“Medialab” website published a caricature which alluded to March 24 – Holy Thursday – to the non-convincing way of performing the Ceremony of Washing of Feet by the Catholicos of Armenia. Recently, one of the subordinates of the Catholicos announced that the cartoonist and the poster scoff at the belief and our church rituals. I have already had the occasion to write about the excessive zeal with which the employee of an organization defends the “honor” of his supervisor. For example, if any unfavorable word is written about former Gyumri mayor Vardan Ghukasyan, then it is mandatory for his “office” to give a “lethal response” to the author, in a feminine style. Well, not to speak about Vladimir Putin, the RF President has a whole “team” of employees on the Armenian Internet, who take on the duty to respond to any, in his opinion, “anti-Russian” publication. Interestingly, does Mr. Volinkin personally decide the size of the “anti-Russianism” and the “intensity” of the response or the lower officials?
But all this is more or less normal, the “militants of the ideological front” answer in the following manner: “Who are you to dare to speak about the great Vardanik or the great Putin?” The Holy See employee’s case is different. He does not say, “my boss is good, do not say anything to him”, like it is in the previous two cases. Essentially, he says, “despite my boss is an ordinary mortal but he is the embodiment of your faith and scoffing at him means to scoff at God, the apostles, prophets and angels. I am against this approach. As someone may like my article or my newspaper, the other one may not like it, and the reader has the right to argue with me, criticize and scoff at me, so as the activities of any clergy, including the Catholicos, can seem convincing to someone and non-convincing, credible or incredible for another one. Articles can be written, caricatures can be drawn and programs prepared about any mortal.
It is another question as to what should be done to be convincing and credible. This question, certainly, refers to all of us, both the clergy and the laymen. It is a very difficult task as most of the people do not believe in no one and anything apart from the money. The outcome, perhaps, is one – to be honest. Since the moment when live broadcast and recording have become a daily occurrence, faking is no more possible. You can pronounce wonderful words from secular or religious “stages” and perform beautiful rituals but when your eyes appear in the footage in close-up, the viewer can easily understand whether your thoughts and words in the same place, or the first one is “flying” in a completely different, much lower spheres. It is clear even to the inexperienced eye.
… As for the caricatures, let Erdoğan be insulted.
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Aram ABRAHAMYAN
