Interfax: Majority of the Orthodox attend churches, but have never read the Bible - survey

An Orthodox friend of mine asked to post this translation of an article in the Russian news agency, Interfax. The impetus behind my posting this was not to create controversy, but to simply be aware of the facts (as reported by the news agencies),

Majority of the Orthodox attend churches, but have never read the Bible - survey
http://www.interfax-religion.ru/?act=news&div=49305

 

Oh Dear, I must intervene again
I will just say that Interfax is NOT state news agency, but private one.
Russian state news agency is RIA-Novosti.

 

Thanks for the correction!

 

Orthodox Christians read the Bible the same as all others Christians in the World.
Reading the Bible private at home is obligatory for an Orthodox Christians on daily basis.
Also, we read the Bible at every Liturgy (Eucharist). Mp3 Bibles are also very popular here in the East, and lots of young people here hear the Bible while waiting for the bus, or driving a car, or travelling with train.

Is someone Christian if he never partake at Eucharist?
Is someone Christian if he doesn't read the Bible?
Whether he is Anglican, or Roman-Catholic or Orthodox.

I am sure that every real Anglican Christian who regularly goes to the Eucharist also reads the Bible. The same is in Russia, China, South Africa, Bangladesh, Argentina...

Someone is Orthodox Christian if he takes Communion at Eucharist. And all such people read the Bible.

I don't know does standpoint "God, I thank Thee, that I am not as other men are, or even as this Orthodox" has any sense.

Russian Orthodox Church gave in 20th Century 200.000 clerics as martyrs for Christs brutally killed by Atheists. And millions more of non-cleric Christians gave their life for Christ.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Christians_in_the_Soviet_Union

Of course that Orthodox people read the Bible.

 

My thread was not meant to offend, friend Servos. I had heard many stories of my Orthodox acquaintances and friends not being interested in reading the Scriptures, and this survey merely corroborates those personal findings. If you do read the Scripture then God Bless you, and nothing I said was intended to belittle that. But the findings of the Survey do not lie, do they?

 

What I am asking myself is is every Russian at the same time Orthodox just because he is born in Russia? Is every English Anglican?
What is criteria that someone is Christian?
Is someone Christian who never partakes at Eucharist? Who never reads the Bible?
Does the thing that someone is born as a Serbian makes him Orthodox? Does the fact that someone is born like English makes him Anglican?
By this survey everyone Russian who is not Muslim is Orthodox.
We do not have in Serbia and Russia established church (Greece have it) but Orthodoxy is part of national identity.
Maybe is that the case with English and Anglican, too?
We have nominal Orthodox, who declare them as Orthodox but never go to the Liturgy, never take communion and never read the Bible.
Do you have nominal Anglicans who are just formally Anglicans because they are English, but never take Communion?
Survey in start make this fault. Who is Christian? Who is Orthodox? Who is Anglican?
For me Christian is the one who take Communion and read the Bible.
And if someone is born like Russian and English that does not make him automatically Christian, although someone make think so.
Daily Bible reading is obligatory for Orthodox.

 

Bible literacy has also been identified as an issue here in the Australian Anglican Church and is being addressed with a number of programs through our Diocese.