The History of the Russian Church in Australia

Description

In this comprehensive work, the history of the
Russian Orthodox Church in Australia is diligently chronicled within the wider
context of the place of Russians in the dominantly anglophone society of what
was at first a British colony and then an independent state. The study begins
with the first contact of Russian naval ships with the Australian continent in
the early nineteenth century and progresses through to the establishment of the
first parish of Orthodox believers in Melbourne in the 1890s and ultimately the
creation of a diocese. The catalyst for this was the arrival of thousands of
Russians fleeing their homeland via Siberia after the Bolshevik revolution of
1917. For these dispossessed refugees Australia was a haven of safety and the
Russian Orthodox Church a symbol of the Motherland they had lost. They were
later joined by successive waves of fellow Russians after World War II and the
fall of communism. Together they created a unified organism, retaining a sense
of heritage and purpose and taking their rightful place in Australia’s
multi-cultural society.

In writing this work the author has drawn on extensive archival sources
spread over several continents together with his own life experience, having
arrived as a small boy in Australia over six decades ago. First published in
2006 this new edition includes an added chapter recounting the ongoing story
from the beginning of the twenty-first century through to the end of 2020,
covering the effects on the Church in Australia of major world events as diverse
as the reunification of the Russian Church Abroad with the Patriarchate of
Moscow in 2007 and the global coronavirus pandemic in 2020.