One of them, presumably, is about persuading minors to commit suicide. Today the Basmanny Court of Moscow will choose a measure of restraint for the former minister of the cult.
Meanwhile, in the Urals, passions for Sergius continue. We are talking about the former schema-monk Sergius Romanov, defrocked, excommunicated and seized, with the consent and support of its inhabitants, the Sredneuralskiy nunnery “The Contestant of Breads”. In October, officers of the Investigative Committee had already arrived to take Sergius away for interrogation, but even they were unable to enter the territory of the monastery. In mid-December, history repeated itself, only this time the bailiffs and almost none of the representatives of the diocese who had arrived for the examination were not allowed in.
On the night of December 29, a solid team of representatives of power structures arrived to arrest Sergius. The reason for the searches and detentions was a video posted on YouTube in which the former schemmon calls on his devotees to "die for Russia." The special forces took the monastery by storm, during which there were clashes between law enforcement officers and supporters of Sergius. Radio "Echo of Moscow" on the morning of December 29 reported about the injured nun - she was taken to the hospital with a fracture of the hip.
According to Svetlana Gerasimova, the detainee's lawyer, a criminal case has been opened against Romanov under three articles and already charged. Shimonakh is accused of inducing suicide (part 3 of article 110.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), violation of the right to freedom of conscience and religion (according to part 3 of article 148 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) and arbitrariness (article 330 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). While already in the Investigative Committee, Sergiy recorded another video, in which, addressing the flock, he says that "everything is fine with him." “Forgive them, Lord, they do not know what they are doing. And even [if] they do, I'm sorry,”he says.
In the name of the Most Holy Theotokos
In October, information appeared in news feeds that a new church in honor of the Most Holy Theotokos was built on the territory of the monastery.
The Yekaterinburg diocese plans to register a number of buildings in ownership, including the one in question. It accommodates, according to Sergius himself, about 4 thousand people.
It is known that three criminal cases have already been opened against Father Sergius (in the world - Nikolai Romanov). Oddly enough, the former monk passes through two of them as a witness. One of them is under Art. 148 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ("Violation of the right to freedom of conscience and religion"), another - under Art. 330 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ("Arbitrariness"). It was instituted in September - by the way, in connection with the refusal to let the diocesan commission into the monastery.
The last shelter
But the third case concerns crimes against children. After the inspection, the employees of the Investigative Committee opened a case under paragraphs "a", "d" of Part 2 of Art. 117 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ("Torture against two or more persons, against a minor") and Part 1 of Art. 293 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ("Negligence").
There are more than enough facts for this. So, in August, the media reported about a 15-year-old girl who died in this monastery due to the lack of proper treatment for her complex disease. The representative of the monastery Vsevolod Moguchev denied the fact of the tragedy.
But the local children's ombudsman Igor Morokov, having reported on the inspection of the Investigative Committee after information about the violence against children, modestly noted that "there is no need to interfere with the way of the monastery." Nevertheless, he later had to confirm the death of the girl.
Somewhat earlier, Ksenia Sobchak made a documentary in which she personally talked with the former novices of the monastery. She was told that the children there were flogged with rods or wires for any offense, and one young man admitted that as a teenager, a monk put him on drugs. It happened in a skete, where he, a child, was sent "for bad behavior."
Anna Kuznetsova, Commissioner for Children's Rights under the President of the Russian Federation, drew attention to this film and announced that she was going to apply to the prosecutor's office.
Investigators found out that seven children living in the same monastery had been bullied for 5 years (from 2004 to 2019). Along with regular beatings, “other violent actions” were committed against them. At the same time, no one from the outside world was interested in their fate.
Let's go together
And one more fact. During one of his recent sermons in December, the priest suggested that women die for the Mother of God, for the life of Russia, as well as "for drunkards and harlots" who come to the monastery. There is a video published in the media showing how he interacts with young nuns. "If I ask you, will you die?" - Sergiy asks one of them. “If you bless, I will die,” the girl replied. Others also gave their consent, including a woman who survived cancer seven years ago. Blessing her and others to death, Sergius declared: "Let's go together!"
According to Romanov, the nuns of the monastery he created were to repeat the feat of the Monk Helena Diveevskaya, who accepted obedience from Seraphim of Sarov to die instead of her seriously ill brother.
Meanwhile, back in July, more than 10 nuns fled from the monastery held by Sergius, including his abbess, Abbess Varvara (Krygina). Hundreds of permanent residents, who by that time were already in a serious psychological state, also left with them.
Double standards
Romanov was deprived of the church dignity for speaking in sermons that COVID-19 is a "pseudo-pandemic" that they want to place Russians in the "electronic camp of Satan", "they are illegally imprisoned in self-isolation," and are deprived of "freedom and work."
In one of the sermons posted on YouTube, he stated that people should go out and visit temples, ignoring the demands of the authorities. And those who believe in the coronavirus pandemic and call for self-isolation must stop believing in God.
“Whoever encroaches on the closure of the church - may he and all his family be damned,” said Sergius.
Nevertheless, the services continued, after which Sergius was completely excommunicated from the church. After the leaders of the Russian Orthodox Church announced the upcoming church trial of the schema-abbot, he seized the Sredneuralsky nunnery.
By a decision of the Verkhnyaya Pyshma city court, the former priest was found an extremist, and a little earlier guilty of spreading fakes.
At the same time, when at the end of October the Investigative Committee officers tried to enter the monastery, the nuns and lawyers loyal to Sergius said that he himself did not plan to leave the territory, because "he is afraid of contracting COVID-19 and is obliged to observe the governor's decree on self-isolation of citizens over 65 years old."
According to some reports, it is possible that about 500 people currently live in the same "monastery", including children from the local orphanage.
Reference:
The Convent of the Breads Convent, located 30 km from Yekaterinburg, was founded in 2005 by the Hegumen Sergius (Nikolai Romanov) and Abbess Varvara (Krygina). But, as the journalists found out, his brainchildren are also the sketes on the Tura River and the secret Kyrtom Monastery, which were built where the priest himself wanted, often without proper approval. Not all land and buildings are properly registered, most of the plots are not even registered in the cadastre. At the same time, the economy controlled by Sergius includes not only religious buildings, but also residential buildings, agricultural facilities and industrial buildings.