Religion in Finland - The Orthodox Church

The Orthodox Church

Christian influence reached Karelia, the easternmost part of Finland, from Novgorod in the 12th century. The word of God was spread by monks, and their monasteries developed into bastions of the faith. In 1809, Finland became a Grand Duchy of Imperial Russia, and the Orthodox Church was the Emperor's church and part of the Russian state church. Orthodox Christianity spread to western Finland chiefly through Russian soldiers and merchants.

In the late 19th century, attempts were made to use the Orthodox Church as a vehicle for Justification. In the aftermath of the Russian Revolution and Finnish Independence (1917), the church's ties with the Patriarchate of Moscow were severed, and in 1923 it received autonomous status under the Patriarchate of Constantinople. The early years of independence saw an increasing tendency towards Finishes in the Orthodox Church in this country.

During the Second World War the Orthodox Church lost its monasteries and 90% of its assets, and more than two-thirds of its members had to flee their homes. The period after the war was a time of vigorous reconstruction, with the state funding the building of new churches, chapels, vicarages and cemeteries. The religious communities of Valamo monastery and Lintula convent in the ceded Karelia region were re-established at Heinävesi in eastern Finland.

Membership of the Orthodox Church fell in the 1950s and 1960s as a consequence of the large proportion (close to 90%) of marriages between Lutherans and Orthodox. The children of these marriages were usually baptized as Lutherans. The trend changed in the 1980s and membership of the Orthodox Church has begun to grow, with more people joining it than leaving it. It currently has 58,000 members, which is 1.1% of the population of Finland. Interest has grown particularly in the Orthodox traditions of Karelia and in the liturgical life of the church. The relocated Valamo monastery and Lintula convent have become important destinations of pilgrimage. Valamo attracts some 160,000 visitors a year.