Georgia’s Quest for Independence, and Ours

​There is a towering figure in the nation of Georgia’s recent history whose life is tremendously meaningful for Dixie.
 
Mr George Sadzaglishvili (1855-1918; after receiving the monastic tonsure, he was given the new name Kirion) was the son of a Georgian priest.  After his schooling he was active in educational and Church circles, but his most intense interest early in life seemed to be uncovering and preserving the history and folklore of the Georgian people:

​In 1880 he graduated from the Kiev Theological Academy and was appointed assistant dean of the Odessa Theological Seminary. From 1883 to 1886 Saint Kirion was active in the educational life of Gori, Telavi, Kutaisi, and Tbilisi. In 1886 he was appointed supervisor of the Georgian monasteries and dean of the schools of the Society for the Renewal of Christianity in the Caucasus. He directed the parochial schools, established libraries and rare book collections within them, and published articles on the history of the Georgian Church, folklore and literature under the pseudonyms Iverieli, Sadzagelov, and Liakhveli (the Liakhvi River flows through his native region of Shida [Inner] Kartli, the central part of eastern Georgia).
 
. . . 

​Bishop Kirion was a tireless researcher, with a broad range of scholarly interests. To his pen belong more than forty monographs on various themes relating to the history of the Georgian Church and Christian culture in Georgia. He compiled a short terminological dictionary of the ancient Georgian language and, with the linguist Grigol Qipshidze, a History of Georgian Philology.

​The South has figures like Bishop Kirion who have worked tirelessly to reveal and strengthen Southern culture:  Frank Owsley, Mel Bradford, Richard Weaver, Cleanth Brooks, Donald Davidson, and others.  This connection makes what Bishop Kirion accomplished for Georgian independence all the more relevant for us here in Dixie. 
 
Having along with others demonstrated the uniqueness of the Georgian culture, and her freedom in the past in governing her religious life, Bishop Kirion made a bold declaration to restore Georgia’s ancient prerogatives.  But his actions resulted in a bitter defeat:

​In 1905, at the demand of Georgia’s intelligentsia (under the leadership of Saint Ilia the Righteous), the regime formed an extraordinary commission to formally consider the question of the autocephaly of the Georgian Church. Saint Kirion delivered two lectures to the commission: one on the reasons behind Georgia’s struggle for the restoration of an autocephalous Church, and the other on the role of nationality in the life of the Church. The commission rejected the Georgian claims to autocephaly and subjected the leaders of the movement to harsh repression.

​Like the South, Georgia’s first attempt at restoring her old freedoms was repulsed quite harshly.  But that did not stop Bishop Kirion and his allies, nor should it stop the South.  And their persistence, with God’s help, would eventually bring about the desired end:

By the year 1915 the regime had ceased to persecute Saint Kirion. They restored him to the bishopric and elevated him as archbishop of Polotsk and Vitebsk in western Russia. He was not, however, permitted to return to his motherland.

In March of 1917 the Georgian Apostolic Orthodox Church declared its autocephaly restored. At the incessant demands of the Georgian people, Saint Kirion finally returned to his motherland. One hundred and twenty cavalrymen met him in Aragvi Gorge (along the Georgian Military Highway) and reverently escorted him to the capital. In Tbilisi Saint Kirion was met with great honor. ​

In September of 1917 the Holy Synod of the Georgian Orthodox Church enthroned Bishop Kirion as Catholicos-Patriarch of All Georgia. 

​The address of Bishop Kirion at his enthronement as Patriarch has the ring of Southern tenderness to it:

“My beloved motherland, the nation protected by the Most Holy Theotokos, purified in the furnace by tribulations and suffering, washed in its own tears: I return to you, having been separated from you, having sought after you, having grieved over you, having sought for you and now having returned not as a prodigal son, but as your confidant and the conscience of your Church.​

“I know that in your minds you are all inquiring, ‘What has he brought back with him? With what ointment will he heal his wounds? How will he comfort himself in his sadness?’ Consider my words: He came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many (Matt. 20:28). I, likewise, have come not as a hired servant, but as a faithful and obedient son!” 

​The significance of Georgia regaining her religious independence now becomes manifest:  It was the step that made political independence possible –

Soon after he was enthroned, Saint Kirion sent an appeal to all the Orthodox patriarchs of the world in which he described in detail the history of the Georgian Church and requested an official recognition of her autocephaly.

On May 26, 1918, Georgia declared its independence. The next day Catholicos-Patriarch Kirion II presided during a service of thanksgiving. The chief shepherd and his flock rejoiced at the restoration of the autocephaly of the Georgian Church and the independence of the Georgian state, . . . 

​Religious separation of Southern Christians from their Northern cousins (the formation of the Southern Baptists, Southern Methodists, etc.) likewise preceded the first political Southern secession. 
 
And yet, for all the joy in Georgia over her newly regained freedom, dark times loomed just beyond the horizon, brought about by the same sort of communist revolutionaries with whom the Southern people are now squaring off against:

 . . . though from the beginning they perceived the imminence of the Bolshevik danger. The socialist revolution, now showing its true face, posed an enormous threat to the young republic and her Church.

On June 27, 1918, Catholicos-Patriarch Kirion II was found murdered in the patriarchal residence at Martqopi Monastery. The investigation was a mere formality and the guilty were never found. 

​Dixie must likewise be ready to face deadly threats of this kind, if God willing, we also regain a measure of independence.
 
Nevertheless, the story of Patriarch Kirion and Georgia has a happy ending.  After the fall of the Soviet Union, Georgian religious and political independence was recovered once again, and 

When the Holy Synod of the Georgian Apostolic Orthodox Church convened on October 17, 2002, it canonized Holy Hieromartyr Kirion and numbered him among the saints.

​If the South would achieve what Georgia has, the steps to doing so are given to us in the foregoing: 
 
-First is the recovery of Dixie’s cultural patrimony and its reintegration into our lives to the extent possible.  Those we mentioned above – Owsley, Weaver, et al. – have done much of the hard work in this field for us.
 
-Second is the establishment of a unified Church in the South, unique in some way (or ways) that sets it apart from congregations in the sister States.  For this we will need figures like Rev James Henley Thornwell, Sts Kirion and Ilya, and others of their kind.  But they will only appear after we have climbed the first step.
 
-With those two accomplished, the ground will then be quite ready for the third and final step, political independence.
 
The accomplishment of all three would be pleasant indeed, but there is a hierarchy of value at work here.  Of the three goals, the first two are far more valuable than the third, and the second the most valuable of all (‘What can a man give in exchange for his soul?’, asks the Lord Jesus).  If we can obtain the first two but not the third, let us rejoice in that.
 
But the Lover of mankind also says that if we ask, we shall receive.  What the gift will look like in the end, we do not know; only let us not grow weary in asking that we, like Georgia, may attain all three goals from the hand of the Merciful God, Who is well able to grant the boon, as we prepare ourselves for the work that we must undertake in cooperation with Him in this great endeavor.

Note: All quotations are taken from this source:
https://www.oca.org/saints/lives/2022/06/27/205447-hieromartyr-kirion-ii-catholicos-patriarch-of-all-georgia