The Model of the Higher Church Administration of the Russian Church as of the Local Council 1917–1918 Decisions

Abstract The author of this article reviews the reforms of the higher administration of the Russian Church that were carried out by the All-Russian Local Council in 1917–1918. These reforms decisively changed the system of government of one of the largest Orthodox Churches in the world. The model included the regular holding of Local Councils of various types, the leadership of the Church by the Patriarch, the work of permanent bodies of church power – the Synod and the Supreme Church Council (with the participation of not only bishops but also clergy and laity), the creation of church districts on the territory of the former Russian Empire. New managing mechanisms began their work, but after a few years they were curtailed due to repressions against Russian Orthodoxy, but at the end of the twentieth and beginning of the twenty-first centuries they were not resumed for other, even though also political, reasons.