The formation of the orthodox identity

The essence of the problem of the Orthodox religious identity is that according to numerous sociological surveys carried out in various regions of the Russian Federation, about 80% of respondents identify themselves as Orthodox, but only 3-5% of citizens conduct an Orthodox religious lifestyle under the denominational canons. The reason for this was a specific Orthodox discourse that formed a religious identity in the 1990s. It relied on the artistic, mythological, political identity of the abovementioned denomination, but at the same time, it ignored or almost ignored the ideological, philosophical content of the Orthodox discourse and the national Russian mentality. Orthodox religious identity was based on speculative constructions of an artistic and mythological nature that suffered from the absence of a true example of specific religious behavior, a real everyday tradition of denominational life, a lack of knowledge in the field of religion. As a result, in the modern Russian Federation, there are two types of Orthodox religious identity: folklore and ritual (rural) and philosophical and rationalistic (urban).