Flight to Freedom

A hardy band of 82 Russian-speaking wanderers who call themselves "Old Believers," the men in flowing beards and the women in bright peasant dresses, were sailing last week on the latest leg of a religious odyssey that has taken them halfway round the world. Behind them lay 300 years of persecution, an exodus from Russia across Asia, a bitter exile in Communist China. Ahead was a free, pioneering life in the forests of Brazil.

The tiny but tough sect got its start in 1653 with a group of fundamentalists in the Russian Orthodox Church. They balked at such reforms as modernizing their ancient Slavonic liturgical books and using three fingers (signifying the Holy Trinity) when crossing themselves. Old Believers stuck by two fingers (signifying the dual nature of Christ) and other old traditions. Excommunicated, they set up their own church organization to keep track of births and deaths. They married only within their small fold, lived in isolated farm colonies where they produced their own food, clothing and shelter. Their descendants still scorn doctors, and live robustly to old age; they faithfully fast every Wednesday and Friday, shun tobacco, alcohol, coffee and tea.

The Old Believers irked Czars and Communists alike. They were hounded constantly, finally fled to Manchuria's Three Rivers Valley near Harbin in the late 1920s. There they lived peacefully until 1945, farming and hunting tiger and boar. Then the Soviet army marched in to occupy the area, threw 300 of the menfolk into slave labor camps. In 1952 the Chinese Communists, who had taken over, promised the sect a chance to migrate to Paraguay. The Old Believers sold their hunting rifles and farms, only to have the Communist government go back on its promise. But last year Peking finally softened, let 526 Old Believers leave for Hong Kong.

To their rescue came generous sponsors: the 27-nation Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration, which is paying their way to South America, and the Protestants' World Council of Churches, which found and bought their Brazilian refuge. The site: 6,000 acres of rich pineland, 10% cleared, about 200 miles southwest of Sao Paulo. Led by 74-year-old Starik (Elder) Antonov Kulikov, the first contingent of Old Believers picked up 64 tons of seed, fertilizer, tools and clothing in Los Angeles from U.S. Protestants before sailing for Brazil.

The 444 left in Hong Kong (about 1,055 remain in Communist China) are waiting and praying to follow them. After months of citified idleness, they itch to get back to felling trees, building houses, tilling the soil--and to go on worshiping in their own way. "We don't want to travel any more," says Elder Kulikov. "We never want to see Soviet Russia again. All we want is peace and hard work."

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