Since 3 April 2024, he has been a Protodeacon of the Church of Constantinople (since July 2024, a clergyman of the Exarchate of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Lithuania [ru]).

[11] By Kuraev's own admission, his conversion to faith was influenced by his acquaintance with the works of Fyodor Dostoevsky in his third year at university, and in particular with the novel The Brothers Karamazov and the "legend of the Grand Inquisitor" included in it.

[15] According to some sources, from September 1990 to 1992 he was the official press secretary and speechwriter of Patriarch Alexy II of Moscow.

[22] A similar, and even more intense, discussion occurred after Kuraev commented on the ethnic and religious background of the Tsarnaev brothers, the masterminds behind the Boston Marathon bombing in April 2013.

"[24] In 2006, Kuraev succeeded in organizing anti-Madonna's Confessions Tour concert protests with the slogan "Madonna", go home!".

[28] In 2019, Kuraev, a vivid Russian rock fan,[29] said Wikipedia was his source of knowledge about the entertainer: "It's written in there that she was inserting a crucifix into her vagina and masturbated with it during her concerts.

[32] On 5 April 2009, during the liturgy in Saint Isaac's Cathedral, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow elevated Kuraev to the rank of protodeaconProtodeacon[a] and awarded him a double orarion and kamilavka for his active missionary service and work with youth.

"[41][42] Kuraev was outraged by the dismissal and linked it to his posts in LiveJournal about the homosexual scandal at the Kazan Theological Seminary and his disagreement with the criminal prosecution and imprisonment of the members of the Pussy Riot group.

[10][51][52] On 29 April 2020, Kuraev was banned from serving by Patriarch Kirill for insulting the memory of the late rector of the Yelokhovo Cathedral, Archpriest Alexander Ageikin.

The court decided to recognize "him as subject to defrocking," while specifically noting that "the decision to defrock Protodeacon Andrei Kuraev will come into force if it is approved by the ruling bishop of Moscow - the Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus', and before that, within the established time period, it can be appealed" in the General Church Court of Second Instance.

[56] On 4 March 2021, the Moscow Diocesan Court, "having examined the petition received from Archdeacon Andrey Kuraev to review case No.

50-54-2020 ... found no reason for such a review and confirmed the previously adopted decision," stating that it "may be appealed to the General Church Court of Second Instance.

[60] On 28 April 2023, the text of the patriarchal decree on the defrocking of Archdeacon Andrey Kuraev appeared on the official website of the Diocese of Moscow.

"[70] On 23 July 2024, Kuraev was accepted into the clergy of the Exarchate of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Lithuania [ru], in accordance with the submitted petition.

[72] On 29 June 2009, by order of Patriarch Kirill, Archdeacon Andrei Kuraev was appointed chairman of the editorial board for writing the textbook Fundamentals of Orthodox Culture for secondary schools.

published in the journal Blagodatny Ogon' [ru] (2004), Kuraev quoted at length the texts of the excommunication letters against Greek revolutionaries signed at the end of March 1821 by Ecumenical Patriarch Gregory V of Constantinople, and pointed out that already at the end of that century the Greeks perceived him not as a traitor, but as a martyr.

In Egypt, Antioch, Palestine, Serbia, Bulgaria - who knows about their one and a half thousand year experience of church life in captivity?

A secular person could say here: "In Sergius, the age-old servile policy of the Orthodox Church in relation to the authorities continued."

No, they began to erect monuments to him already at the end of the 19th century...[76]After Nikolai Selishchev had made repeated appeals to the priests of the Metropolitan chanceries and Father Eleutherios Hatzis, one of the oldest hierarchs of the Greek Church, Metropolitan Panteleimon (Karanikolas) of Corinth, who was then the chairman of the Synodal Committee on Dogmatic and Canonical Issues, spoke out against Kuraev's position.

It makes no sense for the Orthodox to indulge the social fashion for irrationalism (any irrationalism will ultimately work in favor of occultism and against the Church).<…> Thus, unlike paganism, which demonizes matter, and Protestantism, which deprives the created world of the right to co-creation, Orthodoxy has no basis for denying the thesis that the Creator created matter capable of beneficial development.

Both, of course, exist (although modern ecology says that species cooperate rather than fight, and Darwin was too hasty in transferring the morals of early capitalist society to nature).

After all, in "neo-Darwinism," the theory of evolution looks like this: if you punch a black-and-white "Gorizont" for a long time, it will eventually become a color "Panasonic."

[83][84] According to Andrei Kuraev, the "blue lobby" since Soviet times, with the help of the KGB, and then independently, managed to advance 40% (about 40 people) of "homo-hierarchs" from the lowest church levels to the episcopate, while many of the rest cover for them.

"[88] In 2012, during The MDNA Tour, after Madonna announced her intention to speak out in support of homosexuals at her concert in St. Petersburg, Kuraev called on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs not to grant the artist an entry visa, and also jokingly asked those who disagreed to report a bomb planted at the stadium.

[89] Although the concerts of that tour took place, the St. Petersburg trial against the singer ended in the plaintiffs' favor, which disappointed the archdeacon: "It would be good to take a fine from her, and I am amazed by the weakness of our authorities.

[97] On 2 May, Gazeta.Ru published an interview with Kuraev, in which he expressed the opinion that "the annexation of Crimea gave rise to the spread of Russophobic sentiments throughout Ukraine.

[103] In 2006, the Catholic Church in Poland awarded Kuraev the St. Albert Chmielewski Medal "for many years of missionary and evangelistic activity in the territory of the CIS member countries.

"[104] On 30 January 2007, Metropolitan Volodymyr Sabodan of Kyiv and All Ukraine awarded Kuraev the Order of Nestor the Chronicler, 3rd degree, "For services to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and in recognition of his many years of missionary and educational work aimed at preaching Orthodoxy and opposing schisms and sects.

[106] In 2012, Kuraev was awarded the medal of the Russian Orthodox Church "In Memory of the 200th Anniversary of Victory in the Patriotic War of 1812.