MARTYR
EVGENY RODIONOV
From Village Boy to
Soldier, Martyr and, Many Say, Saint
November 21, 2003 - By Seth
Mydans, The New York Times
Shoulders back, chest out, the young
soldier stands as if on parade in his camouflage fatigues - his boots
polished, his rifle at his shoulder, a halo around his head. His face is the blank mask of a man for whom duty is life.
It is not easy being a soldier, or a saint. Portraits
of this young man, Yevgeny Rodionov, are spreading around Russia -
sometimes in uniform, sometimes in a robe, sometimes armed, sometimes
holding a cross, but always with his halo.
He is Russia's new unofficial saint, a
casualty of the war in Chechnya who has been canonized not by the
Russian Orthodox Church but by a groundswell of popular adoration. The portraits are religious icons, venerated in homes and
churches where Private Rodionov has become the focus of a minor cult
that seems to fill a nationalist hunger for popular heroes. In one icon he is painted to look like a medieval Russian
knight. In another he is included, in full uniform, in a group portrait
of the last czar and his family, under the gaze of Jesus. Church officials say all of this breaks religious law.
Sainthood is not a popularity contest, and icons are not campaign
posters. The process of canonization, the officials say, is long and
arduous and can only be carried out by the church. But it does happen from time to time that a symbolic figure
emerges to capture the passions of a moment and becomes a sort of folk
saint - sometimes the first step toward official sainthood.
In pamphlets, songs and poems, in sermons
and on Web sites, Private Rodionov's story has become a parable of
religious devotion and Russian nationalism. The young soldier, it is
said, was killed by Muslim rebels seven years ago because he refused to
renounce his religion or remove the small silver cross he kept around
his neck.
It is the story his mother says she was
told by the rebels who killed him and who later led her, for a ransom
of $4,000, to the place they had buried him. When she exhumed his body
late one night, she said, the cross was there among his bones, glinting
in the light of flashlights, stained with small drops of blood.
"Nineteen-year-old Yevgeny Rodionov went
through unthinkable suffering," reads an encomium on one nationalist
Web site, "but he did not renounce the Orthodox faith but confirmed it
with his martyr's death.
"He proved that now, after so many decades
of raging atheism, after so many years of unrestrained nihilism, Russia
is capable, as in earlier times, of giving birth to a martyr for
Christ, which means it is unconquerable."
As his story has spread, pilgrims have
begun appearing in this small village just west of Moscow, where his
mother, Lyubov, 51, tends his grave on an icy hillside beside an old
whitewashed church. Some military veterans have
laid their medals by his graveside in a gesture of homage. People in
distress have left handwritten notes asking for his intercession. In a church near St. Petersburg, his full-length image
stands at the altar beside icons of the Virgin Mary, the Archangel
Michael, Jesus and Nicholas II, the last of the czars, who was
canonized three years ago. Aleksandr Makeyev, a
paratroop officer who heads a foundation to assist soldiers, said he
had seen soldiers kneeling in prayer before an image of Private
Rodionov. "The kids in Chechnya, they feel they've been abandoned by
the state and abandoned by their commanders," he told the newspaper
Moskovsky Komsomolets.
"They don't know who to appeal to for
help, but they understand that Zhenya is one of them," he said, using
Private Rodionov's nickname. "You can say he is the first
soldier-saint." Among the photographs of her son
that Mrs. Rodionov spreads on her kitchen table are laminated cards
that she says some soldiers carry with them for luck. They bear his
image along with a prayer:
"Thy martyr, Yevgeny, O Lord, in his
sufferings has received an incorruptible crown from thee, our God, for
having thy strength he has brought down his torturers, has defeated the
powerless insolence of demons. Through his prayers save our souls."
Although he has not been formally
canonized, Private Rodionov's mother and other believers say his icons
sometimes emit rivulets of holy perfume, as some extremely sacred
Orthodox icons are said to do. Indeed, Mrs.
Rodionov said, her own icon of her son drips perfume. "When that happens and I am planning a trip, I postpone it,"
she said. "The icon gives me signs."
Mrs. Rodionov said she was able to find
her son's body and learn how he died during a lull in the war when
rebel soldiers were demanding huge sums of money to return live
prisoners or the bodies of men they had killed.
According to the accounts of his captors, she said, he and three other
soldiers were seized in 1996 while manning a checkpoint and were held
in a cellar for 100 days before they were executed.
Private Rodionov was killed, she said,
when he refused the rebels' demand that he remove his cross and
forswear his religion. A poem called "The
Cross," composed in his honor, paints a scene of laughing heathens who
beheaded the young soldier when he defied them.
"Pure mountains in the distance, slopes
covered in blooms of blue," the poem reads. "Refusing to renounce
Christ, the soldier of Russia fell. And his head rolled, blood flowed
from the saber, and the red grass whispered a quiet prayer in its wake."
Private Rodionov was proud to wear his
military uniform and to do his duty for his country, his mother said.
But as a boy in this small village, all he really wanted was to be a
cook.
Lyubov Rodionov holding two
portraits of her son Yevgeny - a primary school photograph and an
unauthorized icon. Mrs. Rodionov says Muslim rebels killed him because
he refused to renounce his religion.
*
* *
Another account:
When he was 11 years old, Yevgeny Rodionov received from his
grandmother a little cross on a chain. He wanted to wear it to school,
but his mother, then an atheist, warned him against it, since the
communist authorities frowned on such things. Yevgeny wore it anyway
and refused to ever take it off. As a 19-year-old soldier in the
Russian
Army, Yevgeny Rodionov was captured by Muslim Chechen rebels. They kept
him hanging by his wrists in a basement. They starved and beat him. The
Muslims commanded Yevgeny to write his mother and ask for a $10,000
ransom. He told them his family was poor and could not possibly raise
such a sum. They then ordered him and several other Russian prisoners
to convert to Islam. In order to save their necks, most of the
prisoners complied. Yevgeny refused to betray Christ. For that he was
rewarded by the Muslims with decapitation.
This happened in 1996. Since
that time Yevgeny's mom has been able to recover her son's body from
the Chechens - in increments: first the body, which still had the
little cross around the neck, then, later, the head. I do not have the
details, but miracles have been occurring in connection with Yevgeny's
relics, and an icon of him in a small Russian village church has begun
weeping myrrh. Yevgeny's father died shortly after the return of his
son's body. Yevgeny's mother, who never before set foot in a church, is
now an Orthodox Christian believer, saved by the example of her son,
the Holy Martyr Yevgeny Rodionov.
*
* *
Another account:
Evgeny Rodionov,19 years old, did not lose his faith
despite horrible
tortures “The Chechen captivity is the most horrid, the most inhuman
and barbaric thing that can ever happen,” says Evgeny’s mother. She had
to survive hell to find her son, the body of her son, to be more
precise. Evgeny’s death coincided with his 19th birthday. Evgeny’s
mother, Lubov, was a little late: she was just seven kilometers far
from the place of her son’s execution.
“Evgeny was born 30 minutes
after midnight on May 23, 1977. His delivery was not hard. He was a
good and healthy child, his weight was 3900 grams. I was so relieved,
when I heard his first cry. As if he was trying to say: “I came into
this world, love me!” I incidentally looked at the window. It was dark
outside, and I suddenly saw a falling star. I went pale, my heart
turned to a cold small piece. Doctors tried to convince me that it was
a good sign. They told me that a falling star was a sign of good life
for my baby. However, I had to live with a sense of something dangerous
coming over us. Time made me forget about it, but I had to remember the
sign in 19 years.”
The Russian patriotic press has already reported
about the deed of a 19-year-old Russian soldier, Evgeny Rodionov. This
young man found himself in the Chechen captivity in 1996. He did not
betray either his fatherland or his faith. He did not take off his
cross even at the hardest moment of beastly tortures. The state
decorated Evgeny with the Order of Courage. People’s donations made it
possible to put a two-meter high Orthodox cross on his grave. People
come to visit his grave from most distant parts of Russia. His mother,
Lubov Rodionova, says that people’s attitude changed her entire
awareness of life. A WWII veteran once came to visit Evgeny’s grave. He
took off his military decoration – the Bravery Medal – and put in on
the tombstone. Evgeny Rodionov’s biography was published in a book that
came out in 2002. The book was called “The New Martyr of Christ,
Warrior Evgeny.” This is not really a book, but a booklet, which was
written by priest Alexander Shargunov. However, we know little about
Evgeny’s inmost thoughts, feelings, emotions, or what he had to go
through during three months of the Chechen hell. A lot of things remain
a mystery. Lubov Rodionova shared her thoughts with the priest about
her son’s childhood, his interests at school, his attitude to the
military service. She also shared her most horrible thoughts – about
the news of his alleged desertion from the army, and what followed that
news afterwards.
Eighteen-year-old Evgeny Rodionov was taken captive
with three other soldiers at night of February 14th, not far from the
Chechen settlement of Galashki. The guys arrived from the Kaliningrad
region. They patrolled the border between the republics of Chechnya and
Ingushetia. Their control and registration post was located some 200
meters far from the security detachment. The post was just a small
cabin, without any light or wire communication. The cabin did not even
have a military support, in spite of the fact that it was a single
cabin on the mountainous road, which was used for carrying weapons,
ammunition, captives, drugs and so on. The border guards stopped an
ambulance vehicle to check it. More than ten armed Chechens got out of
the vehicle. Needless to mention that it was very easy for them to cope
with young inexperienced soldiers. The guys showed as much resistance
as they could, but the outcome of the fight was evident before it even
started. Lubov Rodionova believes that this incident happened over
officers’ negligence, basically.
“The captivity has always been
considered to be the most horrible thing that can ever happen to a
person. It implies no freedom, but only tortures and humiliation.
Experience showed that the Chechen captivity is the most horrid, the
most inhuman and barbaric thing that can ever happen,” Lubov Rodionova
believes.
As soon as she learned that her son was a captive of
Chechen
guerrillas, she started looking for him all over Chechnya for nine
months. She had to go through every horror imaginable. “I think that
God was watching over me. I was walking along mined roads, but I did
not step on a bomb. He protected me from bombings, he did not let me
die, because my duty was to find my son, to bury him on his native
land, according to Christian traditions. I have realized that recently.
When I was walking along those military roads, I just kept silence,
praying to God in my heart.”
Chechen bandits murdered Evgeny Rodionov
on May 23, 1996 in the Chechen settlement of Bamut. Russian troops
occupied the village the next day. Lubov Rodionova learned about her
son’s death only in September. She had to put a mortgage on her own
apartment in order to find Evgeny’s body and to take it away along with
the bodies of his murdered friends. A Chechen man agreed to show her
the place, where Evgeny was buried. She had to pay him a lot of money
for that.
“When I came to Chechnya in the middle of February, a
living
private cost ten million rubles. This price was 50 million in August. A
friend of mine was told to pay 250 million rubles for her son, since he
was an officer. It was nighttime, when I and some sappers were digging
the pit, in which the bodies of four Russian soldiers were thrown. I
was praying all the time, hoping that my Evgeny was not going to be
there. I could not and did not want to believe that he was murdered.
When we were taking out the remnants, I recognized his boots. However,
I still refused to accept the fact of his death, until someone found
his cross. Then I fainted.” Evgeny Rodionov was murdered by Ruslan
Khaikhoroyev. This bandit confessed that himself. “Your son had a
choice to stay alive. He could have converted to Islam, but he did not
agree
to take his cross off. He also tried to escape once,” said
Khaikhoroyev. The guerrilla was killed together with his bodyguards on
August 23, 1999 in a fight between armed Chechen groups.
When Lubov
Rodionova came back home, Evgeny’s father died five days after the
funeral. He could not stand the loss of his son. Archpriest Dmitry
Smirnov, acting chairman of the Moscow Patriarchate department for
cooperation with the Armed Forces, says that Evgeny Rodionov will
definitely be canonized. The adequate inquiry has already been made,
although more information about Evgeny's fate is needed. Father Dmitry
said that Evgeny would be canonized as soon as the information was
collected.
A sign in memory of the brave Russian border guard was put
at the entrance to the school, where he studied. There was also a
documentary released about him. The writings on Evgeny’s grave cross
run: “Russian soldier Evgeny Rodionov is buried here. He defended his
Fatherland and did not disavow Christ. He was executed on May 23, 1996,
on the outskirts of Bamut.” “We know that he had to go through
horrible, long-lasting sufferings that could be compared to the ones of
great martyrs in ancient times. They were beheaded, dismembered, but
they remained devoted to Jesus Christ anyway,” priest Alexander
Shargunov said during the requiem in Evgeny Rodionov’s memory.