Moscow evokes 19th century glory by rebuilding cathedral Stalin destroyed
(c) 1995 Copyright The News and Observer Publishing Co.
(c) 1995 N.Y. Times News Service
MOSCOW (Sep 25, 1995 - 23:06 EDT) – A mountain of concrete is rising, day and night, on the banks of the Moscow River.
A work force of more than 2,500 people labors in shifts around the clock, seven days a week (including the Sabbath), to rebuild the vast 19th-century Cathedral of Christ the Savior, destroyed by Stalin in 1931 and then turned into a weird outdoor swimming pool.
It is an act of religious monumentalism that rings oddly to many here at the end of the 20th century. No one is really sure whether this gigantic structure, almost as large as St. Paul's in London and already towering 130 feet above the ground, is a monument to God or to Mammon.
The Russian Orthodox Church has blessed the re-creation, but the cathedral has become as much a symbol of new state power as the huge memorial to the dead of World War II, Poklonnaya Hill, with its mixture of socialist realism and religious symbols, and the reconstruction after 10 years of the Tretyakov Gallery, the country's finest repository of Russian art.
But this project is also a good symbol for the moral ambiguity and political opportunism of the Russian state, led by former Communists who repent only some of communism's crimes, like the destruction of this church, and take responsibility for none.
It all reminds Russians that the collapse of the Soviet Union was like a sudden shotgun blast that caused all the crows to fly up out of the tree, hover for a time to look around, and then quietly resettle, though sometimes on different branches.
But a new state needs new symbols, and what can be better than the reconstruction of pre-Soviet ones, like this cathedral originally built to commemorate Russia's deliverance from the hands of Napoleon?
The construction of the cathedral, the world's largest Orthodox church, commissioned by Czar Alexander I, took 44 years and three more Romanov czars. It was consecrated in 1883, after an official expenditure of 15,125,163 rubles and 89 kopeks.
But it stood for only 48 years. After Stalin destroyed it, originally intending to use the spot to build a gigantic Palace of the Soviets – higher than the Empire State Building and topped with a statue of Lenin taller than the Statue of Liberty – the cathedral passed into myth.
But "like most myths brought into reality," the writer Igor Yarkevich, a 33-year-old ironist, said of the current re-creation, "the result will be awful."
Yarkevich sees the three big construction projects of the new state as, alas, a troika: the war monument, Poklonnaya Hill, he said, "shows the West, 'We beat you once and if possible, we'll do it again'; the Tretyakov shows that real art exists only in Russia, and Christ the Savior shows that real belief exists only in Russia."
These symbols are more valuable to a confused state than the more utilitarian needs that communism preached about but failed so dismally to provide.
"So let there be no clothes, no hospitals and no apartments," Yarkevich said. "But we've got a huge church."
The single person most responsible for this megaproject is Yuri Luzhkov, Moscow's feisty, aggressive mayor, who prides himself on his enlightened take on the old Soviet model of the boss. He visits with an entourage that arrives in a fleet of black Volga cars several times a month to nod over the plans and encourage the workers, whom he has provided a bottomless supply of kvas, the Russian beer-like drink derived from fermented bread.
Certainly the reconstruction would not be possible without the help of Luzhkov's banker friends, many of whom have made a lot of money by handling the city's accounts. Officially, says Igor Ptichnikov, executive director of the fund-raising foundation for the cathedral, some 48 banks and companies are providing 90 percent of the $250 million estimated cost.
The foundation put on a poorly attended rock concert in August and plans a benefit concert by Mstislav Rostropovich in October at $100 a ticket. But despite calls for patriotic donations from individuals, the state and city are kicking in a lot of money from off-budget accounts, funds reliably said to be accounted for as banker contributions.