MOSCOW - Pro-Kremlin lawmakers and nationalist activists joined forces with the Russian Orthodox Church to protest what they see as an encroaching Western expansion led by the United States and the Vatican.
Announcing a nationwide day of protest for Sunday, the group said the Roman Catholic Church's February decision to upgrade its structure in Russia to full-fledged dioceses was part of a series of jabs at Russian statehood.
"Now, we are seeing spiritual expansion," Gennady Raikov, a deputy in the State Duma, the lower house of parliament. "The goal of our protest is to show that the Russian state is able to defend not only its borders, but its spirituality and values," he said Tuesday.
In a statement, Raikov's People's Party and the Union of Orthodox Citizens accused the Catholic Church of attempting to create an insidious "fifth column" in order to destroy Russia from the inside.
The Vatican's decision to elevate its temporary apostolic administrations in Russia to permanent dioceses angered the Russian Orthodox Church, which has long complained that Catholic activity in Russia amounts to poaching souls from the country's traditional church.
Tensions surrounding the Catholic Church in Russia have increased further in recent weeks. On Friday, authorities refused entry to Bishop Jerzy Mazur, a Polish citizen, preventing him from returning to his diocese in Siberia. Two weeks ago, they took away the visa of Rev. Stefano Caprio, who has parishes in central Russia.
Officials have been silent about the reasons behind the two cases. On Tuesday, Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Yakovenko said only that there had been "serious complaints" about Mazur's activities.
On Sunday, as Catholics in the Siberian city of Irkustk prayed for Mazur's return, about 350 people demonstrated outside the cathedral against "Catholic expansion," Russian media reported.
Raikov said the Western encroachment went beyond the Catholic Church.
"There has been a whole chain of events, beginning with the fact that, under the anti-terrorism flag, the United States has established bases in Central Asia and now in Georgia," he said.
He was referring to the United States' use of airfields in former Soviet republics of Central Asia for its military campaign in Afghanistan and of its plans to help train an anti-terrorist force for Georgia, Russia's neighbor to the south.
A spokesman for the Russian Orthodox Church, the Rev. Antony Ilyin, said the church supported Sunday's protests, which organizers said were planned in more than 20 regions and would include both rallies and prayers.
Ilyin said the "ideology of globalization" was trampling on traditional Russian values.
"We are not obligated to think only within the coordinates of a liberal system of values that is alien to us," he said.