The Katechon and Moscow as Third Rome : Visual analysis of Russia's religious soft power in Greece

Abstract: The symphonic relationship between the Russian state and the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC), a mission conceived as entrusted by God to coordinate their contributions to the society, provides the Russian state with a moral framework and the ROC with the possibility to confirm her spiritual role for the establishment of a Russian Orthodox world. This vision of a new Russian world helps the ROC expand her canonical borders to amend for the fragmentation of the pastoral community after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The category of Orthodox businessmen represents a precious support for creating an influential network of activities of (apparently) cultural and religious content well outside of the post-Soviet territory. This also applies to Greece, given the two countries` historical and religious boundaries. This study will show how political messages can be successfully transferred through images depicting the religious soft power activities of Russian-Greek businessman Ivan Savvidis by analyzing the data through the methods of Visual Grammar. This study found that, by exploiting his Pontic identity and certain cultural values extrapolated through the Visual Grammar to attract the Russian-Greek diaspora in Northern Greece, Ivan Savvidis manages to convey the image of Russia as savior and protector of the Orthodox world, therefore showing the great potential of visuality in Russian religious soft power activities.