450 CHURCHES OF RECONCILIATION OR DISCORD?
Vestnik Kavkaza, Russia
Jan 26 2015
26 January 2015 – 3:25pm
By Giorgi Kalatozishvili, Tbilisi. Exclusively for Vestnik Kavkaza
Vestnik Kavkaza published an article “Armenia wants to win some 450
churches of Georgia in court” was published last week. The article
provoked a lively reaction from the eparchy of the Armenian Apostolic
Church in Georgia, refuting the facts mentioned in it. At the request
of the press service of the eparchy of the Armenian Apostolic Church
in Georgia, Vestnik Kavkaza published the retraction.
In the following material, the author of Vestnik Kavkaza justifies
his position and brings counterarguments to the claims of the eparchy
of the Armenian Apostolic Church in Georgia.
In a response to my article “Armenia wants to win some 450 churches
of Georgia in court” published by Vestnik Kavkaza on January 13, 2015,
the press service of the eparchy of the Armenian Apostolic Church (AAC)
in Georgia released a letter in an attempt to refute my arguments,
using the well-known technology of substituting facts with their
interpretation. It is noteworthy that the authors of the letter have
not mentioned a word about the material Ñ~Ið Interfax about Armenia’s
request to UNESCO to recognize Georgian churches as being Armenian,
which confirms the main conclusion of my article with references to
its own sources.
It seems that staff of the press service of the eparchy of the AAC
in Georgia considers a debate with me easier and more convenient
than with a giant Russian information agency. Whatever the case, it
is their right. Respecting the eparchy, I must note that the press
service of the religious organization does not use very consistent
tricks, cunningly “leading” the reader from the point. And the point
is about the demand for the restitution of the 450 churches. That
was what my article was about. The remarkably amazing “claims” in the
conversation with me were commented in by Father Michael Botkoveli,
the secretary of the holiest and most blissful Catholicos Patriarch
of All-Georgia Ili II.
So, first of all, I consider mentioning his words to be appropriate,
then I will answer the other claims of the press service of the
eparchy of the AAC in Georgia, based on the information and opinions
of a competent and respectable source.
“At first, we did not even believe that the eparchy of the AAC in
Georgia addressed the prime minister of Georgia with the letter
about “the restitution of 450 churches.” We did not believe it due
to the absolute absurdity of the demand,” Father Michael said with
bewilderment and sorrow in his voice in a conversation with me.
“I wonder, does Armenia itself have that many churches if it found 450
“Armenian churches” in Georgia?” Father Michael Botkoveli called the
actions of the eparchy of the AAC in Georgia “an attempt to complicate
relations with the Georgian Orthodox Church” and stated: “We will
have a very principled conversation with them to clarify some issues.”
According to the secretary of the Catholicos Patriarch of All-Georgia,
“the approach of the eparchy of the AAC in Georgia is unconstructive.”
Father Michael emphasized that “the talk cannot theoretically be about
only a few churches, compulsively with involvement of historians and
art experts.”
“The case with the church on Leselidze Street is the most essential
symptom of what conclusions impartial scientists may come to most of
the time,” concluded the interviewee, confirming the opinion of Paata
Bukhrashvili, a historian and archeologist, expressed in an interview
with Vestnik Kavkza. Bukhrashvili said that “there have been many
cases in which Georgian foundations were discovered at excavations
at Armenian churches in Tbilisi.” It seems that the historian meant
the church on Lesidze Street too. Considering the aforementioned, the
assertion of the press service of the eparchy of the AAC in Georgia
that it “did not lay claims to any church belonging to the Georgian
Orthodox Church” sounds strange. In that case, what churches would that
be, if Father Michael Botkoveli expressed doubts about the presence of
“450 Armenian churches” in Armenia itself, not to mention Georgia?! On
other hand, an official of the eparchy of the AAC in Georgia leaked a
word in an interview with Georgian media a little later that the letter
to the prime minister does mention “Georgified Armenian churches.”
This provokes the question of whether they claim any churches belonging
to the Georgian Orthodox Church or consider part of the churches
“Georgified Armenian churches” and demand their restitution.
Both cases lead to total absurdity, so Georgia has “Georgified Armenian
churches” that do not belong to the Georgian Orthodox Church.
The Georgian Orthodox Church has “Georgified” and forgotten about them,
that is why they can be demanded back as “idle property.”
The letter of the press service of the eparchy of the AAC in Georgia to
Vestnik Kavkaza says: “The Georgian Orthodox Church has appropriated
many churches, which had been operating as Armenian churches and
serving to satisfy the religious needs of the parish of the Armenian
Apostolic Church in Georgia from the day of the foundation and until
Georgia’s joining the Soviet Union, without any approval from the
Armenian Apostolic Church.”
So, are they mentioned in the letter to the Georgian government
or not? It would preferably be clarified for the reader. Asserting
that “the issue on the status of a “legal body” of the public is not
connected with the problem of restitution of property confiscated in
the Soviet period, it was a different problem,” the authors of the
letter to Vestnik Kavkaza are prevaricating. I only stated a fact:
many did warn ex-President Saakashvili (who had made many naïve
mistakes throughout his career) and were right because “a legal body”
in any country is a subject of the law of the state and international
law. The authors of the letter know this well enough. That is why
I mention a tricky inscription suddenly appearing in one of the
documents of the UN Human Rights Council that “problems related
to the restitution of places of worship and related properties of
religious minorities, confiscated during the Communist era, have
not been resolved, and it recommended to the Georgian authorities
to address the problems related to the confiscation of places of
worship and related properties of religious minorities.” It is easy
to figure that such “inscriptions” in serious documents of such
authoritative international organizations appear as a result of the
influence of some “groups of interests.” There is nothing obnoxious
about that, but why consider the reader so naïve? The status of
“a legal body is directly related to the opportunity for appeal at
international institutions with even greater grounds. Concerning
UNESCO, the situation is comical. In an interview with Georgian news
agency Kvira, Levon Asakhanyan, the head of the legal section of the
Georgian eparchy of the AAC, outspokenly denies the existence of any
such plans. There is no such renunciation in the letter of the press
service of the eparchy of the AAC in Georgia to Vestnik Kavkaza. It
only states that “a whole set of international organizations has raised
the issue many times in recent years.” But if there are no such plans
to “internationalize the problem,” then why muddy the waters?
Should it be insisted that the issue is not being taken to a stratum
of interstate relations, and Armenian official delegations, being
in Tbilisi (or receiving similar delegations in Yerevan) have not
left the questions at quite the interstate level, not to mention the
sensational visit of the head of the AAC to Georgia?
Another example of “the specific fib” of the staff of the press
service of the respectable eparchy was a passage that the “matter of
the restitution of Armenian churches in Georgia to the Armenian eparchy
is a legal matter, not political.” In an age when even a football match
or a religious caricature becomes a global-scale political affair,
the problem of “the restitution of 450 churches” turns out to be out of
politics. However, it concerns millions of people, and the authors of
the letter know it well because they live in an atmosphere where such
problems are perceived from a political perspective, whether we want it
or not. Another astucious passage is the impermissibility of mentioning
“the Armenian party.” For example, the European Court of Human Rights
in Strasbourg studies a lawsuit of a Georgian citizen against his own
country, he is considered one “party”, the state is another. There is
nothing offensive about this for either the state or a citizen or a
group of citizens willing to be “a party” in a dispute. Not to mention
that the Patriarch of the Georgian Orthodox Church is a “side” in the
dispute (according to Father Botkoveli’s aforementioned statements),
which turns their opponents into “a party.” I admit that perhaps I
should have omitted “the Armenian party” and should have clarified
the subject, because many Armenians familiar consider the claims to
“450 Armenian churches” in Georgia “utter nonsense and foolishness”
of their authors. But this is only a subjective opinion that has a
full right to exisy, just like all of us, certainly including the
staff of the press service of the respected eparchy.
Generally, the authors of the letter overly-often bring criticize me
for stating the facts. Although, as a journalist, I have the right
to express my own opinion, not only facts. I hope that the eparchy of
the AAC in Georgia does not doubt my right fixed in the Constitution.
Onesuch fact is Mikheil Saakashvili’s “deep sorrow” over “the clarion
reception” organized for famed Vaagn Chakhalyan, which was attended
and organized by the eparchy of the AAC in Georgia and went far beyond
a modest “thanksgiving prayer.” Let me keep the right to express my
opinion about the process. For example, in ex-President Saakashvili’s
opinion, it looked terrible, as he said several times.
Finally, I express hope that Georgian state institutions would pay
special attention to all issues concerning Georgian citizens and the
congregation of the Apostolic Church, and give a competent answer,
despite “information assaults” around the possession of “the 450
churches.”
Maybe after the competent analysis that Father Mikhail Botkoveli was
calling for, it would be revealed that there are actually fewer than
450 churches, just like Georgian churches on the territory of Armenia.
With all due respect to the staff of the press center of the eparchy
of the AAC in Georgia, Giorgi Kalatozishvili
FROM THE EDITORS
Vestnik Kavkaza thanks the press service of the Georgian eparchy of
the Armenian Apostolic Church for its attention to the information
and analysis portal and its publications, where we try to state facts,
describe problems and find solutions. Logic knows many ways to renounce
a thesis, the most common of them is by rebutting it with facts. The
fact is that the Caucasus is a common home for dozens of peoples, and
it is impossible to create “special conditions” for a specific one of
them at expense of another one, especially on a territory interlacing
the material and spiritual riches of Armenians, Georgians, Russians,
Azerbaijanis, Jews… Caucasians are fated to live together, and we
are the ones to choose whether we treat each other with respect or
hatred, whether we have immoderate appetites or are satisfied with
what God has given us, whether we work for unification or for the
separation of churches, territories and peoples.
http://vestnikkavkaza.net/analysis/society/65276.html