In recent months, Estonia has seen extensive debate over a draft bill to amend the Churches and Congregations Act, one of the aims of which is to reduce the influence of the Moscow Patriarchate. The Riigikogu constitutional and legal affairs committees have concluded that the bill is clear, necessary and worthy of adoption without amendment.

President Alar Karis has pointed out that security issues could also be addressed within the framework of existing legislation. However, history shows that the political messages conveyed through the Moscow Patriarchate do not remain confined within church walls. The Patriarchate's actions have repeatedly aligned with Russia's foreign policy objectives, making legislative inaction a potential vulnerability to foreign influence in Estonian society — more so than may appear at first glance.

This debate points to a broader question: Is ecclesiastical subordination to Moscow truly neutral or does it inevitably entail a political dimension?

Scholarly analysis indicates that the Moscow Patriarchate has not functioned solely as a spiritual institution, but as part of Russia's geopolitical project. This role has been affirmed both by Patriarch Kirill's public positions on the war in Ukraine and by historical patterns in which ecclesiastical structures have been used to strengthen state control.

While many Orthodox believers in Estonia are religiously devout without being politically loyal to the Kremlin, it is impossible to ignore that congregations under Moscow's jurisdiction have, in many countries, been part of a network that in recent decades has justified military aggression and undermined Europe's values-based security order. This is therefore not only a matter of theology or community cohesion — it is also a matter of political responsibility.

Church subordination does not equal nationality in Estonia

Russian-speaking Orthodox congregations in Estonia today fall under different structures: the legally recognized Estonian Apostolic Orthodox Church (EAOC) and the Diocese of Tallinn of the Moscow Patriarchate, established in 1945 and registered in 2002 under the name Estonian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate. Known since March 2025 as the Estonian Christian Orthodox Church (ECOC).

Legally, the ECOC operates in Estonia as an independent religious organization. However, under church law, it remains an autonomous part of the Moscow Patriarchate, with a governance model and canonical subordination based on the statutes of the Russian Orthodox Church. In addition, the Pühtitsa Convent and Tallinn's Alexander Nevsky Cathedral fall directly under the authority of Patriarch Kirill. While the goal of the new amendments to the Churches and Congregations Act is to limit these ties, whether that will actually succeed remains an open question.

Historical parallels: Finland, Poland and Estonia

It must be acknowledged that ecclesiastical subordination is not set in stone. Over the course of history, congregations have at times been under the jurisdiction of the Patriarchate of Constantinople and at other times under the Moscow Patriarchate. Around the world, there are also fully independent Orthodox churches that are not subordinate to either jurisdiction.

The Finnish Orthodox Church, which — like the EAOC — is autonomous and operates within the Ecumenical Patriarchate, belonged to the Moscow Patriarchate until 1917. After Finland gained independence, the church became the second national church of the young Finnish Republic. In 1923, the Patriarchate of Constantinople granted it official autonomy.

A similar development occurred in Estonia, where the Estonian Apostolic Orthodox Church came under Constantinople's jurisdiction in 1923 instead of Moscow's. At that time, nearly 18 percent of the population belonged to the church and it played a significant role in Estonia's cultural and political development.

In Poland, the Ecumenical Patriarchate granted autocephaly in 1924. However, Moscow did not recognize it and issued its own "competing" autocephaly in 1948. All of these examples show that ecclesiastical subordination has shifted over time, shaped not only by dogma or institutional structures but also by broader societal and national developments.

Today, Metropolitan Stephanos has shown openness toward Russian-speaking communities, expressing a willingness to establish a separate auxiliary diocese for them, should they wish to transfer from the jurisdiction of the Moscow Patriarchate to the EAOC. This does not represent the suppression of one tradition, but rather an effort to preserve Orthodox unity in Estonia while respecting linguistic and cultural identity.

Geopolitics and the threat of geotheology

One emerging threat demands attention: the shifting of geopolitics into churches is starting to evolve into "geotheology."

When flipping through Soviet-era Russian Orthodox periodicals, it's often difficult to distinguish where theology ends and Soviet foreign policy or peace propaganda begins. That same tradition continues today in the post-Soviet space, both in Russia and in Orthodox churches across the Balkans, where national, ecclesiastical, dogmatic and international dimensions intertwine in various ways.

Unfortunately, this still affects Orthodox churches bordering Russia, shaped by the old Byzantine tradition of the symphony of church and state, symbolized by the double-headed eagle. What was originally conceived as a vision of cultural cohesion — Russkiy Mir or the "Russian World" — has, under the leadership of the Moscow Patriarchate, evolved into a kind of spiritual ideology: a political theology in which the sacred and the political merge and the secular and the spiritual are fused within the symbolism of the double-headed eagle.

This is also the rationale behind Estonia's proposed amendments to its Churches and Congregations Act. The state seeks to protect its internal security against ideologies presented under the guise of theological obedience, neo-traditionalism or nationalism. The amended law recognizes these risks and aims to limit such influences — instances where theology is interwoven with political agendas. Does freedom of religion also include an unrestricted right to maintain ties with church leadership that blesses wars and sanctifies tank columns?

Balance of religious freedom and security

This raises the question: to what extent and in what ways can the state place limits on freedom of religion? It's precisely within this context that some Western researchers should also be viewed with a critical eye.

For example, Nikolai Mitrokhin, a scholar of the Russian Orthodox Church now based in Germany, in a presentation last year placed developments in Estonia on the same spectrum as Turkmenistan, Belarus and Ukraine — claiming that in these countries, religious organizations are increasingly being seen as "enemy agents."

According to Mitrokhin, this approach blurs the line between religious policy in authoritarian and democratic states and pushes Estonia's church law amendments in a more authoritarian direction. In his view, ecclesiastical subordination must remain untouched under any circumstances, even if it serves the strategic interests of a de facto aggressor state.

Personally, I cannot agree with the notion that freedom of religion is an absolute truth that can ignore the reality of security threats. Even in democratic countries, religious freedom has its limits when there is a proven connection to extremism or the ideological influence of a foreign power.

For instance, in the 2000s, Germany banned several Islamic organizations with verified ties to extremist international movements. In France, restrictions were imposed on associations pursuing theocratic or anti-state objectives. Estonia is not doing anything unusual by protecting itself against ideological influence campaigns; the real question is how that protection is implemented.

The future of Orthodoxy in Estonia: Unity in diversity

The strength of Estonia's Orthodox community does not lie in uniform subordination to Moscow, but in its diversity, solidarity and willingness to respect differences. The Moscow Patriarchate's insistence on subjecting congregations to a unified and strictly centralized hierarchy is political in nature rather than theological.

If we are able to distinguish ecclesiastical affiliation from national identity and shape legislation that is both practical and resilient to foreign influence, unity can be preserved without forced subordination.

This would be in line with both the spirit of European ecclesiastical law and the historical experience of local Orthodoxy, where jurisdiction has repeatedly shifted — from Constantinople to Moscow and back — yet faith and community life have remained vibrant precisely because of their adaptability.

The legal framework governing church-state relations is also neither eternal nor dogmatic. Within the European Union, various functioning models exist — from France's principle of laïcité to Italy's tax system, which allows citizens to allocate a portion of their taxes to a religious organization of their choice.

These examples confirm that the state can accommodate religious diversity without becoming hostage to a church structure tied to a foreign power. In Estonia's context, this inevitably calls for a critical view of the Moscow Patriarchate, which in recent decades has become an ideological conduit closely aligned with the Kremlin.

Therefore, the debate over amending the Churches and Congregations Act should not be reduced to a purely technical legal issue. This is a test of whether the Estonian state and local churches can organize their relationships in a way that reduces external political pressure and aligns more closely with the legal space of the European Union.

The tensions surrounding the Estonian Christian Orthodox Church, which is affiliated with the Moscow Patriarchate, are no coincidence. They reflect a deeper issue: subordination to the Patriarchate is not religious neutrality — it is political alignment with Russia's interests.

A real solution lies not in accepting dictates from Moscow, but in building mutual trust — trust grounded in local congregations, civil society and Estonia's democratic institutions. Only such a framework can ensure that every believer may practice their faith freely, without feeling pressured to justify or redefine their identity through Moscow.

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