The characteristics of autocracy and a type of monolithic, state-sponsored orthodoxy were deeply ingrained, and they continue on even into the present totalitarian regime. This in particular presents a barrier to Western sympathy, which has been conditioned by liberal and democratic revolutions and our current pluralism. Of course, to point out this grimmer side of Muscovite Orthodoxy takes nothing away from those examples of deep Christian spirituality that interlace Russian history and literature.