A Journey That Will Come Full Circle and End With a Ring

March 21, 2007
A Journey That Will Come Full Circle and End With a Ring
By MICHAEL SCHWIRTZ

(Photo by Sergei Kivrin for The New York Times)

MOSCOW, March 20 — The bells of Lowell House at Harvard — so much a part of the university’s tradition that they have their own society of bell ringers — will soon return to the Russian monastery from which they were sold more than 70 years ago.
The Russian Orthodox Church and the university announced a final agreement on Tuesday to move the bells next year to Danilov Monastery, the residence of the Russian patriarch, after a replacement set for Harvard is completed.
The bells have become a symbol for the resurgence of the Orthodox Church and its drive, much like Russia's, to reclaim its former glory.
“The bells are not only a witness, but a victim of history,” the patriarch, Aleksy II, said during the signing ceremony at the monastery, which was founded in the 13th century. “They are a symbol of the independence, greatness, and identity of the people.”
Over the years, however, the bells — the oldest cast 325 years ago — have also been endowed with nearly sacred significance at Harvard, where they have become a fixture of Lowell’s identity and a source of pranks, including one played on Franklin D. Roosevelt. (He was led to believe that the bells would be dedicated to him.)
After Stalin silenced the bells and had the Danilov monks killed, an American diplomat, Charles R. Crane, bought the bells from the Soviet government and donated them to the university in 1930. Seventeen of the bells are at Lowell House and the other, also to be returned, is at Harvard Business School.
The Orthodox Church has been pushing for the bells’ return since the Soviet authorities allowed the Danilov Monastery to reopen in 1983. Negotiations between church and government officials and Harvard representatives have intensified over the past several years after the university agreed to study the difficult and expensive task of removing bells from the Lowell House tower built specifically to house them.
Aleksy II said he was happy that his guests from Harvard have been able to “feel this piece of the Russian soul.” Speaking metaphorically later in the ceremony, however, he said that there was a “need to return the stones from whence they were thrown.”
Sean T. Buffington, associate provost for arts and culture at Harvard, who represented the university at the signing ceremony, said, “There is always sadness when you return something that’s important to you.” But, he added, “we are proud to be returning them.”
Earlier in the week, Mr. Buffington visited a foundry in Voronezh, about 300 miles from Moscow, to inspect the work on Harvard’s new bells. He said he was “stunned by the beauty of the replacement bells,” which he said surpassed the originals.
Now begins the daunting task of removing the bells from the Lowell House bell tower, where they are rung on Sundays and at events like commencement. The project to remove the bells will begin in the summer of 2008, with the hope of returning them to Russia by that August, Mr. Buffington said.
Viktor F. Vekselberg, a prominent Russian businessman, who was also at the ceremony, has agreed to finance the entire project, though he refused to comment on its cost.
“A spiritual symbol can in no way be gauged in terms of money,” he said.

Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

A Library of the Russian Religious-Philosophical and Church-Historical Thought: Towards the End of the 20th Century

The compiler and editor-in-chief of the series is Archpriest Boris Danilenko.The series will be published in 10 issues.

The 19th and 20th century books written by church scholars, theologians and historians, who worked both inside and outside Russia, contain many materials needed by researchers and all those interested in theology and church history. These books are not easily available in spite of their repeated reprints covering only in a small part the rich field of this literature. This prevents contemporary researchers from an effective use of the rich traditions of the Russian theological thought. The Synodal library of the Moscow Patriarchate has begun publishing a series of these works on CD-ROM under the common title:

The first issue, which came out this year, is an electronic reprint of the Put''("Way") magazine which was published under the editorship of Nicholas Berdyaev in Paris from 1925 to 1940. The 61st issue of about 7200 pages, a bibliographic rarity, carries articles written in emigration by Russian philosophers, theologians, literary men and church publicists. Among them are Archpriest Sergius Bulgakov, B. Vysheslavtsev, N. Glubokovsky, L. Zander, Protopresbyter Basil Zenkovsky, N. Zernov, V. Ilyin, Archbishop Ioann (Shakhovskoy), L. Karsavin, A. Kartashev, Bishop Cassian (Bezobrazov), Archimandrite Cyprian (Kern), N. Lossky, Sister Maria (Skobtseva), Alexis Remizov, I. Smolich, G. Fedotov, Archpriest George Florovsky, S. Frank, Archpriest Sergius Chetvertikov, D. Chizhevsky, Leo Shestov, and many others. The disk is equipped with a search system for facsimile materials. Any text can be copied and printed out. A brochure containing an article devoted to Nicholas Berdyaev and his colleagues as well as a full bibliography of the magazine accompany the edition.
The 2nd issue will be an electronic version of the 12-volume Orthodox Theological Encyclopedia, which came out in 1900-1911 in St. Petersburg. It is a sort of profile of the pre-Revolutionary Russian theological and church-historical scholarship. Today this reference book certainly ranks among rarities.
The issues to follow will contain electronic versions of the journals of the Theological Academies in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Kiev and Kazan, as well as a number of fundamental works on church history and the history of the theological thought in Russia and the Russian Diaspora.
Address for inquiries: The Synodal Library of the Moscow Patriarchate, Andreyevskaya Embankment 2, Moscow 117334. Tel.: (095) 137-6942, Fax: 135-7400 E-mail: boris.danilenko@uc.ru

From the Round Table "Education for Change and Diaconia:" Department of External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate http://www.rondtb.msk.ru/home_en.htm

ABLE - American-Bulgarian Library Exchange

Bulgarian Library Exchange: Creating Gateways for Global Understanding and Community Information Services

IRIS, Iowa Resource for International Service has received a grant to develop partnerships between libraries in Bulgaria, Colorado and Iowa and to share information about using libraries as Community Information Centers. American libraries have adjusted to the electronic revolution and have become critical information and resource centers for their communities. Bulgarian libraries preserve a rich history and cultural traditions. Communities and librarians from both countries will benefit from an exchange and training program. IRIS will collaborate with the Colorado Association of Libraries, the Union of Librarians and Information Service Officers in Bulgaria, and Iowa libraries to establish an exchange between Bulgarian and U.S. librarians
It builds on the successful Partner Library Project between Bulgarian and Colorado libraries. Begun in 1996, there are now ten public library partnerships. A recent evaluation of the project showed both its successes and areas needing improvement. In addition to strengthening the partnerships, Bulgarian librarians asked for professional training in the areas of community service, working with local government, and developing library advocacy.
Goals of the Project include:
Increase capacity of Bulgarian libraries to provide online community information services to local government offices and Bulgarian citizens in a minimum of five Bulgarian public libraries.
Increase understanding and support by Bulgarian government and community leaders for the role of libraries in a democratic society.
Utilize "partner libraries" as a means of sharing cultures and information about our two countries.
Develop a continuing network of Bulgarian and U.S. libraries that will seek additional funding through philanthropic sources to upgrade the computer capacity of Bulgarian libraries

For more information see: http://www.ableportal.bg/

The Russian Church and Native Alaskan Cultures

From the Library of Congress - A wonderful exhibit entitled:

"In the Beginning Was the Word The Russian Church and Native Alaskan Cultures."

The coming together of a renowned scholar and a rich, but relatively unknown and unused archive of historically significant documents is a rare phenomenon. Last winter the Librarian of Congress, Dr. James H. Billington, asked Dr. Vyacheslav Ivanov, one of the foremost linguists of our day, to review and evaluate the Alaskan Russian Church Archives, and to select some items for an exhibition. This installation is the direct result of that encounter, and it offers a rare opportunity to witness the insights that such an exchange can produce.
In the space of little more than a month, Dr. Ivanov scoured hundreds of documents in the Archive, probing deeply for the vital, historical truths that lay within them. The results of that remarkably intense experience were an evaluative essay written by Dr. Ivanov about the Archive; an oral presentation of his findings and observations, shared with Dr. Billington and interested Library staff; and this exhibition -- based on objects Dr. Ivanov selected and commented upon while reviewing them, day after day, in the Manuscript Division, whose staff generously provided a room and brought forth box after box of documents.
In confronting these documents, mostly written in Russian but some in the Alaskan Native languages of Aleut, Eskimo, and Tlingit, Dr. Ivanov has resuscitated the vibrant, incredibly moving human exchanges that took place between the priests of the Russian Orthodox Church in Alaska and Native Alaskans, during the years 1794 to about 1915. These remarkable priests, intrepid heroes such as the Russian "giant" Ioann Veniaminov and the Creole Iakov Netsvetov, were not merely essential to the success of the colony established by the Russian American Company in 1784, they were also the agents through which much of the culture and languages of Native Alaskans were preserved. Only in recent years has the magnitude of their achievement been recognized -- and most appropriately during this 200th anniversary of the founding of the first Orthodox mission in North America in 1794.
This exhibition is made possible through the generous support of Messrs. Lloyd Cotsen and Plato Malozemoff, members of the James Madison Council of the Library of Congress.

To see the exhibit visit: http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/russian/s1a.html