The Church calls to protect the individual against total controlMessage from the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church

The Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church has sent on October 6, 2005, a message to the authorities in the CIS and the Baltics.

The message was prompted by the anxiety expressed by some believers over the introduction of a personal electronic identification system, collection and integration of personal electronic databases and the new identification papers with electronic biometric information, initiated or planned in some countries.

Aware of the need to protect the security of the state and society and to struggle with crime, especially terrorism, the Holy Synod appreciates the concern of the authorities for adequate organization of population accounting, as it believes there is nothing sinful in the very fact of a state’s effort for population accounting. From time immemorial, relations between people and nations began with answering the question Joshua asked of Archangel Michael at Jericho: ‘Art thou for us, or for our adversaries?’(Josh. 5:13). The Mother of God and the Righteous Joseph submitted to the lawful demand of the authorities and took part in the Roman Empire population census in Bethlehem.

There is nothing sinful either in using the latest technological achievements – including electronic ones as only developing customary methods – in population accounting to ensure security for both individuals and society. Thus, descriptions and images of human faces and bodies were used for security reasons as far back as antiquity. Their sophisticated recording does not carry anything fundamentally new.

However, along with some technological advantages, the development and integration of personal electronic identification means are fraught with many dangers, as an individual becomes increasingly dependent on inevitable technical fails, errors, negligence of the staff or malefactor interference. There is also a possibility for a centralized collection of information on people’s private life and convictions. This presents a threat to individual rights and freedoms and makes it possible to introduce a total control over individual life including individual worldview. This enhances the danger of prejudice towards an individual on the grounds of his of her religious, political and other views.

This danger becomes real at a time when the national and international law tend to seal the ideas of ethical and ideological relativism.

The Orthodox Christians, the faithful of our Church which endured in the 20^th century the persecution, unprecedented in scale and cruelty, for the confession of the name of Christ, cherish the opportunity to live according to the norms of faith. In this connection, the supreme authority of the Russian Orthodox Church has conducted a not unsuccessful dialogue with the authorities concerning these matters, informing the church people about the progress and results of this dialogue.

In many questions the authorities have already met the wishes of the faithful. It is important that in future too all the measures in this delicate area should be made transparent and taken under a strict public control. Addressing the authorities in the countries with a predominant Russian Orthodox flock, the Holy Synod expressed some wishes which, if met, could remove the existing concern and help to avoid putting on trial the traditional loyalty of Orthodox Christians to civil statutes.

The Synod referred in particular to the danger of collecting and keeping information about people’s private life, especially their religious and political preferences, health, contacts, travel, etc.

Especially unwarrantable is the distance identification of people without their knowledge, especially in places where they are not obliged to introduce themselves.

Every individual should know what kind of information about him is contained in his ‘electronic dossier and have an opportunity to exclude irrelevant information from it. The list of collected and preserved data, in the Church’s opinion, should be clearly defined and made public.

It is important that the personal electronic identification and accounting system should be developed transparently and under the public control and the motivation for it should be clearly explained and the meaning of the symbols used in it expounded.

It is necessary to define clearly and exhaustively the list of the authorities having access to the databases, to take measures for protecting personal information and to increase liability for its illegal use.

Identification devices should not do harm to people’s health, humiliate their honor and dignity. The varieties of the devises inseparable from a human body appear unacceptable.

It is inadmissible that these accounting systems should give people certain numbers to be used instead of names. Just as a passport number, an accounting number can refer to a document or a record in a database, not an individual.

Finally, and most importantly, it is inadmissible that people who for various reasons refuse to participate in the new identification system should be marginalized, disfranchised, subjected to discrimination in employment and distribution of social aid, etc. These citizens should be offered an alternative enabling them to live a full life in society, to exercise their rights and freedoms and to enjoy lawful benefits regardless of a particular form of their personal identification.

Orthodox Christians are urged to remember that acceptance or non-acceptance of new identification papers, including those containing electronic information on the natural characteristics of human body, should not become a ground for mutual denunciation, for sowing discord and division in the Church.

The millennium-long experience of life in Christ shows that the Lord safeguards the inner freedom of a Christian wherever he or she may be, for ‘the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty’ (2 Cor. 3:17)