TENSIONS between Church and State in Armenia have intensified, culminating in the arrest of two bishops of the Armenian Apostolic Church, who are now facing allegations of terrorism and plotting to overthrow the government.
Armenian security forces detained Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, who is the Primate (Arachnort) of the diocese of Tavush on Wednesday, along with 13 other individuals who “had planned to carry out terrorist acts and actions aimed at seizing power in the Republic of Armenia”, according to the news agency News.am.
The Archbishop is the leader of an opposition movement (Sacred Struggle), which has been trying to topple the current government, led by the Prime Minister, Nikol Pashinyan, since 2018.
The Investigative Committee of Armenia accuses the Archbishop and the rest of the group of planning a series of terrorist attacks in and around the capital, Yerevan, and that the group has managed to recruit hundreds of people, mostly former military and police personnel.
The Armenian Church has defended Archbishop Galstanyan, who, it says, has been arrested for “political reasons”, and said that the case against him was part of the “anti-church campaign initiated by the authorities”.
“The fact that from the very beginning, the Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia and various representatives of the ruling party have been trying to direct law-enforcement bodies through various publications for obvious political reasons does not inspire confidence in the legal process,” the Supreme Spiritual Council of the Armenian Church has stated.
The Primate’s arrest follows the 2023 Armenian military defeat in Nagorno Karabakh, a disputed land region with neighbouring Azerbaijan. The Archbishop led protests against what was seen as conceding land to Azerbaijan.
Tensions further escalated two days later, when security forces attempted to detain another senior cleric, Archbishop Mikael Ajapahyan, Primate (Arachnort) of the diocese of Shirak, who at the time was attending a meeting at the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin — the seat of the Armenian Apostolic Church.
The authorities have initiated an investigation into the Primate for allegedly making calls to overthrow Armenia’s constitutional order, more than a year ago.
Initially, the security forces could not reach him owing to resistance from the gathered crowds defending him, which resulted in a scuffle; but he later voluntarily approached the state authorities. The Armenian Church called the use of force by the security-service officers at the site “condemnable and unacceptable”.
Archbishop Ajapahyan denied all charges against him as false and “absolutely illegal”, asserting that the threat to Armenia is “sitting in the government”.
“I have never hidden, and I am not going to hide now. I do not want to create the impression of hiding behind my brethren. They came after me, I will go,” the Archbishop has said, as quoted by Radio Free Europe (RFERL).
The Catholicos of All Armenians, Karekin II, was near by during the stand-off between the police and the group of believers.
The growing animosity between Church and State has taken a further turn as the Prime Minister alleged that Catholicos Karekin had been asked if he had dishonoured his vows of celibacy and had a child. The Prime Minister also called for a new church leader.
In response, Catholicos Karekin suggested that Mr Pashinyan was directly undermining the nation’s spiritual unity. Some interpret this as an effort to weaken Mr Pashinyan’s premiership.
But the public confrontation took a different turn when an aide close to the Catholicos questioned the Prime Minister’s faith, as a professed adherent of the Oriental Orthodox Armenian Church, by suggesting that he was circumcised and not a true Christian. The Prime Minister declared his readiness to accept the challenge and provide evidence that he was not circumcised.
The Armenian Apostolic Church is the most influential religious organisation in the country: more than 90 per cent identify with it. The Armenians are said to have been the first nation to adopt Christianity as a state religion, c.300.
Before the arrests of senior clergy, authorities detained Samvel Karapetyan, a dual Russian-Armenian national and a billionaire, widely regarded as a key financial supporter of the Armenian Church. Mr Karapetyan had been vocal in defending the Church after the clash over the Catholicos’s alleged breach of celibacy; he was also detained on charges of plotting a coup.
A representative of the Russian Orthodox Church, Archpriest Nikolai Balashov, an adviser to Patriarch Kirill, expressed his solidarity with Armenian believers, strongly condemning Armenian state officials’ recent interference in church affairs with “gross insults” that evoked feelings “of shame and indignation”.
“Attempts at brazen interference by representatives of the secular authorities in the internal life of the most important national spiritual institution with a centuries-old history are unacceptable and deserve condemnation,” Archpriest Balashov said.
In the Armenian Church, a Primate (Arachnord) is the head of a diocese, and Archbishop is an honorific title conferred by the Church’s chief pastor, the Catholicos.
