Formation and key features of the Siberian renovationist ideology at an early stage (1922-1923)

The article is devoted to the problem of formation of renovationist ideology in Siberia and to its key features, which had formed by the end of 1923. The aim of the study is to analyze the formation process of the Siberian renovationist ideology and identify its characteristic features, as well as the key ones. It is the first attempt to trace the origin, evolution and features of the ideology of the Siberian Renovationist Church as the structure integrated into the Renovationist Schism as a whole, but possessing its own distinctive features. The internal church and political ideological attitudes of the Siberian Renovationists are classified drawing on the analysis of their evolution during the formation of the schism, as well as the influence of various factors on this process, taking into account the decisions of the Congress of the “Living Church” (August, 1922) and the Second Renovationist Local Council (April-May, 1923) in the first place. Considerable attention is paid to the emergence of the Siberian Renovationist ideology. It is emphasized that in the winter of 1922-1923 the Siberian Renovationist Church already differed in its ideological attitudes from the Moscow Renovationism, which makes it possible to consider the “Siberian Living Church” of this period as a separate church grouping. It is concluded that the idea of the total introduction of «married episcopate» was a distinctive feature of the Siberian Renovationist ideology. At the same time, the political theology of the Siberian Renovationists had practically no specific features.