Abstract: The institution of superficiality originated in Ancient Rome and exists in various models today in the legal systems of many countries, which proves the high value and universality of this legal structure. He was analyzed as classics of the law of the past centuries, and there are modern leading civilists. However, as our research has shown, not all the achievements of foreign specialists in the field of civil law are available to domestic theorists. This is explained both by the significant amount of accumulated information itself and by the difficulty of choosing it when preparing specific scientific publications. The author understands the monumentality of the raised problem and sought to focus on those aspects of it that other Russian scientists do not always pay attention to in their publications. The novelty of the undertaken research is the introduction into the domestic scientific circulation of modern English-language publications on the legal regulation of superficies in the countries of Eastern and Central Europe and Japan. The relevance of the article is seen in an attempt to use the examples of foreign legislation to assess the prospects for using this concept to improve Russian legislation.
In addition to the formal legal method, which is traditionally the main tool for the author, the comparative legal method, typology and classification were used in the preparation of the article. The object of the study is legal relations mediated by the institute of superficies. The subject of the study is the legislative acts of modern foreign states and the norms of law governing super-official relations in earlier historical periods.

Abstract: The object of the study is the state-confessional relations in Russia at the present stage. The subject of the research is state (secular) legal acts regulating the legal status of religious organizations, the norms of canonical (church) law, as well as the works of Professor A. S. Smykalin, in which the scientist explores the stated topics and gives a legal assessment of both public relations in which the state and religious organizations interact, and intra-church legal phenomena (internal the institutions of religious organizations). In preparing the work, the author sought to follow the principles of scientific objectivity and consistency, primarily using the formal legal method in analyzing the norms of secular legislation and the comparative method in comparing secular legislation and canonical (ecclesiastical) law. Since a significant part of the professor's work is interdisciplinary (at the intersection of jurisprudence and history), historical and functional methods of cognition were also used. The scientific novelty of the undertaken research is the theoretical understanding of modern state-confessional relations through the prism of the works of Professor A. S. Smykalin. The reference ad deliberandum ("to reflection") in the title of the article is made in order to formulate the author's opinion on particular issues. The author considered it possible not to limit himself to references to the research results of a prominent scientist, but also to express his own point of view on the phenomena under consideration, focusing on the most problematic points.

Abstract: The subject of the study is the use of the definition of "sect", which is absent in federal legislation, in relation to religious organizations registered in accordance with the established procedure in the legal acts of the Central Federal District. The object of the research is scientific articles by foreign and domestic scientists on the subject, legal acts of the Central Federal District. The author examines in detail modern scientific and theoretical research in the field of destructive religiosity and a vast array of legal acts in which the term "sect" is used. Particular attention is paid to hypothetical problems that can lead to broad discretion of subjects endowed with public powers when trying to introduce rather religious, sociological (and often just everyday) term "sect" into legal discourse. Methodological basis of the research: analysis, synthesis, formal-logical and comparative-legal methods in their systemic interrelation, as well as the consistent practical experience of the author of the article as a teacher of religious studies, and an employee of one of the executive authorities of Primorsky Krai.
The main conclusions of the study are the statement of the unsatisfactory experience of the implementation of the term "sect" in the legal field of the subjects of the Russian Federation included in the Central Federal District; the formulation of recommendations to eliminate these shortcomings of legal regulation.
The author's special contribution to the study of the applicable conceptual apparatus is that there are practically no similar studies in the scientific legal literature. Representatives of other humanities disciplines use this term as a matter of course, but their ideas are speculative, very poorly correlated with legal reality. In a state governed by the rule of law, it is hardly justified to arbitrarily label "sect" on various religious organizations, even relatively small ones.

Abstract: The object of this scientific research is state-confessional relations at the federal and regional levels, as well as the relationship between local governments and religious organizations and law enforcement practice. Sects and cults can be studied from the point of view of sociology, history, religious studies, psychology. But if such a phenomenon as sects and cults is present in public life, it must also be properly regulated by legal norms.
The subject of the study is regulatory legal acts of the Russian Federation and the subjects of the Russian Federation, as well as municipal legal acts regulating various aspects of the activities of religious organizations. Since 1997, the Federal Law "On Freedom of Conscience and on Religious Associations" (hereinafter – Federal Law No. 125-FZ) has been in force in Russia. If we analyze the legislation that regulates public relations in the sphere of the realization of the right to freedom of conscience and freedom of religion, as well as the legal status of religious organizations, then, in our opinion, one of the problems that, despite its undoubted relevance, has not received due attention from the domestic legislator to date, is the problem of the use of terms "(totalitarian) sect", "(destructive) cult". Along with the formal legal method, such methods of scientific cognition as induction, deduction, hypothesis, analogy were used in the preparation of the study. In addition, typology, classification and systematization were used as auxiliary methods.The scientific novelty of the research is a comprehensive analysis of the legal regulation of the activities of "new religious organizations", synonymous with the concepts of "(totalitarian) sect", "(destructive) cult" in everyday life, and sometimes in normative legal acts. As the main result of the research undertaken, the author suggests specific measures for both point-by-point changes in the current legislation and complex changes in the model of state-confessional relations as a whole.