The Priest Who Fought the Orthodox Church

On Christmas Day, the world lost an extraordinary man of faith who once went to prison for his Christian beliefs under an atheist state and later challenged both his church and the repressive entanglement of church and state under a regime that claims to celebrate religious values. When the Russian dissident and priest Father Gleb Yakunin died, outside the small circle of the liberal opposition and its sympathizers, he was almost as unknown in his homeland as in the West. His journey, which ended at the age of 80 after a long illness, is not only the story of one man’s lifelong battle; it is also the story of the complicated relationship between religion and power in 20th and 21st-century Russia, with all its ironic twists.