On 6 October 2025, an international conference entitled ‘Orthodoxy in imperial and post-imperial context’ was held at the University of Tartu. It was jointly organized by the University of Tartu (Estonia), the Volos Academy for Theological Studies (Greece), and the Orthodox Church of Estonia.
The conference was attended by leading theologians, historians and researchers from various European countries – from Lithuania to Greece, from France to Ukraine. Such a broad geography revealed the profound commonality of issues facing the Orthodox world: is it possible to combine fidelity to tradition with critical freedom of spirit, if tradition itself has often served as the language of empires?
The conference was opened by Pantelis Kalaitzidis, Director of the Volos Academy, who, during the panel discussion ‘Theological Foundations of Orthodoxy and Imperial Identity’, explored the topic of Byzantine political theology, returning to the origins of the Nicene Creed. He questioned the extent to which the imperial concept of the tsar as the image of Christ was faithful to the spirit of Nicaea, and how this monarchical model continues to influence theological conceptions. His speech was a response to contemporary attempts to revive the ‘holy empire’ under the slogans of the ‘Russian world’.
Sister Vassa (Larin) addressed the issue of imperial nostalgia within the Russian Orthodox Church outside of Russia (ROCOR). She traced how the experience of exile and loss of the ‘great motherland’ was transformed into a specific theological language of memory, in which longing for the empire is mixed with a sense of spiritual exceptionalism. Her analysis revealed that the empire continues to live on not only in political but also in theological ideas – as an attempt to sacralize past greatness.
In his report, Archimandrite Cyril (Hovorun) examined how Orthodoxy can rid itself of the imperial mindset that has defined its relationship with state power for centuries. He emphasized that the ‘de-imperialisation of the Church’ is not a political slogan, but a spiritual process of purification from the temptation of power, centered on freedom of conscience and collective responsibility.
The conference in Tartu was not just a scientific gathering, but an intellectual event-confession, in which theology, history, and politics came together in search of a new language for Orthodoxy – a language of freedom, repentance, and open dialogue. It marked the beginning of a new stage of reflection: what it means to be Orthodox after empires. A detailed version of the news about the conference can be found on our Foundation’s website:
