Influence of the Council on the renewal of Orthodox lay fraternities and movements

This article by Cyrille Sollogoub examines the influence of the Moscow Council of 1917-1918 on the emergence and renewal of Orthodox lay brotherhoods and movements in the twentieth century. Drawing on historical and ecclesiological study, it analyzes two distinct contexts: Soviet Russia, where brotherhoods developed in response to Bolshevik persecution, and the Russian emigration in the West, where they embodied a renewed Orthodox witness. The central idea is that the Council, by rediscovering conciliarity and the responsibility of the laity, directly gave rise to the multiplication of these brotherhoods as living forms of ecclesial expression. The theological contribution of the article lies in its illumination of the structural link between conciliarity and lay brotherhoods, presented as an ecclesiological response to the exit from the Constantinian era, analogous in their function to the monastic communities that emerged at the entry into that same era.