Priest Mikhail Dudko gives the religion’s take on space exploration

  1. Lemma
  2. Священник Михаил Дудко о религиозной оценке освоения космоса
  3. Russian
  4. Asliturk, Miriam
  5. Complementarity - Culture and national identities - Orthodox critique of science
  6. 30-01-2017
  7. Дудко, Михаил [Author]. Священник Михаил Дудко о религиозной оценке освоения космоса
  8. Русская Православная Церковь. Официальный сайт Московского Патриархата.
  9. Outer Space - astronomy - Space exploration - Russian Orthodox Church
  10. Click Here
    1. <p>Дудко, Михаил (2006). Священник Михаил Дудко о религиозной оценке освоения космоса. <em>Русская Православная Церковь. Официальный сайт Московского Патриархата.</em> Retrieved from: <a href="http://www.patriarchia.ru/db/text/104666.html">http://www.patriarchia.ru/db/text/104666.html</a> </p>

    1. This is the answer of the secretary of international relations of the Moscow Patriarchate on a religious online resource. Mikhail Dudko, the secretary of international relations of the Moscow Patriarchate, argues that space exploration can actually strengthen one’s religious worldview and not serve as anticlerical propaganda of the Soviet times. Dudko claims that many astronauts start to express more interest in religion after having been in space. He makes an example of one of the first persons on the Moon, who read lines from the Bible. Dudko also pointed out that the Church was not to give moral judgement about the public funds spent on space. Dudko argued that not everything could be counted in terms of money. It is hard for example to tell how much money was spent on Gagarin’s flight to space. It is obvious, however, that this event being the first human to space contributed greatly to the strengthening of national pride and patriotism in the country. Another example is churches and monasteries. They are not profitable but it is not the economical factor that matters here. What matters, according to Dudko, are great achievements of the human spirit, such as Gagarin’s flight of 1961. It is these achievements that make one proud of one’s community and country.