On 5 November MEPhI hosted the III International Research Conference titled the Theology in Research and Education Environment: Religion, Culture, Education. Saratov State University was represented by its Rector, Professor Aleksei N. Chumachenko; Dean of the Faculty of Philosophy, Chair of the Department of Theology and Religion Studies Michael O. Orlov, and the students of the Faculty of Philosophy.

It has become traditional for the Research and Educational Theological Association to organise the annual international conference. Aleksei Chumachenko took part in the Plenary Session, where the new university members of the association were given the certificates. Saratov University was one of the first universities which joined it in 2018 when the association was established.

At the meeting the event hosts read the welcoming addressed from President of Russia Vladimir Putin and His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia. The audience listened to the reports delivered by Metropolitan Hilarion, Rector of the Ss Cyril and Methodius Institute of Post-Graduate Studies; Michael N. Strikhanov, Rector of National Research Nuclear University MEPhI; Vladimir M. Filippov, Chair of the Higher Attestation Commission of the Ministry of Science and of Higher Education of the Russian Federation, Rector of RUDN University.

The conference consisted of research sessions, and one of them, namely the Issues of Professional Theological Education: Content and Methods session, started with the report of Michael Orlov devoted to pedagogical and methodological aspects of Bible course teaching and the role of digital sphere in theological education.  

Following the materials of the Faculty of Philosophy