The spiritual and moral revival of the Russian peoples, that is
the overcoming of the general crisis which has gripped Russia,
calls for a return to the historical spiritual and cultural
roots of national and state life - to Orthodoxy. The foundation
of the St.Tikhon Orthodox Theological Institute in Moscow has
proved to be an undertaking of great scale and significance
for the nation and the Church.The Institute has been founded
in March 1992 with the blessing of His Holiness Patriarch Alexy
II and in September 1992 His Holiness granted the Institute
the honour to bear the name of St.Tikhon the holy Patriarch
of All Russia.The Institute is the first in Russian history
higher educational establishment providing theological education
for lay persons (until now theological subjects were taught
only in seminaries training clerics). Along with that the Institute
has the aim to provide higher humanitarian education (historical
and philosophical subjects, ancient and modern languages etc.).
The graduates of the Theological Institute will be qualified
to work in the fields of education (primary, secondary and
higher), research and theological activity, church arts (icon-painting,
church singing, architecture), art study, reporting, museum
study etc. The theological-pastoral department will train candidates
for ordination.The Innstitute's part-time department was formed
on the basis of part-time Theological-Catechetical Courses
which had successfully functioned for two years on a voluntary
basis. The full-time department of the Institute opened in
September 1992, the correspondence department <196> in 1993.
At the part-time department of the Institute mostly theological
subjects are taught to students who already have a higher education.In
September 1993 about 1000 students have been enrolled to the
5 faculties of the Institute's full-time, part-time and correspondense
departments.
The Structure and the Tasks Facing
The Institute according to the Rules of the Institute approved
by His Holiness Patriarch Alexy II, the Institute is governed
by the Academic Council and the Rector elected by it.Archpriest
Vladimir Vorobyev has been elected Rector of the Institute,
his candidature has been approved by His Holiness Patriarch
Alexy II.There are the following faculties at the full-time
and part-time departments of the Institute:
- Theological-Pastoral
- Catechetical
- Historical-Philological
- Teacher's Training
- Icon Study, Icon-painting and Architecture
- Church Singing
These following chairs are being formed:
- The History of the Ancient World and the Middle Ages
Russian History
- The History of Philosophy
- The History of Culture
- Ancient Languages
- Modern Languages
- Computer Science
- General Church History
- The History of the Russian Orthodox Church
(the latest History of the XX century will be included)
- Dogmatic Theology
- Comparative Theology (Western Confessions)
- Pastoral Theology
- Moral Theology
- Liturgic and Church Order
- The Old Testament
- The New Testament
- Apologetics
- Patristics
- Homiletics
- The Canon Law
- Pedagogics
- The History of Missions
- Icon Study
- Icon-painting
- Architecture
- The History of Church Singing
- Solfeggio, Harmony
- Piano
- Academic Directing
- Precentors' Training.
The Institute's library is being formed
At present about 100 teachers make
up the Faculty of the Institute, among them there are graduates
and teachers from Moscow Theological Academy, Moscow University,
well-known icon-painters, restorers, church singing experts.
The Main Problems:
- Provision of a building for the Institute
At present classes are held at different places
provided by different institutions on a charitable basis.
- Provision of finances
For two academic years all the activity
of the Institute was based on the enthusiasm of students and
teachers who worked without pay. Now we can only hope for charitable
donations.
- Creating a material base:
- furnishing the rooms (furniture for 2 large and 20 smaller classrooms)
- the equipment for the administration - computers,
- telephones, fax etc.
- special facilities for the library, the language Laboratory,
the music room, the icon-painting studio equipment for the teaching
process (publishing equipment and Xerox for copying the notes of lectures,
dictaphones for recording lectures, tape-recorders, computers for information
systems including teaching process and scientific reserch work.
- The organization of teaching and theological research activity:
- The formation of a library on the main humanitarian and theological
subjects and trends, as well as library on icon-painting and
a special musical notes library.
- Writing new text-books taking into account the present day
realities (as the existing pre-revolutionary Russian and foreign
text-books can't be used by our students because of absense of a
teaching tradition and a basic spiritual culture we are confronted
with a necessity of publishing special text-books written by the
practising priests and lecturers) publishing text-books on four
subjects prepared during the academic year of 1991-1992.
- Working out information systems for supporting both teaching
process and research work (bibliography data base, Russian Saints
data base, the new martyrs of the XXth century system).
- Working out teaching plans and curricula.
- Developing research work at the chairs.
- Organizing publishing activity including text-books and research
materials.
The successful foundation of the institute
would in future result in bringing
together highly qualified teachers and theologians for training
and educating the younger generation, and would ultimately
promote the revival of the interrupted spiritual tradition
of the russian people.
Address: Novokuznetskaja str., 23b, Moscow 113184, Russia,
Tel: +7 (095)953-2289, +7 (095)953-3121 (office), +7 (095)951-6141 (church)
Fax: +7 (095)953-5697
www address:
http://kuz1.pstbi.ccas.ru
e-mail: pstbi@ccas.ru
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