Orthodoxy in the era of COVIID-19: using the example of social networks of executive authorities in the Northwestern Federal District (Russia)

Kovalenko Vladimir Dmitrievich ORCID: 0000-0003-4260-8877 Postgraduate student of the Faculty of Sociology of St. Petersburg State University ; Senior Lecturer of the North-Western Institute of Management of the Russian Academy of National Economy 199034, Russia, Saint Petersburg, Universitetskaya nab., 7/9 vl.workvl@yandex.ru Other publications by this author

Introduction:One of the phenomena that has rebuilt modern communication practices and public institutions has been the emergence and spread of the Internet and digital media. The very process of changes in society under the influence of new media is denoted by the term "mediatization", which has already become an international term ^[1]. A full–fledged theory of the study of mediatization took shape in sociology relatively recently - in the 2000s, but is now widespread among specialists in this field. In the modern theory of mediatization, it is customary to distinguish four approaches — cultural, institutional, socio-constructivist ^[2] and figurative.

Danish sociologist Stig Hjarward defined the process of mediatization through the prism of transformation of public institutions under the influence of the media institute. He formulated a framework question for the direction; how do media, culture and popular culture in general transform existing phenomena and begin to perform collective functions in society that were previously performed by other institutions ^[3]? This premise became the basis for the formation of an institutional approach to the study of mediatization.

Scientific development of the topic: Considering the problems of this article from the point of view of modern sociological discourse, it is important to note that the mediatization of Orthodoxy is a subsection of the study of the mediatization of religion, which, in turn, is a sub—topic in the research of mediatization as a social global meta-process. The domestic sociological field of mediatized Orthodoxy is small and has been formed relatively recently – the first work opening this topic can be considered the dissertation "The Internet in the information and communication activities of religious organizations in Russia" (2009) ^[4] by church journalist, candidate of Philological sciences Ksenia Valeryevna Luchenko.

At the moment, specialists such as Elena Alexandrovna Ostrovskaya, Evgenia Evgenievna Zhukovskaya, Viktor Mikhailovich Khrul and others are working on the topic of mediatization of Orthodoxy. According to some research results, the process of mediatization of Orthodoxy is not homogeneous, several stages can be distinguished in it. Sociologist and church media manager Evgenia Evgenievna Zhukovskaya offers a two-part classification of stages based on their correlation with managerial changes in the church's media strategy ^[5]. The distinctive features of the first stage are the formation of specialized departments and a change in the interpretation of interaction with the media in the main texts of the ROC. The second stage is associated with scaling management decisions made earlier to the grassroots level. The second stage is also connected with the creation of specialized departments in dioceses that interact with the media.

In the dissertation work of media researcher and philologist Viktor Mikhailovich Khrul, important trends in the process of mediatization related to the conservatism of religious media are described and analyzed ^[6]. However, Viktor Khrul's research does not describe the conceptualization of the mediatization process, nor does it describe its stages.

The Russian sociologist Elena Alexandrovna Ostrovskaya interpreted the "case of Hieromonk Photius" as the starting point for the formation of a mediatized Orthodoxy, mastering secular secular public spaces for its mission beyond the prescribed boundaries of sacred territories ^{[7, p. 303]}. The mediatization of Orthodoxy and, more broadly, the problems of the mediatization of religion raise the question of the actualization of other conceptual solutions and applied sociological research. According to Ostrovskaya's model, Orthodoxy passed through three stages during mediatization. At the first stage, Orthodoxy borrowed secular ways of communication. At the second stage, it entered the public sphere, which coincided with social changes in Russia itself. The third stage correlates with the expansion of the use of digital media and the penetration of the largest religion in Russia into the secular field ^{[7, p. 309]}.

Despite the growing interest in the topic, the number of works still remains small. In general, the consensus thesis of the research authors is that the mediatization of Orthodoxy and, more broadly, the problems of the mediatization of religion require new conceptual solutions and new research that could expand the scope of the concept of mediatization. In the context of the study of Orthodoxy, a certain step, according to Ostrovskaya, may be the turn of sociological science towards the study of digital Orthodoxy, as well as the creation of a canvas for research on a fundamentally new process of mediatization of religions ^{[7, p. 304]}.

Research methodology: The purpose of our research is to form and propose a model for the application of tools created as part of the study of the process of mediatization to the study of state-confessional relations. We are interested in analyzing the elements of mediatized Orthodoxy in a specialized segment of the media of the executive authorities of the Northwestern Federal District of the Russian Federation.

The Federal District selected for analysis is not only important from the point of view of infrastructure and economy for the Russian Federation, but also from the point of view of the historical heritage of Russia. Which is associated with a religious tradition, mainly with the tradition of Orthodoxy (the historical, architectural and artistic heritage of many regions, for example, Novgorod, Leningrad region, Pskov, Arkhangelsk and St. Petersburg). At the same time, the capital of the District is a federal citySt. Petersburg has often been the target of conflict situations on the basis of a religious nature (for example, the situation regarding St. Isaac's Cathedral in 2017).

In this regard, a difficult question arises about the dominant religious tradition – Orthodoxy and its place in communication practices. At the present stage, the Russian Orthodox Church, having mastered new media formats, seeks to strengthen its participation in the communicative processes of the entire Russian society.

One of the main recent crisis situations for both Russian and global society has been the coronavirus pandemic and restrictive measures. Executive state authorities played a major role during the restrictions of the COVID-19 era, acting as the main actor in regulating public activities not only of economic and social, but also of religious groups and communities, which caused a mixed reaction in the media ^[8]. However, any state institution acts not only as a limiter of communication in a crisis, its task is also to support functional communication in society, including in the field of religion.

The research methodology is based on the institutional approach of mediatization authored by Stig Hjarward. It was in the institutional approach (earlier than in a number of others – cultural, socio-constructivist and figurative) that the tools for analyzing the process of mediatization of religion were created. This distinguishes the institutional direction from the rest, formed more as a way of thinking about society.

Before moving on to the empirical part, we decided to separately describe the tools of the institutional approach in relation to the mediatization of religion. To characterize the mediatization of religion, Hjarward uses the achievements of the American media researcher Joshua Meyrowitz, defining media in three categories as conduits, languages and environments ^[9]. In the first case, the emphasis is on increasing the importance of the media as the main source of information on religious issues. However, the media distribute religious texts and practices in a modified form, combine fragments of the institutional narrative, mixing it with elements of folklore and civil religions.

In the second case, it is taken into account that the media not only create and disseminate religious motifs, but also transform them under the influence of popular culture. This not only leads to a change in the original religious meanings, but also to the possibility of spreading them in new ways. Understanding media as an environment involves focusing on changing the social relations of communities and the role they play in the public field. Hjarvard emphasizes that the media take over some of the functions previously performed by religious institutions.

In conjunction with the three forms of media understanding, three forms of mediatized religion are formulated as a way to change its public representation; religious media, journalism about religion and banal religion. Religious media are media organizations and media practices created and managed by religious entities. Hjarward notes that the first form is a less mediatized form of religion, compared to the other two. This is due to the fact that religious organizations have a greater degree of control over the communication process. They are forced to adapt to the logic of the media in various ways, which not only changes the form and content of communication, but also affects the idea of the legitimacy of actors. Once in the public media sphere, religious media are judged by the same standards as other media, being able to use technologies and genres in a way that suits them.

The next type is journalism about religion. From an institutional perspective, both religion and journalism are institutions with their own internal logics. Both institutions appeal to society in an effort to influence its worldview. For a long time, it was journalism, as a secular institution, that had the legitimized right to cover religious issues ^{[10, p. 51]}. But the growing influence of religion in the public sphere indicates a redistribution of roles in the process of defining and framing religion. Hjarward notes that one way or another, journalism is involved in the production of social facts, because as an institution it promotes interpretations of moral assessments, as well as participates in shaping the agenda.

Hjarward uses the framework of the Australian cultural critic John Hartley ^[11] about the rootedness of journalism in popular culture and about market orientation. Hjarward says that journalism about religion is capable of pursuing goals like sensationalism ^{[10, p. 50]}.Journalism controls such a significant practice as public representation, therefore social actors are obliged to adapt to its requirements, which means they meet the criteria of news value, act as a source of information, and so on [Ibid.]. At the same time, journalism about religion limits the ability of religious actors to frame religious issues independently in the public sphere. The author points out that journalism adheres to secular values, therefore it uses the tool of "modernization" of religion in the sense of an attempt to expose and correct behavioral practices.

The concept of "banal religion" was borrowed from the work of the British social thinker Michael Billing ^[12]. "Banal religion" is the presence of various symbols and actions in the media that can implicitly enhance the public presence of religion in culture and society ^{[10, p. 65]}. However, banal religion transforms the original religious ideas, demonstrating religious intentions in other contexts. Hjarward cites as an example a series of Harry Potter books with a secular narrative structure, which simultaneously has a large number of quasi-religious elements, like magic. Elements of banal religion lead to the preservation of the presence of religion in the secular world, but do not contribute to the strengthening of a specific religious belief ^{[10, p. 63]}. Hjarward notes that banal religion is a form of religion that can exist in any human society ^{[10, p. 66]}.

Banal religion relies on basic cognitive mechanisms capable of endowing the phenomena of social life with human-like features and subjectivity ^{[10, p. 67]}. It is the elements of a banal religion that are the foundation for any kind of institutionalized religion, but it does not contain a complex system of moral precepts or patterns of behavior. Based on this, Hjard defines that banal religion is a bricolage of ideas borrowed from differentiated sources that include religious texts, as well as elements of institutionalized religion. It incorporates both various rituals and symbols borrowed from institutional religions, as well as elements of folk religious beliefs. These elements move into different contexts and serve different purposes than those of established religious organizations.

Journalism about religion, in turn, is able to actualize certain forms of banal religion in covering the activities of religious organizations. The spread of this form of mediatized religion is mainly due to the replication of works of art in the media. Hjarvard adds an analysis of the work of Danish media researcher Lyne Petersen ^[9], that banal religious representations in the narrative play the role of carriers of religious imagination due to the secularity of society, demonstrating this by the example of Danish society.

Both banal religion and journalism are capable of criticizing institutional religion. However, the former is more open to religious, spiritual and magical influences. Hjarward notes that the presence of religion in the public media sphere is not synonymous with a general religious revival, and the achievement of a wide presence of institutional religion in public media and its low support at the private level are not necessarily paradoxical, the process of mediatization itself is multidirectional. It may include conflicting directions; on the one hand, the spread of secular values, and on the other, the creation of new religious ideas.

Research methods: Moving from the theoretical and methodological block of the article to the empirical part, it should be noted that the media of authorities in social networks have a specific character, since the content in them is carefully selected and edited. This increases the research interest in the elements of mediatized Orthodoxy in them. If public media and media are aimed at increasing the diversity of their content or increasing the reach of the audience, competing with each other for consumer attention, then the media of the authorities have rather a manifesting function, starting from which other actors can form their own agenda. This is due to the fact that the media of the executive authorities have no competitors within their own country or region, since in conditions of political stability, the source of state regional power in a certain territory is always the same.

In the empirical part of the study, we focus on congratulations or mentions of Orthodox holidays in the media of the executive authorities of the subjects of the Northwestern Federal District, since we proceed from the thesis that such categories are a manifestation of banal religion. The content of this communicative practice in the media varies greatly – congratulations and mentions of religious holidays can be both compliance with protocol, formality, and an emphasis on the importance of an event. At the same time, the dominance of certain religious subjects and themes in the media of the authorities may indicate the consolidation of a "banal religion".

The materials presented in the empirical part were collected within the framework of the research project "State and Religion in the North-West: a sociological analysis", conducted on the basis of the RANEPA in 2020. The project was based on a pilot study of state-confessional communication in 5 subjects of the Northwestern Federal District – St. Petersburg, Leningrad Region, Pskov Region, Novgorod Region and Arkhangelsk region.

As part of an empirical study, we were interested in the number of congratulations and mentions of Orthodox holidays on behalf of the accounts of the executive authorities of the subjects of the Russian Federation (members of the Northwestern Federal District) on the official pages of the VKontakte social network. The VKontakte social network was chosen based on the high level of popularity among the Russian population and the fairly large representation of governments and regional governors in it.

Our research was conducted by qualitative content analysis and processed manually. The unit of analysis was the material in the media of the regional executive authorities (governor and government) dedicated to congratulations on a religious holiday or mention of a religious holiday or a major religious event.

The object of the study was publications in the media of the social network in the period from 09/01/2019. to 09/01/2020, since this particular period has an eventful completeness, including the main religious holidays. The allocation of such a period provides us with a description of communication practices in the region both before the introduction of restrictions related to coronavirus, during and after their partial abolition.

The content analysis was based on the principles of selecting information-rich cases that are crucial for the purposes of the study. In each of the selected regions, we concentrated on the official pages of the government and the official page of the governor of the subject of the federation on the social network.

Operationalization of conceptual concepts:

Empirical indicators of the primary attention paid to the subjects were:

• type of authority (executive branch);
• the denomination to which the greeting is addressed (Orthodoxy);
• congratulations channel (VKontakte social network);
• the type of message (congratulations on the Orthodox holiday or a mention of the holiday).

Empirical indicators of the primary attention paid to the topic were:

• the presence of media by the authorities on the VKontakte social network;
• the presence of congratulations or mentions in the media;

An empirical indicator of the primary attention to the form and channels of information presentation was:

• the format of a greeting or a mention of a holiday (whether the record is a personal greeting from a statesman, a greeting on behalf of a state institution, or a mention of a holiday);
• the presence of addressing the person of a religious figure in the appeal.

The study used only manifest encoding due to the small amount of data being processed.

The allocation of thematic blocks took place in one stage, and tables were filled in with an indication of the authority, the presence of congratulations, the form of congratulations or mentions.

To classify and interpret the data in all subjects, it was necessary to recode the data array we collected into a single summary table. For this purpose, high-quality content analysis methods were applied for already generated tables in each region under study. In this regard, we were interested in the categories of religious communities being congratulated, the format of congratulations or mentions, the presence of a personalized recipient for congratulations, their number and subject matter.

In the process of collecting information, we divided the structural categories "congratulations" and "mention". Congratulation in this context is crucial for the consolidation of a religious event, as it distinguishes it from everyday space into the category of special from an authoritative socio-political actor – the state (or a representative of one of the branches of government). By design, these objects differ in the presence of an intention in the text related specifically to congratulations.

Such a division requires a visual justification, therefore, we will give here an example of the difference between these categories using the example of the official account of the government of the Novgorod region on the VKontakte social network;

"Merry Christmas!" is the shortest of the forms processed by us, which carries a congratulatory intention;

"Easter service in St. Sophia Cathedral of Veliky Novgorod on 04/18/2020" is one of the forms of mention that does not have a congratulatory message.

The difference in these cases lies in the semantic difference between the two constructions, the mention only indicates the event, without emphasizing the importance for the recipient, without involving him in the space of the holiday, without making the recipient (who may be of another denomination) an accomplice of the festive event.

Congratulations were divided according to the principle of personal and impersonal. In this case, a personal greeting has an indication of a personalized sender. That is, the recipient of the greeting is a specific person in the executive branch of the region, and also has a more official style of writing. The general data for all regions are presented in Table No. 1.

Table No.1 Congratulations on Orthodox holidays in the media authorities, summary table for all regions

Results: The conducted research demonstrates that the methodology created as part of the study of the mediatization of religion can be functionally applied to the topic of state-confessional relations, but not limited to it. Such a study shows that the formation of a canvas of new texts on the topic of mediatization is an extremely urgent modern task for sociologists, as this will provide researchers with more relevant information about the processes taking place in society.

The results demonstrate that communication practices are mediated by the media, including in the religious sphere, but there is no emergence of a "digital religion" — media practices and practices of real space exist in conjunction simultaneously. At the same time, there are elements of mediatized Orthodoxy in the official media of the authorities. In the personalized media of the governors of the subjects there are congratulations on the two most important Orthodox holidays, namely, Christmas and Easter, the third most popular mention and congratulations was the feast of Epiphany. Which was congratulated in the Pskov and Arkhangelsk regions, as well as mentioned in the Leningrad region. Such frequent mention of the feast of the Epiphany, a separate two-hundredth holiday (12 holidays revered in the Orthodox tradition, above which the hierarchs have only Christmas and Easter) is associated with the rooted and very widespread tradition of bathing in the Jordan among the population.

This relatively dangerous practice is becoming the object of attention and control by the state, up to the maintenance of statistics. For example, in 2020, according to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, about 2.4 million people took part in Epiphany bathing, which is an extremely high figure for a fairly specific public practice^[14].

The most popular mentions on social networks were mentions of the feast of the Intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the beginning of Lent, which is an important event in the life of Orthodox Christians, but does not stand out in a separate category of the holiday. Congratulations on social networks were associated with the most important holidays in the Orthodox tradition, that is, Easter and Christmas, as well as the feast of the memory of Saints Peter and Fevronia. The last listed holiday is not one of the main ones in the church canon, but has become consonant with the secular holiday "Day of Family, Love and Fidelity", initiated in 2008.

Conclusions: Summing up, describing the main features of congratulations on Orthodox holidays as an element of banal religion, it should be noted first of all that we can observe a clear prevalence of congratulations dedicated to Orthodox holidays, which have the greatest popularity among the population. These are Christmas (which is a state holiday), Orthodox Easter, Epiphany (the twentieth feast), associated with mass bathing in the Jordan and the memorial day of Saints Peter and Fevronia (associated with the "Day of Family, Love and Fidelity", initiated in 2008). It should be noted that in the media, Easter and Christmas are satellite events, and are almost always present in the form of congratulations or mentions from one actor, despite the fact that Christmas is also a public holiday, and Easter is exclusively a church holiday.

The topics chosen by the authorities for congratulations are not related to the religious canon in terms of the degree of significance of the holidays. Confirmation of the nature of the mediatization of Orthodoxy is that congratulations are made on the occasion of the most popular Orthodox holidays ^[15]. For example, the Epiphany of the Lord is included in the list of the most frequent mentions due to the widespread practice of bathing in ice holes and folk festivals, which necessitates a reaction from the executive branch. And the situation with the introduction of restrictions due to COVID-19 did not affect the congratulations on Orthodox holidays in the media of the authorities in any way.