Roland Clark's expert study analyzes the evolving character of the Orthodox Church and its place within Romania politics and society after the First World War. Drawing on a very impressive range of archival sources, newspapers, periodicals, and published texts from the period, Clark explores efforts to promote religious renewal, charts divisions within the Orthodox Church, and analyzes how Orthodoxy related to the Romanian state and Romanian identity. The 1866 constitution had established the Orthodox Church as the “dominant religion of the Romanian state” (54). In 1885, the ecumenical patriarch recognized the Romanian church as autocephalous. The church then came under increasing secular control with priests paid a state salary and the number of parishes set by law. Many clergy lacked required levels of education, however, and by 1913 only around half of all Orthodox Church buildings in Romania had a priest available to hold services.
After the War, the Orthodox Church faced the challenge of integrating the new Romanian territories of Transylvania and Bessarabia. The 1923 constitution affirmed that the Orthodox Church remained the dominant church in the state. Metropolitan-primate Miron Cristea promoted a unified and centralized authority over the church as part of a nation-building project. In Transylvania, this included efforts to diminish the role played by the Greek Catholic church among Romanian-speakers, while the Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Reformed, and Unitarian Churches (with adherents from the Hungarian-speaking and German-speaking communities) were marginalized. In 1924, the church adopted calendar reform in conformity with the Romanian state provoking an Old Calendarist movement, especially in Moldavia and Bessarabia.
The Orthodox Church also faced challenges from the emergence of Adventists, Brethren, Pentecostals, and Baptists among groups Clark describes as “repenter churches.” While these groups remained a marginal demographic presence, their evident piety and moral commitment crystallized concerns among some about the character of religious life of Orthodox communities. There were repeated claims about the failings of Orthodox clergy to provide adequate leadership and about popular religious apathy and immorality. Clark analyzes attempts that were made to revive Orthodox spirituality and piety during the 1920s. He examines, for example, the Lord's Army movement led by Iosif Trifa from Sibiu in Transylvania. This movement produced newspapers (including The Light of the Villages) that were aimed at a popular audience. Trifa thought that the new Romanian state needed not only political but also moral renewal. The Lord's Army declared spiritual warfare against alcoholism in a campaign that was in part promoted through antisemitism. By the mid-1930s, Trifa claimed that 100,000 supporters had signed a declaration to join the Lord's Army. After a dispute between Trifa and the Transylvanian metropolitan Nicolae Bălan, leadership of the Lord's Army passed to Bălan. Mass meetings of the Lord's Army supporters were held and the movement became increasingly associated with ultra-nationalist politics. Clark argues that the Lord's Army shows how Orthodox leaders were “transforming their church by drawing on spiritual practices they had discovered in the West” (166). Clark also assesses a renewal movement based in St. Stefan's Church in Bucharest (known as the Stork's Nest) led by parish priest Teodor Popescu. Popescu preached on the need for individual conversion experiences and moral renewal among the faithful. The movement was in part inspired by a new Bible translation completed by Dumitru Cornilescu. However, opponents claimed that sermons delivered in the Stork's Nest were influenced by foreign ideas. Both Popescu and his opponents claimed to be working for the salvation of Romania, and both sides accused each other of being in league with Jews. A 1923 heresy trial concluded that Popescu's teaching was infected by Protestant beliefs.
While many Orthodox clergy were convinced of the need for religious renewal both for the sake of the faithful and to save the Romanian state, there were unresolved tensions within Orthodoxy over what renewal meant while remaining within the boundaries of tradition and acting in the interests of Romania. Clark's thoughtful analysis draws the attention of readers to the significance of the place of the Orthodox Church in Romanian society and examines critical questions about Romania's cultural and political history in the interwar period.
