On September 14, 1971, the ROCOR Bishops' Council officially adopted a resolution, which implied that the ROCOR was in communion with the "Catacomb Church", but not with the Moscow Patriarchate. This position was criticized by people who directly knew church life in the USSR. Archpriest , who fled the USSR and served 6 years in Soviet camps, noted that Metropolitan Anastasius (Gribanovsky), who headed the ROCOR, and the hierarchs subordinated to him, wanted to live in a myth about the supposedly numerous catacomb Church that existed in Russia, and considered them as doing wishful thinking.
On September 14, 1971, the ROCOR Bishops' Council officially approved a resolution stating that the ROCOR was in communion with the "Catacomb Church," but not with the Moscow Patriarchate. This stance was criticized by individuals who had firsthand knowledge of church life within the USSR. Archpriest, who escaped from the USSR and served six years in Soviet labor camps, observed that Metropolitan Anastasius (Gribanovsky), who led ROCOR, along with his subordinates, sought to live in a fabricated myth about an allegedly substantial Catacomb Church existing in Russia, viewing it as wishful thinking.