Freedom for an Old Believer

Book excerpt: Review by Margaret McKibben: Paul J. Wigowsky, a Russian-speaking schoolteacher with many years experience teaching Russian Old Believer children, has put together an extensive site describing Old Believer faith, history and traditional ways. This is the place to start: http://wigowsky.com/products.html The same school teacher who put together the website "Collection of Old Believer History and Traditions" (see above) also wrote a novel which describes the adventures of an Old Believer family fleeing from China to South America to Oregon. This novel, Freedom For an Old Believer, recounts the adventures of a fictional Old Believer couple, Ivan and Masha Bogolubov. The couple leaves rural China in the late 1950s and immigrates to Brazil. In 1962, they emigrate from Brazil to Oregon, where the husband dies years later in the eruption of Mt. St. Helens. The author goes to great lengths to portray Old Believer life, including much historical background and many details of their customs and beliefs. Most of the incidents are drawn directly from the real-life experiences of the Oregon community. Other material (expositions of dogma, folk tales, and religious stories) are drawn from secondary sources.