Journal of European Baptist Studies, 2017

nt much success in your ministry. Brotherly love from the rector of Leningrad Theological Academy and Seminary, Cyril, the Archbishop of Vyborg.’ 7 Calling Mary by the name of the ‘Ever-Virgin’ was never a practice in Russian Baptist churches, but the editorial staff of Bratsky Vestnik readily included in full the message of the Russian Orthodox Archbishop. Similar trends can be found in the underground periodicals of the CCECB 8 . For instance, an editorial of Bratsky Listok [Fraternal Leaflet] mentioned what it called an ‘ancient heresy’ in the early Church, which was that Mary was called ‘not by the name of the Theotokos [the one who gives birth to God] but by the name of the Christotokos [the one who gives birth to Christ]’. 9 The Baptist editor undoubtedly gave priority here to Orthodox sources. The Patriarch’s Christmas and Easter greetings to Klimenko, who was President of the AUCECB from 1974 to 1985, are significant for the reiteration of the phrase ‘holy kiss’: To the president of the AUCECB, A.E. Klimenko, ‘Dear brother in the Lord! We greet you with a holy kiss and compliment you on the high grand feast of Christmas... With unfailing brotherly love, in Christ’s love - Pimen, the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia.’ 10 To the president of the AUCECB, A.E. Klimenko, ‘Dear brother in the Lord! ...Greeting you with an Easter kiss, we stand in the unfailing love of the Risen Christ. Pimen, the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia.’ 11 6 Bratsky’ Vestnik did publish greetings from Western Baptists from time to time, but from about the mid- 1970s the emphasis was on the representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church. 1 BV, no. 1 (1978), p. 18. 8 Council of Churches of Evangelical Christians-Baptists, underground association of Baptist communities in the Soviet Union, opposed to the AUCECB (since the 1960s). 9 Bratsky Listok [Fraternal Leaflet], no. 2 (1991), p. 1. 10 BV, no. 2 (1975), p. 13. 11 BV, no. 3 (1979), p. 40. 26 Journal of European Baptist Studies 17:1 (2017) This Orthodox language (and practice) was not found among Russian Baptists. 12 The Soviet Baptists normally reserved the ‘holy kiss’ for those within their communities, and the publication of these letters in Bratsky Vestnik in the 1970s, and the implied acceptance of the ‘holy kiss’, showed that the ‘brotherhood’ was opening itself up to Orthodoxy in a new way. 13 In response to the numerous congratulations and greetings from the official representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church, the leaders of the AUCECB also spared no flattering words for a variety of reasons: The All-Union Council of Evangelical Christians-Baptists sends wannest greetings to the Russian Orthodox Church on the occasion of the 40 th anniversary of the restoration of Patriarchate in Russia... We wish His Holiness Alexius, the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia, as well as all the episcopacy and priesthood of the Russian Orthodox Church, grea