Russian Church Leader: Beards Protect From Gayness

The Moscow Times reports:

A religious leader for Russia’s Old Believers has called on Russian men to stop shaving to “protect themselves from homosexuality.” Metropolitan Kornily, Primate of the Russian Orthodox Old Believer Church (RPSC), said that men with beards were less likely “corrupted” by same-sex relationships.

“God set down certain rules. The Lord created everyone with a beard. No man can resist his creator,” Kornily told Russia’s National News Service. “It’s made a monstrous thing to see men’s clothing and hairstyles changing.” Metropolitan Kornily also lamented that the beard’s special status had “completely disappeared from the Catholic West.”

Per Wikipedia, the Old Believers split from the mainline Russian Orthodox Church in 1666 in protest over liturgical reforms. The Old Believers currently have an estimated 800,000 adherents around the world versus 150 million for the Russian Orthodox Church.