but as our eternal mentors and helpers to whom we can turn. Show what was the main thing in the life of all these great people.
3. Useful tradition for children and adults - daily write out and memorize a verse that touched the heart from the read chapter of the Gospel.

Prayer

1. The day of all family members begins and ends with prayer. For children, the rule may consist of several short prayers, for example, the so-called. “the usual beginning” (morning prayers and for the coming sleep begin with it) in any prayer book.
2. Prayer before and after meals the most powerful tool spiritual education.
3. Before breakfast, it is customary to eat a small piece of prosphora(you can buy it in the temple and cut it) and holy water (you can always get it in the temple) with the prayer "To accept prosphora and holy water."
4. When the child leaves the house (and also before going to bed), he needs to be baptized with a prayer. For example, such: “Lord, bless” or “Fence (child's name) Lord, by the power of Your Honorable and Life-Giving Cross, and save him from all evil.” Or: “Lord, Jesus Christ, Son of God, bless, sanctify, keep with the power life-giving cross yours"; If you have an obstinate teenager, then you can do it after him, so that he does not see.
5. Don't impose a big prayer rule on your child. When learning to pray, attention and sincerity are especially important.
6. It makes sense to add prayers to the prayer rule, depending on the circumstances.: holidays, holy day, fasting, someone's illness, some joyful or sad event.
7. At home prayer light a candle or a lamp, it is desirable that this be the responsibility of the child.
8. Do not pray late when the child only dreams of sleep and his attention is relaxed.
9. Children should be taught to short prayers: “Bless the Lord”, “Glory to You, Lord”, “Lord have mercy”, “Most Holy Theotokos, save us”, “Glory to God for everything”; "God bless me for teaching" (sincerely, not automatically).
10. Help your child make a memorial. All names there should be entered only by him at his own heart's call, because this is his commemorative.
11. In the child's room (as in other rooms and the dining room) there should be icons. The main and larger icon should be the icon of the Savior or the Holy Trinity.

Church Sacraments and Services

1. AT Sundays Christians participate in the Sacrament of Holy Communion. Children under the age of 7 may receive the Sacrament without confession. One should not directly direct the preparation of the child for this Sacrament. You can gently advise, remind, but not demand. Trust the priest, he will help the child himself. When preparing for confession, the child should think about his sins and ask God for forgiveness for each.
2. Before the Liturgy, the children should get a good night's sleep, then the morning preparations will not be a burden for them.
3. A baby goes to the temple because his parents do it. Then you can explain "The Lord is waiting for you, He will be glad if you come to His house." The goal is not for the children to go to church unquestioningly, but for them to fall in love with the Church.
4. In order to love the services, you need to study them. Use manuals for children to study the Divine Liturgy. Include worship prayers in prayer rule child: what the choir sings, but not the prayers of the priests or the litanies.
5. Accustom to the liturgical circle of fasts and holidays. Meeting the holidays accumulates in the soul a stock of holy impressions, joyful and pure experiences, which will become the foundation of the future conscious religious life. Three components of the holiday: festive clothes; tasty food; holiday pastime.
6. Before the start of the school year, many churches serve a prayer service for students.
7. Children should stand close to the altar and watch the actions of the ministers, and not in the porch or next to their parents, looking at the back of the adult standing in front.

asceticism

1. Explain to the child the mechanism of committing a sin (from thought to action). If a person does not cut off his passions in his youth, then, over the years, the strength of his will will weaken and his passions will become stronger.
2. To teach that the soul is the mistress of the body, and not vice versa. To teach the child to overcome laziness, fatigue, to justify their desires. Children should feel the restriction as a necessity. They should know that their parents limit them out of love. A child who cannot consciously and completely freely refuse pleasure is simply a child with an undeveloped will.
3. The responsibilities of children should be determined (cleaning the bed, garbage can, setting the table, shopping).
4. The child must understand the purpose of the posts and their meaning. For him, fasting should become a journey, a school of spiritual education, and not a time of despondency and envy for those who can afford everything. The duration of multi-day fasts should correspond to the capabilities of the child. For example, a long Peter fast (in those years when it is more than 8 days) can be reduced to one, last week.

Other

1. Churching families should invite a priest from the nearest church to bless the apartment. And consecrate the dwelling, and then you can get to know the priest better and communicate.
2. Involve godparents in the upbringing of the child, in difficult cases, contact the confessor of the family.
3. For a harmonious spiritual life, trusting relationships with children are important. Parents should be aware of what spiritual problems their child has in order to help him.
4. There must be a hierarchy in the family. The younger ones should be aware of respect, submission and gratitude to the elders as a law. The elders, in turn, should have love for the younger ones, help and protect them. From V. Rozanov: “The everyday rule that children should respect their parents, and parents should love children, should be read the other way around: parents should respect children, respect their peculiar world and their ardent, ready to be offended every minute nature; and children should only love their parents - and they will certainly love them, once they feel this respect for themselves.
   Hierarchy will be learned by children when they see it in their parents, when the mother does not contradict the father, when the parents do not condemn grandparents, when they do not grumble at the bosses.

And the most important thing! Pray for the child, pray for the rest of your earthly life, pray, even if it seems that nothing can be changed. Everything is possible for God.

Kovalenko E.V.

teacher-psychologist, MBDOU "Rucheyek"

Noyabrsk

Orthodoxy and education, upbringing

The role of Orthodoxy in education

Orthodoxy is pure and undistorted Truth brought to earth for the salvation of people by Christ the Savior. The Christian lives, feeling his connection with world history and with the future. Probably, the transition from a cosmogonic to a historical worldview, which occurred with the Russian people at the turn of the 9th-10th centuries, caused the appearance of such a unique phenomenon as Russian chronicles, which are literally permeated with a sharp sense of the flow of moving time. Old Russian state many literate people were required - to serve the prince, govern the state, communicate with foreign lands, and trade. Judging by the chronicles, the princes of that time were not only familiar with foreign languages, loved to collect and read books, but also showed concern for the creation of schools. The first educational institutions arose under Vladimir the Baptist. It was he who ordered "to collect from the best people children and send them to book education. There is hardly a name in Russian history more significant than the name Kyiv prince St. Vladimir, the Baptist of Rus'. Rus', through his efforts, was illuminated by the light of the Christian faith. Faith laid the foundation for our writing, painting, and architecture.

Analyzing the role of Orthodoxy in Russian history, I. Ilyin wrote: "All Russian art came from Orthodox faith from time immemorial, imbibing the spirit of heartfelt contemplation, prayerful soaring, free sincerity and spiritual responsibility. Russian painting came from the icon, Russian music was covered with church hymns, Russian architecture came from temple and monastic architecture; Russian theater has evolved from dramatic "acts" on religious themes, Russian literature has evolved from the church and monasticism.

After the accession to the throne of the emperor Alexander III, since 1882, the revival of parochial schools begins. Excellent experience of the work of the parochial school was accumulated at the end of the last century in the village. Tatevo, Smolensk province, which was led by Sergei Alexandrovich Rachinsky for several years.

Religious upbringing and education included so-called "educational trips", when children went on a pilgrimage in the summer, to holy places or to the nearest monastery. In addition to visiting holy places, children during such trips learned about their land, its history, collected songs and fairy tales, recorded rituals and games of the Smolensk and Tver regions. The most beloved holiday of Slavic writing by children.

The second subject was the Russian language and reading, the third compulsory subject was arithmetic. Rachinsky introduced church singing, arithmetic of fractional numbers and elementary geometry, geography and national history. His school was called the school of arts. He helped T. Nikonov become a portrait painter, I. Peterson became an icon painter, a well-known artist - the son of a laborer N.P. Bogdanov-Belsky, whose workshop was in the Rachinsky house.

“For us,” Ushinsky wrote, “non-Christian pedagogy is an unthinkable thing, an enterprise without motives behind, without results ahead.”

So is it possible to Russian classics of the XIX century. understand outside Orthodoxy. Where does the patriotic pathos of "The History of the Russian State" come from? Where are Gogol's thoughts directed? How to understand the heroes of Dostoevsky and Tolstoy? Philosophical ideas Russian philosophers? Vladimir Solovyov? And what about the Russian religious-philosophical renaissance, Russian cosmism, which brought Russian ideological thought to the world level? What fed them? Where to look for the motivating causes of all that constitutes the spiritual pride of the Russian land? Russian culture and Orthodoxy are fundamentally inseparable.

It is necessary to return Orthodoxy as a social ideology - this is the main condition for the salvation of the Russian people.

It is quite obvious that the most important task on this path is the education and upbringing of children and youth.

I think we need to get acquainted with brief extracts from the book of His Holiness Patriarch Alexy "The Church and the Spiritual Revival of Russia"

The main component of spiritual education is spirituality itself, that is, the ability not to talk about Christ, about the Church, but to live in Christ and in the Church. Without the spiritual blessing and guidance of the Church, the centuries-old moral foundations, without which neither the state nor the people are able to exist and flourish, turned out to be shaken and undermined.

The fate of Russia, its future is in the hands of teachers, educators and teachers.

Russia is needed not only by itself, but by the whole world, like the Russia of Theophan the Greek, Andrei Rublev, Pushkin, Dostoevsky, St. Sergius of Radonezh and Seraphim of Sarov.

It would be good for all of us together, by joint efforts, to better understand the traditional foundations of education and upbringing in Russia ... to try to create a concept and program for the spiritual enlightenment of Russia. The task of education has always been one of the most important social tasks.

(His Holiness Patriarch Alexy II of Moscow and All Rus')

For the purpose of raising children in the Orthodox Christian tradition, the Tobolsk-Tyumen diocese has created a comprehensive system of religious education, which today, in addition to the Tobolsk theological schools, also includes the Tyumen Theological School and 12 Orthodox secondary schools, which are located in the cities of Tyumen. On May 6, 2000, on the day of the Great Martyr George the Victorious, the first bell sounded in the Noyabrsk Gymnasium, which announced the birth of the first theological school - the Noyabrsk Orthodox Gymnasium. Vladyka Demetrius blessed first-graders for good and diligent studies

It should be emphasized that in Noyabrsk, at the church of the Archangel Michael, a Sunday school for adults has been organized. I enjoy attending classes at this school. We study such subjects as catechism, New Testament, Old Testament, liturgical charter. Classes for the study of the catechism and the liturgical charter are led by priests - Archpriest Roman Markelov, Priest Evgeny Kosolapov; Old Testament and the New Testament is taught by Velichko L.P.

On December 14, 2013, a plenary meeting was held in Noyabrsk session III Diocesan Christmas Educational Readings on the topic “St. Sergius. Rus. Heritage, modernity, future”. The plenary session was attended by the clergy, specialists in the education system, youth policy, culture, social protection population.

Bishop Nikolay of Salekhard and Novo-Urengoysk, Deputy Governor of the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug Tatyana Buchkova, Head of the City Administration of Noyabrsk Zhanna Belotskaya, Director of the Department of Education of the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug Irina Sidorova, writer, candidate philosophical sciences M.Yu.Bakulin.

In their reports, the authors shared their work aimed at shaping spiritual and moral values ​​and foundations among the younger generation, and also reflected on the problems of modernity and the causes of crisis phenomena in society.

The Christmas Readings ended with an unforgettable performance by the choir of the Orthodox November Gymnasium.

Many young people and children are active in social activities.

So in holding an all-Russian competition children's creativity"The 700th anniversary of the birth of St. Sergius of Radonezh" was also attended by the children of Yamal. This competition was held with the blessing of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Rus'. “It is very important to acquire spiritual knowledge. After all, education from the word “image”, we must go to this image, imitate the image of God ... Therefore, the relationship of knowledge, faith, God's commandments and secular science educates, forms a strong personality.

Still, there are traditions, thanks to which the connection between generations is not interrupted. In modern times, as in the past, religious traditions do not so much divide as unite peoples and cultural worlds. “The identity of a particular people is created by the combination of all factors of ethnic diversity, and most importantly, the uniqueness of the historical path of each people, including the history of its religious development” (Guzenko V.N.)

Used Books:

1. Averintsev S.S. Baptism of Rus' and the path of Russian culture. M.: Nauka 1990.

2. Averky. What is Orthodoxy//Moscow. 1996. No. 3.

3. Bessonov MN Orthodoxy in our days. M.: Political literature, 1990.

4. Davydova N.V. Gospel and ancient Russian literature. M.: Enlightenment 1992.

5. Kontsevich I.M. The acquisition of the Holy Spirit in the ways of Ancient Rus'. M.: Political Literature, 1993. 6. Malyagin V. K. Orthodoxy and Russia//Youth.1994.№3.

7. Fedotov G.P. Saints of Ancient Rus'. M.: Terra, 2000.

8. Russian Orthodox Church. Salekhard diocese official website www.yamalrpc.ru

• puchkool November 13, 2014

  The structure and content of the article does not quite correspond to the theme of Christmas readings, it consists of loosely connected parts. First, we are talking about the times of Prince Vladimir, then, without a proper transition, about parish schools, about the Tyumen-Tobolsk diocese, about Christmas readings and about the author's studies at Sunday school. It is difficult to understand the logic of the author and the essence of his calls such as: "It is necessary to return Orthodoxy as a social ideology - this is the main condition for the salvation of the Russian people." Completely disagree with this call. We already have the experience of the dominance of ideology in the public consciousness, which has long been abandoned and, moreover, in modern Russia, in conditions of multinationality and multi-confessionalism, the imposition of the principles of any one ideology is fraught with social conflicts.

• Oliga November 13, 2014

  The structure and content are easy to read by non-specially educated readers. The article is more intended for parents of children of educational institutions, among which there are many ordinary workers who will understand the simple language of presentation. And about the dominance of ideology in the public mind. Lord! We felt both the dominance of a common ideology and the dominance of pluralism of opinions and multi-confessionalism. Ask yourself first, and then the people closest to you, when did they feel most secure? You will get a clear answer to this question. It's about not about the imposition of one ideology and the prohibition of other faiths. The article is about the connection of generations and the unification of peoples. Orthodoxy has proved its ability to unite peoples. Russia has always coexisted peacefully different religions and there was never any confrontation. But when the people began to move away from Orthodoxy for many reasons, that's when the riots appeared. The author is right about the role of Orthodoxy in uniting people.

• ludmila555 November 16, 2014

  I do not agree that the structure and content of the article does not correspond to the theme of the Christmas Readings. Albeit briefly, the topic of the baptism of Rus' by Prince Vladimir and his great influence in organizing the education of children is touched upon. I won't repeat myself as I fully agree with Oliga's previous comment. It seems to me that the author wanted to show readers that the influence of Orthodoxy on education is not empty talk, but reality, which we see in the example of the Tobolsk-Tyumen diocese and in the city of Noyabrsk. And as His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Rus' said: ".... the relationship of knowledge, faith, God's commandments and secular science educates, forms a strong personality.

In the educational standards, the connection between Orthodoxy and Russian national culture is clearly insufficiently indicated. The Orthodox Christian type of spirituality is taken out of consideration of many sections on national history, social science, and Russian literature. In this area, the solution to the problem posed is seen in the increase in the absolute number of elements of Orthodox religious studies and spiritual and moral content in the main courses of literature, history, social science and other humanitarian disciplines.

I. Humanitarian education and social science.

Admittedly, the invaluable cultural treasure - the Russian language has been subjected to severe deformation for decades. It has been extremely impoverished and clogged with non-literary words and jargons. All this should induce those who care about the great language to do everything possible to preserve its purity and increase its expressive richness. Solving the problem of how to return to the language its desired Russian word, we came to the conclusion that special attention in the course of the Russian language should be paid to the importance of the Christian tradition in the formation of the modern Russian language. The use of texts of religious and spiritual and moral content is effective tool in the upbringing of Christian personality traits.

The Russian system of literary education is currently solving the problem of returning Orthodox literature to the content of literary education. Russian classical literature and modern literature contains numerous images, allegories, plots of their Orthodox literature. It is impossible to understand and study Russian literature in isolation from its deep spiritual foundations, which are associated with Orthodoxy. Studying the works of Russian literature, students, one way or another, acquire knowledge from the field of traditional Russian spiritual culture - about life and death, about God, about the meaning of life.

When planning a course of literature, it is necessary to take into account educational task course - the formation of spiritual and moral personality. Revealing the connection of the literary works of the studied writers and poets with the experience of their lives, the attention of students should be drawn to the spiritual portrait of the author of the work, his religious worldview, connection with the Christian tradition.

Turning to Orthodox literature will not only significantly deepen the understanding of Russian literature, but will expand the moral horizons of students. The return of Orthodox literature to the system of literary education will strengthen the foundation of historical and philological knowledge, without which access to pure springs Russian language, literature, culture, and, consequently, the spiritual revival of the nation is also impossible.

There are opportunities to work on spiritual and moral education through lessons foreign language. An indispensable proof of this is the socio-cultural aspects of learning foreign languages ​​in the following topics: Traditions; Holidays; Travel; Attractions; A look at history (wealth of the past and present); The role of Christianity in the formation of national culture; Saints of the Undivided Church. It is important that the study of a foreign language does not lead away from the Motherland, but strengthens love for it and forms patriotism. All the theories and concepts included in the mandatory minimum of social science education have been formed as a result of a long and complex spiritual process that originates from ancient times.

Relatively recently, social science has become an independent secular discipline. The initial development of the problems of man and society in the European mind took place within the framework of theology. Anyone will look methodologically flawed. subject, in the teaching of which its historical and religious-cultural context is taken out of the brackets. Therefore, it is extremely important to integrate knowledge about religion into those topics and issues of social science education, the full disclosure of which is impossible without such an addition.

In the courses of history, social studies, the Moscow Art Theater, and other disciplines, it seems interesting the culturological approach to the selection of religious studies material, which, as you know, focuses on the consideration of religious phenomena in the context of their existence in culture as a whole and in its various spheres. It is based on the correlation religious traditions and derivative phenomena of religious culture, the methods of influence of Christian doctrine, morality and religious practice on the social, political, spiritual and other spheres of society are revealed.

An important role in the process of education and formation of a socially mature personality is played by the study of such a complex and interesting subject as Social Science. This subject is significantly different from other disciplines of the school cycle in its structure. Social science is a complex discipline, it consists of subsections devoted to the presentation of the foundations of the main sciences of society - philosophy, sociology, cultural studies, economics, political science, and jurisprudence. In addition to educational tasks, this subject is very important for solving the problem of educating the student's personality.

The existing educational standards formulate requirements to form schoolchildren's ideas about the role of religion in the history of people, about its impact on culture, students should have ideas about Christianity as the basis of cultural and spiritual life medieval Europe etc.

Understanding the meaning of history depends not only on the knowledge or scientific and theoretical ideas of the scientist himself or any person striving for knowledge of history, but on his religious and philosophical worldview, and more precisely, on his faith. Therefore, the science of history is closely connected with religion.

The actions of our ancestors for a modern schoolchild will be largely perceived as a set of meaningless actions if the motives that guided them are not correctly understood, and schoolchildren do not understand the worldview, religion, which ultimately determined value orientations and actions historical figures, ordinary people. All our history is life-affirming. Despite the seemingly defeat at times, our Fatherland, on critical paths of development, each time finds the strength to overcome internal disorganization and external threats. It is important to convey to students the religious meaning of our history, guided by a number of basic principles of the Orthodox understanding of history.

The first principle: history is the embodiment of Divine Providence. Consequently, history has the meaning and purpose of its development, as well as the laws of development determined by Divine Providence, which does not exclude the freedom of acting subjects.

The second principle: the laws of historical development are manifested in the course of people's historical activity. The historical activity of people depends on their consciousness and will. But any consciousness based on faith is a religious consciousness that has different forms of expression. Consequently, religious consciousness is an effective catalyst for historical development, has a real and direct impact on the development of specific historical events.

The third principle: history must be understood as the realization in reality of Divine Providence, in the form of a complex, dialectical process of interaction between consciousness and being, social consciousness and social being. At the same time, it is necessary to see the leading role of the spirituality of consciousness, first of all, religious consciousness in history. In other words, human activity is determined by his spirit and consciousness. Therefore, it is necessary to search for the semantic content of the historical activity of people, that is, to answer not only the questions "how?" and "why?", but also to the main question - "why?". Based on the answers to this question - "why?" - we can comprehend the patterns of development, both private and general.

Within just a few years, the departments have carried out serious work to update, enrich and update the content of the humanities, clarify their list and determine the subject, structure and logic of study (the so-called didactic units), ensure the integrity of teaching and the formation of students' interest in their study. It was at this time that the spiritual treasures of domestic and world humanitarian thought, previously accessible only to a few, returned to the students. In the humanitarian training of students, it was possible to maintain and develop the supremacy of value content over information technology, education over training.

The initial and primary in such a turn is the upbringing of spirituality, i.e. love and will to perfect content, objectively the best, on the basis of national culture and the great spiritual and moral experience of the people represented in their religion. Despite the influx and imposition of Western teaching aids (such as the notorious "Economics"), the efforts of patriotic scientists and teachers began the active development and publication of a new generation of educational literature. Before students began to reveal the great historical rank of Russia in the field of religion and culture, statehood and economy, the social structure of society, the way of thinking and deeds of saints, ascetics, heroes of Russia, creators of national culture, whether it be science, philosophy, literature and art, economy and social field.

As a positive moment, one should characterize the emerging shift in emphasis from the external, information-formal, technical, methodological and functional side of humanitarian education to human, personal, subject-forming, cultural, value-semantic and spiritual and moral guidelines. And this qualitative turn, which gave the first positive changes, needs to be strengthened and purposefully developed.

Sociological studies of students, which were again widely developed in universities in the second half of the 1990s, recorded the first emerging positive developments. So, in a Russian vocational pedagogical university, to the question: "Whom, in your opinion, should a university train?" - the following data of the interviewed students was obtained:

First of all, a decent, honest person who knows how to live with dignity and has a high professional qualification - 32.6%;

A generalist who is capable of self-education, obtaining a new profession in accordance with market requirements - 31.9%;

A highly qualified specialist and cultured person - 25%;

Highly qualified specialist - 6.9%.

To the question: "Do you think that humanitarian knowledge is necessary for you in life?" - almost 90% of students gave an affirmative answer. Satisfaction of students with teaching humanities and courses has risen many times in comparison with the end of the 80s and amounted, for example, to philosophy - 74.7%, psychology - 73.4%, history - 65.3%. All this was the result of a difficult work to update humanitarian education, its improvement and actualization in the coordinates of the spiritual heritage of domestic and world culture, anthropological foundations and the theory of personality socialization. Problems of methodology, substantiation of the essence and content of humanitarian education, its spiritual basis and value fund, the ratio of sacred and secular volume in it and the share in the educational and professional training of specialists; a reasonable correlation of federal, regional and university components, the ratio of domestic material and foreign experience, software and the creation of their own educational and methodological complex have become a number of urgent and solvable not only theoretical, but also practical tasks.

Russian higher education, unlike education in most other countries, is called "professional". State educational standards allocate more than 20% of study time to general (mainly humanitarian and socio-economic (GSE) disciplines. However, the actual humanitarian - spiritual core in GOST is no more than 10%. And it’s not even so much about the volume and specific gravity of the actual humanitarian and spiritual "tithe", both in its content-semantic, value-target, personal-creative, culturally forming, worldview-methodological and social-educational purpose and practical implementation. the weighted average assessment of experts and students of the optimal ratio of the federal, national-regional and university components of the social and humanitarian cycles looks like 5:2.5:2.2.

The recommendations of the II All-Russian Scientific and Practical Conference "Education of Spirituality: Values ​​and Traditions" substantiate the position on the expedient increase in the share of the domestic component in the content of the humanities compared to foreign material in a ratio of 7:3. The student has the right and must thoroughly understand the spiritual national heritage, his own culture, then he will be able to better understand other cultures. The path to humanity lies through the "threshold" of the native fatherland.

The final result of liberal education is the formation of the social competence of a specialist. Humanitarian education is designed to ensure the process of transmission, continuity and development from generation to generation of absolute social wealth - the universal productive and creative forces of man. The reproduction of these forces in the humanities education belongs to a variety of Spiritual labor that is universal in meaning. The goal of humanitarian education is the upbringing of a cultured person as a self-determining subject. This goal is optimally achievable within its three-level structure:

1) spiritual and value (axiological) level;

2) development of universal cultural abilities (creative-anthropological level);

3) socio-technological (praxeological) level.

The main thing is that liberal arts education should retain at its center the semantic and value core, the spiritual basis and the spiritual attitude to the entire problematic and content field of the interconnected cycle of humanitarian, natural sciences, general professional and special disciplines in the holistic process of education, upbringing and formation of the student's personality.

Changes of a turning point took place in the minds of students in their attitude towards religion and the Church. According to various modern public opinion polls, from half to two-thirds of our citizens consider themselves believers, of which 75% are Orthodox, 16% are Muslims, 4% are Protestants, 2% are Buddhists, 1% are Jews, 1% are pagans, non-traditional religions all together - less than 1%, Catholics - less than 1%. According to the results of sociological research of the scientific center "Religion in Modern Society", headed by our famous philosopher M. P. Mchedlov; 43.4% of respondents consider themselves believers in God; a non-religious worldview orientation (non-believers and indifferent to religion) was declared by 28.6%, fluctuations between faith and disbelief - 23.9%; about belief in supernatural powers - 3.9%. Comparative data of twenty years ago show that among 1,200 students of Omsk universities there were 38% atheists, 43% unbelievers, 14% indifferent to religious issues, 4% vacillating, and there were no actual believers (for quite understandable reasons and appropriate measures undertaken in relation to this category).

The turning shifts in the growth and strengthening of the religious consciousness of students have yet to be understood and correctly assessed, but the first positive results have already been recorded by sociologists. So, believing students of Moscow State University, as a rule, are distinguished by conscientiousness and diligence, but not by ambition and envy. Our data on believing students of the Ural Institute of Business. I. A. Ilyina (Yekaterinburg) fully correlate with this assessment.

A new and remarkable phenomenon was the opening of theological (theological) faculties and departments in forty universities of modern Russia and the readiness of many universities to begin training specialists in this field. The activity of these faculties and departments not only realizes the deeply personal request of students, and the growing need of modern society for the training of specialists of special social service to the world and people. A close acquaintance with the work of a number of theological faculties and departments shows their beneficial influence on the entire socio-psychological and spiritual atmosphere of these universities.

Over the past seven years, cooperation agreements have been signed between the Ministry of Education and Science and the Moscow Patriarchate, educational authorities of all subjects of the Russian Federation with Diocesan Administrations, many higher and secondary professional educational institutions with religious organizations of the Russian Orthodox Church and other domestic confessions. The Constitution of Russia does not contain a line about the separation of secular educational institutions from religion. Secular education does not mean atheistic or religious education, but reinforces the position of freedom of conscience of a person (and not from conscience), including in the field of education. Since 1993, the International Christmas Educational Readings, held since 1993, have become a kind of socio-religious review of the state of problems and prospects for deepening the creative joint cooperation between the church and the state in the education and upbringing of students. Impressive is not only the scale (15 thousand participants of the XVI Readings), but also the nature, depth and level of great responsibility for the future of the country and people, which is born and formed in our general education and professional school, which inspires confidence, hope and social optimism.

The main aspects of the spiritual Orthodox understanding in the lessons of art and the Moscow Art Theater:

A) the basic (methodological level) concepts of history (its meaning, direction, fundamental duality, architectonics in general); the concepts of tradition, culture, the idea of ​​the unity of culture and its two sides);

B) the most important milestones in history for understanding art: the birth of Christian culture, the humanistic New Age with its two suns - ecclesiastical and secular, Newest time with the allocation within the framework of secular culture of a new duality - traditional culture and occult anti-culture; a special place in the history of Russia, determined by its vocation, which was clearly felt and about which all Russian artists spoke;

C) a vision of the essential and historical connections of church and secular art in modern and contemporary times.

Of great interest is the use of the Orthodox religious component in the study of the geography of Christian shrines. Speaking of "religions of the world" one can use information about the founding of Orthodox monasteries, about those people who were their founders; their amazing destinies. The history of monasteries is fertile material for talking about the origins of Orthodoxy; high spirituality, moral purity Orthodox people.

II. The Orthodox aspect of natural science education.

It's not a secret for anyone that the main goal of today's natural science education is to educate a person who knows the material world. Knowledge, which, as you know, is power, adapts a person to the world, makes it possible to satisfy certain material and spiritual needs. There is another goal that is no longer advertised, but actually continues to take place - the formation of a materialistic, that is, an atheistic worldview. Is it possible to have a Christian worldview and not give up scientific knowledge, is it possible, by teaching children the natural sciences, to form an Orthodox view of the world? You can, as long as you follow certain principles.

For Orthodox education there is no need for special lesson content, special textbooks, programs and standards. It is necessary to bring into ordinary programs the spirit of Orthodoxy, a special view of things, a special sense of the world, a look through a prism that refracts the image, when the world is illuminated by the light of Divine truth, when all the depth, beauty, expediency, complexity and predestination of the world are revealed. When the Creator's providence for the world is revealed, His care for us and every second presence, the acquired knowledge become necessary not for the sake of knowledge, but for the sake of strengthening in faith, for salvation, that is, movement towards God.

The system of natural science knowledge can be divided into three parts, different in type and level of reliability. These are, firstly, the results of observations and experiments. Experimenters have always strived for greater reliability, accuracy, repeatability and verifiability of their results (three series of experiments are the norm in physics). The same criteria can be applied to the study of miraculous objects and phenomena, such as the Shroud of Turin, the annual Descent Holy Fire on the Holy Sepulcher in the Church of the Resurrection of Christ on Great Saturday according to the invariably valid in Orthodoxy Julian calendar, myrrh-streaming icons and many others. Unfortunately, research Christian miracles now, although it is carried out, it is clearly not enough.

The second part is the construction of models, hypotheses and theories that give a systematic, and usually to some extent mathematicized, explanation of a large number of observational data, and it is the degree of correspondence with the experiment that is the criterion for accepting a particular theory. As new facts appear and accumulate, old theories cease to explain them, and a need arises for new theories. Many "revolutions" in physics are known from history (in the 17th-18th and early 20th centuries), when the entire explanatory system (paradigm) was completely changed. This point should be emphasized, since from here comes the realization that modern theories will soon be replaced by the following ones. Signs of a brewing scientific crisis are already visible.

Finally, the third part of the "building of science" is the so-called "philosophical comprehension" of its results, which is called the "scientific worldview." It is here that scientific scenarios of possible chains of events are developed with the aim of more or less plausible explanation of the past (for example, the "theory of evolution", " big Bang") and making predictions for the future.

Philosophers, some of them are or once were scientists, dissect science in order to disseminate it widely and form the so-called "scientific picture of the world" in "public opinion", as well as to develop government decisions to support certain scientific projects. Many studies do not receive support, because their results could destroy the established system of views. That is why a large number of real scientists are hostile to the "ideologists of science."

So, it should be explained to students that both experiments and theories are themselves religiously neutral, and the opposition of science and religion is the result of the malicious activity of powerful and influential groups of philosophizing ideologists who have appropriated the authority to speak on behalf of the entire scientific community.

The role of the teacher, therefore, is not in the special selection of the studied, although this is necessary in some cases, but in placing special emphasis on the material being taught. For the formation of an Orthodox worldview in natural science courses, common content lines are important.

Great opportunities lie in the biographical approach to teaching. Religious performances prominent people(Faraday, Pasteur, Pirogov, Pavlov, Korolev, Vavilov, Newton, Einstein, Pascal, Kepler, Cauchy, Gauss, etc.) were hushed up or distorted. But many of them were not only deeply religious people - some of them were engaged in theology or other religious activities, considering it no less important than science. Now we can and should talk about it. In addition, an example of an ascetic life for the sake of people, selflessness and self-sacrifice can serve as an inspiring and educational force. Negative examples can also become educative. "The death of a sinner is cruel" (Ps.33:22) Mirabeau begged before his death: "give me opium so that I do not think about eternity." Eternity is the content of the mind, which a person cannot remove from it, for this is its foundation!

The materialism of the revolutionary turned out to be too weak a poison, unable to drown out in the consciousness of the dying person the eternal idea put into man by His Creator. The soul, anticipating what terrible places it is heading to, comes into a state of indescribable horror. That is why Beria squealed before the execution, Lenin in a madness asked for forgiveness at the chairs, and Voltaire tossed about on his deathbed. As in the case of Tolstoy, free-thinking friends did not allow the priest to see the man who was dying in mental anguish. Both restless and joyful death are the seal of a lived life.

The next obligatory line is the teleological nature of the universe. The red line through all natural courses can be defined properties and signs, laws and rules of animate and inanimate nature. The anthropic principle of the arrangement of the Universe points to the surprisingly precise "fitting" of all the laws of nature to each other. It can be said that these laws have the only possible form, since the values ​​of the interaction constants included in them take on quite definite numerical values with such fantastic accuracy that it is more appropriate to use the term absolute accuracy. If these laws were slightly different, the whole world would not be able to maintain its exact order, but would immediately fall apart, turning into chaos. There are plenty of examples of the teleological nature of the world both in the courses of chemistry (the Periodic Law) and in biology (the biochemistry of the cell and the expediency of the organism, etc.).

For the formation complete picture The world traditionally lacks the integration of sciences in teaching, and although such attempts are made, for example, in creating a natural science course, these attempts are, by and large, artificial, moreover, they lead to a loss of fundamentality and depth of knowledge. The Orthodox view of nature could play such an integrating role in general, and in some topics direct integration of knowledge can be achieved. An example of this is the study of water. Water is a real miracle, often unconscious by people. Water is a chemical solvent of many substances, it is also a chemical reagent, cell biochemistry is unthinkable without it, it is also vehicle in the microcosm and in the macrocosm, global cycles in the biosphere and particular processes of root nutrition, transpiration, etc. Water creates a habitat for billions of creatures, insects can move through it. It is no coincidence that water on Earth occurs in three states of aggregation, each of them is necessary for a specific purpose: snow, ice, which turned out to be lighter than liquid water and therefore floats on the surface, protecting water bodies from complete freezing and destruction. Is it by chance that water has a high heat capacity and thermal conductivity, good heat transfer and fluidity? And without steamy water, our earthly problems cannot be solved. Is water a random substance? Or the Creator created it especially for all of us, giving the molecule certain properties and the structure of the dipole. It is impossible to bypass the theological aspect in such a lesson: Holy water is a source Divine energies and information.

Biological education has its own stumbling block - evolutionary theory, which permeates all of biology, has become its methodological basis. Science goes forward, exposing one after another the fakes of our ancestors: the fake drawings of embryos, the crazy ideas of the spontaneous generation of life in an ammonia-hydrogen atmosphere under the influence of lightning, and all sorts of other fairy tales about evolution, but the vast majority of our contemporaries perceive this musty theory in much the same way as rotation Earth around the sun. There is no doubt that we are dealing with a religious belief in evolution, so the conversation about the origin of the world and life cannot be conducted only as a scientific dispute.

The picture will be incomplete if we do not touch upon the religious and philosophical side of the problem. After all, it is not different points of view that come into dispute here, but different worldviews, which are not formed immediately, and change much more difficult than any scientific views and installations. Under evolutionism lies the belief in progress, the belief that both nature and society by themselves, unconsciously and objectively, develop from lower forms to higher ones, from simple to complex, which excludes God as the Provider and Ruler of the world. In evolutionism we are dealing with a form of mythology that has its roots in paganism. The inclusion of philosophical concepts in the taught course is indispensable. It is necessary to acquaint students with the concepts of "development", "idealism", "materialism", "religion", "worldview", etc. With this approach, the Christian scientific position becomes very strong, the material of the latter scientific discoveries he leads the students with great force to the conclusion about the truth of the Christian worldview, it is only important to honestly use scientific data, without distorting or keeping silent about anything.

Another meaningful line in the teaching of natural sciences is connected with the aesthetics of living nature. Nature gives us incomparable pleasure, for it is the work of the Great Artist, where the traits of divine wisdom are imprinted in the smallest organism. Let us remember the words: "Look at the lilies of the field, how they grow? They neither toil nor spin. But I tell you that even Solomon in all his glory did not dress like one of them" (Matt. 6:28-29). And, according to John of Kronstadt, "flowers are the remnants of paradise on earth." Seeing this beauty yourself and teaching this vision to students is an important task for a biologist. nature loving will love both people and God.

Ecological education and upbringing can also be filled with Orthodox content. In no way should it become another horror story for children about the imminent destruction, the complete collapse of our habitat. Without hiding the true state of affairs, the emphasis should be placed on a clear awareness of one's personal responsibility for everything that happens in the world, in nature. The destruction of nature begins with the destruction of the soul of each individual person. It is possible to solve and solve environmental problems only starting with the cleansing of one's own soul.

The moral education of a person in natural science education should be based on the correct attitude towards own body. Our body is not our property, but a gift of God, a means for the salvation of the soul, and the attitude towards it should be appropriate: caring, responsible, chaste, careful, as to the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit. The harmony of the body and its beauty are a manifestation of piety, and illness and deformity are the result of corruption, licentiousness, sin, since the spirit creates a form for itself.

In a biology course, it is necessary to consider moral aspects from a Christian point of view environmental issues, human sexual relations and heredity, genetic engineering; relation to the problem of absolute value human life and the inadmissibility of approaching a person as a biological material.

Thus, the Orthodox view, its worldview, life-meaning positions, value-target lines of comprehension can and should be organically introduced into the "fabric" of the educational process of general education and professional schools in all subjects and courses of general scientific, natural-mathematical, humanitarian, general professional and special -applied cycles. The federal, national-regional and actually school-university components of the existing state-educational institutions of various types, forms and levels of education allow teachers to creatively and responsibly pose and solve these fateful problems for youth.
Archpriest Alexander Minyailo, Rector of the Ural Institute of Business, Professor, Doctor of Economics (Yekaterinburg)
Hieromonk Jerome (Mironov), rector of the Orthodox gymnasium at monastery of the All-Merciful Savior (Yekaterinburg)

Notes:

1 - See: Vetoshkin A.P. Cultural revival // Professional education. No. 2. M .: Edition of the Academy of prof. Education and Development Institute prof. education. 1998. S. 12-13.
2 - Vetoshkin A.P. Decree. op. S. 13.
3 - See: Verbitskaya L. A., Kasevich V. B. On the modernization of the Russian high school: problem status and possible solutions// Questions of education. M., 2004. No. 4. S.20-21.
4 - Monitoring the opinions of specialists, the pedagogical community on the problems of developing standards for higher teacher education new generation. M., 2004. P.27.
5 - See: Education of spirituality: values ​​and traditions / Dokl. and abstracts of the II All-Russian Conf. Yekaterinburg, April 15, 1999. Yekaterinburg, 1999. P. 467.
6 - See: Galitskaya I. A., Metlik I. V. New religious cults and school. M., 2001. S. 10.
7 - Mchedlov M. P., Gavrilov Yu. A., Shevchenko A. G. On the social portrait of a modern believer // Sotsis. 2002. No. 7. S. 69.
8 - Vetoshkin A.P. The place and role of students in the development of a socialist society. Tomsk, 1986, p. 79.
9 - See: Are our youth religious? // Orthodox Moscow. 2000. No. 8.

Report of Bishop of Stavropol and Vladikavkaz Feofan

Orthodoxy is the living past, present and future of the Russian people. It is represented in every cell of life, in the images of the best sons of our people: spiritual and statesmen, thinkers and creators, warriors and ordinary workers.

Orthodoxy is the living history and living truth of the Russian people, it is culture and modern life, philosophy and worldview, ethics and aesthetics, upbringing and education. Therefore, to tear a Russian person away from Orthodoxy means to tear him away from own history, its roots and soil, i.e. just kill him. Thus, the return to Orthodoxy is the main condition for the salvation of the Russian people. To do this, we must provide every opportunity for every person to convert to the faith, and above all, children. It is necessary that the connection between conviction and life be formed from infancy, so that the child learns to motivate his behavior with the Christian faith, which gives spiritual strength. Therefore, the duty of the Church is to make doctrinal truths alive in the eyes of people.

This task can be accomplished through public policy, strengthening the traditional family and education.

It is necessary to return Orthodoxy, if not as a state, then at least as a social ideology. Understanding it as a fundamental idea that will be understood and accepted by the majority of society. With its help, it will be possible to oust from the minds of Russians common ideologemes-myths: godless materialism, soulless consumerism with indifferent pluralism, and spiritually dangerous cosmism with pantheism.

Today, there are more and more insistent calls to search common idea, a deep reference point, a universally significant ideal. Everyone now understands that it is impossible to reorganize the life of the people, and even more so the education and upbringing of young people, without a spiritual core, without an idea that unites and inspires people. Some people think that such a national idea can be invented and instilled in the people. But the history of the 20th century has convincingly shown us that the invented national ideas most often turn out to be erroneous, false, and even taking possession of the people for a short time, always lead them to disaster.

Such an idea should ripen in the depths of the people's consciousness, reflect the deepest aspirations of millions. If its prerequisites are not formed in the bowels of society, then no efforts state structures, theorists and ideologists will not give a reliable result.

The roots of the modern civilizational collapse lie in the changed picture of the world that has developed in the era of modern times. With this understanding, God remains both in philosophy and pedagogy, but in a different capacity. He, in fact, is taken out of the brackets of this world, in which a person becomes the owner, now endowed with creative power.

We must fight the idea of ​​anthropocentrism in order to establish the principle of theocentrism in our lives, for the center of our being is not a man of dust, but the eternal God.

It is quite obvious that the most important task on this path is the education and upbringing of children and youth, those who should receive centuries-old values ​​from us. folk life.

If we do not cope with this problem, then no economic and political programs will change anything for the better. They, just as before, will be perverted and strangled by immorality, selfish desire for profit by any means.

Orthodoxy understands true freedom as freedom from sin. This implies the voluntary self-restraint of a person, the bringing of a certain sacrifice, the imposition of certain spiritual and moral bonds on oneself in the name of salvation. The liberal standard, on the other hand, asserts the exact opposite: the removal from one's being of everything that limits, restricts, does not allow, because the idea of ​​freedom is for him an idol above any belief in God. The direction that they are now trying to give to the system of secular education from kindergarten to higher education, focuses on the formation and approval of precisely this liberal standard of human freedom.

That is why we need to clearly define the goal of education, identifying the fundamental reason that gives rise to all the consequences that are detrimental to our life and our salvation, testifying to the madness of the existence of a person outside of faith as a norm. human being, educate a person in our own, Orthodox standards. Religious education, rooted in the Orthodox Tradition, should be oriented towards the formation of these standards, which include the worldview attitudes of the individual.

Children can be taught in different ways. Unfortunately, quite often, all kinds of prohibitions become the most common method - for this or that clothes, these or those hobbies, interests. Of course, restrictive, protective methods should be present along with others in the process of personality formation. But experience shows that this path is the least productive and the most fraught with the response of childhood and adolescent negativism. Thoughtless prohibitions naturally provoke a stubborn desire to act contrary. Equally erroneous is the assertion in the mind of a person of a positive ideal by the method of hammering common truths similar to how it was done in Soviet times. But life always rebels against the scheme and always wins.

The problem is that it is impossible in principle to program people's behavior through ready-made and externally imposed worldview clichés. A person simultaneously exists in diverse everyday situations that do not fit into any schemes, which, because of this, turn out to be useless for him. The way out of this situation lies in what we invest in the concept of a standard. For if a person is brought up in a certain system of values, then at the moment of any, and even more so, a fateful choice, by virtue of the upbringing received, he will be able to make the right decision.

Thus, the task of including elements of religious education in secular education is seen in the formation of a life standard, a certain system of values ​​that predetermine a person's behavior in various circumstances and make the Christian motivation of actions and decisions vital for him. Through religious education to the Orthodox way of life - this should be the strategy of modern Orthodox pedagogy.

Without faith in God there is no national life. Faith is the soul of the people.

But is there a place for it in the current legislation?

The Law on Education states that education in our country must have a “secular character”, that “At the request of parents or persons replacing them, with the consent of children studying in state and municipal educational institutions, the administration of these institutions in agreement with the relevant authorities local government provides a religious organization with the opportunity to teach religion to children outside the framework of the educational program: (Art. 5, p. 4). Our entire educational system, subject to the inertia of previous years, perceives this law as an affirmation of atheistic education in public schools.

"Secular" does not mean atheistic, and therefore not clerical. All confessional comprehensive schools before the revolution in Russia, and now abroad, as well as modern Orthodox gymnasiums, they gave and give a completely secular education.

The interpretation of the "secular nature" of education as atheistic is based not on the letter and not on the essence of the law, but on a complete misunderstanding that another completely legitimate approach to this problem is possible. It is necessary to use the regional 20% component presented at the discretion of the local authorities for the teaching of religiously oriented subjects, to teach the main humanities subjects in such a way that they give an objectively scientific, and not a tendentiously atheistic description of the place and significance of religion in history and culture.

Atheism, not even militantly aggressive, is not some kind of objectively supra-religious progressive knowledge. It is just one of the worldviews that expresses the views of not the majority of the Earth's population, and does not have any scientific justification.

In a country where more than half of the population declares themselves to be believers, there are no reasonable grounds for atheism to occupy a dominant position in education and upbringing.

Atheism, denying the ontological existence of good and evil, is not able to logically and consistently substantiate the necessity and obligatory nature of morality.

Today Orthodoxy is the main spiritual and moral support of a very large part of the Russian population of our country. Therefore, it would be fair to include religiously oriented disciplines in the grid compulsory subjects on the basis of equal alternatives. Parents who want to raise their children as atheists can choose, for example, "Fundamentals of Morality" instead of "Fundamentals of Orthodox Culture."

The system of Orthodox upbringing and education in Russia is being formed today in accordance with the following principles and directions.

First of all, the development of spiritual and moral potential began humanitarian knowledge, with the inclusion of religious components in its content. A system of spiritual and moral education is being created, based on both humanistic and religious traditions.

Today we can already say that it is possible to receive religious education in accordance with the beliefs and at the request of children and parents, as an additional, optional one. Software and scientific and methodological support for the teaching of spiritual and moral disciplines is being created. In this regard, the activities of educational institutions and religious organizations are being coordinated on issues of mutual interest.

A big step forward is the inclusion of Theology in the number of educational areas allowed by the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation in state universities.

Raising the authority of Christian science, and, consequently, of Christian education and upbringing, we can work on the return of our people to a moral life, the norms of Christian morality. In addition, these measures will help eliminate the flagrant facts of anti-state educational activities of sectarianism, which is becoming a real state disaster.

For this, it is necessary to combine all forces, to include in cooperation the most authoritative educational and scientific structures- Russian Academy of Sciences, Russian Academy of Education, Moscow State University, Ministry of Education and Science, educational institutions of the Moscow Patriarchate, to carry out fruitful work, including to promote:

Exchange of information and transfer of experience in educational activities;

Mutual understanding in an objective way full interpretation legislative acts;

Conducting an analysis of existing experience and considering the issue of opening an educational direction and specialty Orthodox theology.

Preparation and harmonization of standards in Theology and other humanities, in their composition corresponding to traditional higher theological education, consistent with existing standards (the presence of compulsory disciplines, the total number of hours and the timing of subjects) of the organization and
the functioning of the Educational and Methodological Association for
polyconfessional direction and specialty Theology;

The study and implementation of traditional and modern experience of educational activities that imply religious
worldview and aimed at receiving a secular education;

Cooperation on a bilateral basis in the issues of publishing educational and educational literature, developing and implementing curricula and other materials, holding various events in the field of
education and expertise in relation to published books;

Involvement in the writing of programs and textbooks in the main humanitarian subjects of professional specialists from culture-forming faiths who are able to give an objective scientific description of the place and significance of religion in history and culture.

There are already significant shifts in the minds of the people, government officials, employees of ministries and departments.

In the Stavropol and Vladikavkaz Diocese, active work is being carried out in the field of Orthodox education and the spiritual and moral education of children and youth. This work includes the improvement of the average and higher education(introduction of the subject "Fundamentals of Orthodox Culture"), and a system of measures addressed to the family, children of preschool age; the introduction of spiritual and moral content in the field of additional education, culture, health care, social protection, the work of public associations with adolescents and youth, the activities of law enforcement agencies.

In the Diocese, measures are being taken to improve the qualifications of teachers, including not only the holding of scientific and practical educational conferences, seminars, round tables, but also the organization of teacher training courses on the "Fundamentals of Orthodox Culture".

After the conclusion of the Cooperation Agreement between the Stavropol and Vladikavkaz Diocese and the Ministry of Education of the Stavropol Territory dated May 16, 2002, it became possible in 150 educational institutions of the Diocese to introduce the subject "Fundamentals
Orthodox culture” (mostly optional). On the basis of this Agreement, more than 30 Cooperation Agreements have already been concluded and joint action programs have been developed for the bodies executive power, bodies of the Department of Education and commissions for religious education and catechesis in all deaneries of the Diocese.

But there are spiritual problems that are still impossible to cope with.

The evil influence of the environment permeates our schools and is often perceived as a coveted forbidden fruit;

We have a huge shortage of teachers. Our external successes are far ahead of internal - spiritual ones. Good, often religious people come to teach, but they themselves are neophytes: they do not have proper education, taste, do not understand their duties, do not know how to educate
children in the spiritual, church life, tk. they themselves do not know what the spiritual life is. They confuse spiritual freedom with democracy, spiritual leadership with zombies, and so on.

How to kindle the soul of a child with faith, so that it becomes not some kind of everyday condition, but so that the heart of the child catches fire? How to do it? The heart lights up from the heart like a candle from a candle. Usually this happens due to a meeting with some wonderful believer, an ascetic of faith. The beauty of achievement can captivate the soul of a child, it captivates him. If our teachers are such ascetics, then the children will be believers. If our teachers are ordinary Orthodox inhabitants, then our children will leave the Church, as happened, before the revolution. At that time, the Law of God was taught everywhere, but this did not prevent a huge part of our people from renouncing the faith as soon as the revolution took place.

Religious disciplines cannot be taught at school in the same way as other subjects, it must be remembered that the main goal is to instill in the soul of the child the desire to be an ascetic of faith, it is necessary to instill in him love for God, love for the Church.

At the same time, it must be well remembered that education is not just edification. Education is perennial Cohabitation with kids.

Times are changing and secular education, experiencing the deepest crisis, is turning to spiritual, traditional foundations.

The use of faith necessary for the revival and prosperity of Russia is well known. It consists of a body of those primordial values ​​of morality and civic life, which are the same for both the Gospel and the constitution of the modern state.

And the first task of the modern period is to establish these moral and civic values ​​in an unadulterated form in our schools. Moreover, to put them at the center of education, since the future of the Fatherland primarily depends on the spiritual and moral potential of young people, on their kindness, honesty, justice and striving for disinterested care for their neighbors and selfless love for their Motherland.

In the last period, moral imperatives more and more tangibly triumph over momentary needs, they increasingly become

guide to action by the government and the Ministry of Education and Science.

Reforms and innovations will be carried out on the basis of the currently being developed National Doctrine of Education and federal program its development.

As a result, the leading role of spiritual and moral values ​​in the development of education will be restored, education will be returned to schools, which means that the humanistic purpose of educational institutions will be strengthened from the very beginning.

At the suggestion of His Holiness Patriarch Alexy II of Moscow and All Rus', a secular-religious commission on education was created, which is called upon to free state educational standards, curricula, textbooks and teaching aids from manifestations of militant atheism.

Most of the tasks that determine the development of schools, universities and other educational institutions can be solved only with the active participation of the general public, representatives of religious and confessional, state-political and business circles.

Without public organization of the life of children, adolescents and young people outside of schools and other educational institutions, it is impossible to provide a full-fledged upbringing of the younger generation. It is very important that the Orthodox Church find an opportunity to participate more actively in the forms inherent in it in the activities of public organizations for children and youth.

Summing up all of the above, it should be noted that a certain part of our society is already on the path of reviving Russian national traditions and culture. Against the background of this process, the crystallization of the basic principles of Orthodox education takes place. This is, first of all, Christocentrism, the personal nature of education through the unity of the family, parish and school, teaching love, churching, asceticism, moral and rational moral education ahead of the rational and informative, instilling the skills of moral perception of cultural values, cultivating a sense of universal humanity and patriotism, deeply moral relation to the environment. On this basis, the national Russian culture was formed, the self-consciousness of our people, there is hope that the spiritual revival of Russia will begin with the establishment and dissemination of Orthodox education.