Nadezha Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina were arrested last week after Pussy Riot's five-minute, unannounced appearance inside the monolithic cathedral on Feb. 21. The charge they face carries a sentence of up to seven years in prison.
An Orthodox church official said Wednesday that the church does not support the women being held in detention but that it will not interfere in the activities of the criminal justice system.
"Personally I don't see reasons for holding these women in detention, but what's most important is that everything take place within the confines of the law," said synodal communications department head Vladimir Legoida, Interfax reported.
Legoida added that while the church does not want to see the women receive long prison terms and calls for mercy on them, the pair do not seem to have apologized for what Legoida termed a "vile act."
"Official church representatives have said on multiple occasions that they do not support the idea of a real sentence of punishment in this case, but call for their public censure and the acknowledgment of a crime," he said.
"The church has always called for mercy. And this situation is no exception. But let's not forget: in all this time following the blasphemous and vile act committed by these women, they have not expressed even a hint of remorse," Legoida said, citing interviews with the women in unnamed media outlets.
Joining the calls for Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina's release are prominent activists like Alexei Navalny, who wrote on his blog Tuesday that while he found the band's church performance "idiotic," there are circumstances that make the women's arrest inappropriate — specifically, their having young children at home.
"[There are] two main questions right now: 1. Is their transgression of such a dangerous nature to society that the women need to be held behind bars? Obviously not. [And] 2. Are there circumstances that exclude the accused from being held in detention? Obviously yes," Navalny wrote.
Tolokonnikova is the mother of a four-year-old girl and Alyokhina has a five-year-old son, he wrote.