The Making of Holy Russia: The Orthodox Church and Russian Nationalism Before the Revolution

At a time of rising nationalist movement throughout Europe, Orthodox patriots advocated for the place of the Church as a unifying force, central to the identity and purpose of the burgeoning Russian Empire. This work introduces the reader to a wide range of "conservative" opinion that equally strove for spiritual renewal and the spread of the Gospel. Ultimately neither the "conservative" voices presented here nor those of their better-known "liberal" protagonists were able to prevent the calamity that befell Russia with the Bolshevik revolution in 1917. Grounded in original research, this study is intended to reveal the wider relevance of its topic to an ongoing discussion of the relationship between national or ethnic identities on the one hand and the self-understanding of Orthodox Christianity as a universal and transformative Faith on the other.