Copyright © 2024 By Cassandra St. John, an Orthodox Christian
In my last piece, with the hundreds of thousands of war casualties in mind, I aimed anti-war verbiage at the Russians, before launching a broadside at America’s hegemonic war machine and its religious enablers. The piece was about Archbishop Elpidophoros of the Greek Archdiocese, and it included my critiques of his warmongering.
I, your lovely, astute political correspondent, began a brief and salutary anti-war section with these lines:
“I am neither left nor right, and I condemn the Russians for their disgraceful role in the Ukrainian calamity. (I have this habit of reacting poorly to bloodletting, no matter who is doing it.) But let’s be clear: Elpidophoros and Bartholomew serve the U.S. military-industrial complex (MIC).”
Using my column for their manipulative purposes, Charles Bausman and “Russian-Faith.com” removed my references to Russians, disgrace, and bloodletting. They retained my byline but edited the piece without permission, reposted it, and continue to ignore requests to take it down. I hereby christen them “In-Bad-Faith.com.” Frailty, thy name is revision.
Ignominy, thy name is war.
I am philosophically opposed to war. Let me pound my desk, Khrushchev-style, to emphasize the point. I am against arms races. I am aghast at clergy of any type or any nationality enabling the militarists instead of tamping them down — including Orthodox clergy abetting Orthodox militarists in Ukraine. “Holy war,” my foot, Patriarch Kirill and Mr. Putin.
Pugilists and armchair warriors: Put down the guns and listen.
Before you launch explanations of and justifications for this grinding Slavic conflagration, you first should realize that the Russia-Ukraine war represents a fundamental and foreboding shift in the conduct of warfare. Nicholas, the editor of “Orthodox Reflections” and a United States military veteran, explains:
“Air assets can’t be deployed [easily], because air defenses are so good the aircraft are in constant danger. . . . What has now happened is that war is back to attrition. Russia pounds defensive positions with drones and artillery, creeps forward slowly in small units, sometimes brings in armored assets to back up the infantry, takes a defensive line, [and] then rinse and repeat. The results are huge piles of dead bodies and a slow, slow slog.”
Nicholas also urges everyone to abandon outmoded notions of armored vehicles rolling across open terrain or armies winning dramatic battles. Small, agile drones have taken over warfare and have heightened its intensity. Drones make massing troops, breaching defensive positions, and staging sneak attacks extremely difficult because they can go in for the kill and then dodge return fire. This Reuters article confirms Nicholas’ assessments: “How drone combat in Ukraine is changing warfare.”
Nicholas continues:
“Russia is in the process of perfecting [this new style of warfare]. China is learning these lessons. . . . Attritional warfare is deeply immoral, even within the framework of war. You are literally eroding lives on a daily basis. The deaths of the enemy, not the gaining of territory, is the objective. You crush the enemy military so that the enemy must accede to your will. . . . It is World War I all over again. You fight till exhaustion. Only when one side has essentially collapsed will you see big moves.”
Ukrainian soldiers fire artillery toward Russian positions in the southern Kherson region. (RadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty, Marko Ivkov/AP)
So, using each other as target practice, the Russians and the Ukrainians are giving the world a master class in modern attritional warfare. Thanks, “Russian World.”
A pithy saying attributed to Albert Einstein is that after the destruction of World War III the next world war will be fought with sticks and stones. Nicholas echoes that sentiment: “[Adding in missiles], even without the nukes, a major conflict is going to bury millions. With the hypersonic weapons, there is no defense possible. War should be unthinkable.”
I recall the line from President John F. Kennedy’s famous 1963 speech: “I speak of peace because of the new face of war.”
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Nevertheless, America, Ukraine, and Russia are escalating their godforsaken war as I write, stoking fears of a nuclear exchange while also stoking memories of the satirical black comedy “Dr. Strangelove.” In the movie, the character Major T.J. “King” Kong rides a bomb as though astride a bucking bronco, whooping as he and the bomb plummet to Earth and explode. Is that a militarist’s dream come true?
The decades-long, cocky Russian-American rivalry is coming to a head. Power politics are in your face, whether or not you want them. The message from each side is clear: You can’t blow up the world — that’s our job!
Where are the voices of reason? Novaya Gazeta Europe recently reported: “Patriarch Kirill dismisses nuclear fears, arguing Christians don’t fear ‘end of the world.’” The esteemed Russian Orthodox patriarch has demoted himself to the leader of a doomsday cult? Did you have that possibility on your End-Times Bingo Card?
Are tit-for-tat escalations more likely to decrease the world’s howling militarism or to increase it? What will an even more bellicose world look like? Importantly, given the mind-bending warmongering of Kirill & Co. on the one side and Bartholomew & Co. on the other, what will a more bellicose Orthodox Church look like? That is the unkindest cut of all. And even if peace is soon declared in Ukraine, the world’s growing militarism will persist.
“Orthodox Reflections” previously has covered various aspects of American militarism. Following are four recent examples of Russian militarism, each juxtaposed against a piece of sage wisdom about the follies of war. Notice how well the sage wisdom has aged.
- “Since the start of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the Russian military has repeatedly used missiles to blast civilian targets across the country, with devastating consequences” (The Associated Press, 2023).
- “Though war may not, strictly speaking, be an ecclesiastical heresy, one might consider it to be the perpetuation of the iconoclast mindset,” said Metropolitan Tikhon of the OCA in 2022.
Recovered Shahed thermobaric warhead stamped with “TBBCh-50M,” plus “4-24,” which may be the date of manufacture. (Forbes, Ukraine MOD)
- “The Russian defense market is expected to grow significantly due to the ongoing geopolitical and economic crises resulting from wars” (Mordor Intelligence, “Russia Defense Companies, 2024-2029”).
- “War is a racket,” said Smedley Butler in 1935.
- “Russia to produce over 32,000 drones each year by 2030, TASS reports” (Reuters, 2024).
- “War is the health of the State,” said Randolph Bourne in 1918.
- Russian schools “are indoctrinating children with false government-mandated narratives and directly reporting those with dissenting views to the police and security services” (Oleg Kozlovsky of Amnesty International, 2024).
- Men, women, and children are being trained to be “tolerant of war, receptive of war, prepared for war, lovers of war,” said Dorothy Thompson in 1937.
Don’t Tase me, bro. All I am saying is give peace a chance.
War is hell. It is also a big haul. Is the big haul the real reason for the Russia-Ukraine war? U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham has said repeatedly that Ukraine sits atop trillions of dollars of mineral assets that the U.S. wants to keep out of Putin’s grubby, little hands. Et tu, Putin? Is Russia’s use of the term “holy war” congruent with Slavic coreligionists slaughtering one another over mineral-laden real estate? What would an “unholy war” look like?
Have you noticed that every war is now a mini-world war, with everyone aligning one way or the other? And that the wars are queuing up concurrently? Russia versus Ukraine. Israel versus Hamas. Israel versus Iran. China versus Taiwan. The U.S. government clutches its pearls over Russian aggression in Ukraine while simultaneously giving Israel carte blanche to smash Gaza like Godzilla.
Is Ukraine defending itself against an imperial Russia? Or is Russia defending itself against the hegemonic U.S. and its proxy, Ukraine? Or is it a bit of both? Do you care enough to choose a side? What exactly are you choosing besides death and destruction? And the perennial question: Is all warfare, at heart, a racket — a dishonest scheme?
The age of hegemonic global empire is the Age of Insanity. As an American, I am expected not only to pick a side in every war and to argue over the particulars, but also to help pay for the killing. I am expected to approve one thug’s slaughter over another’s. I reject the false choice. Aren’t the rabid, worm-infested dogs of war fighting over rotten carcasses on the edge of an abyss?
I do mean all of the dogs. “Facing Russian threat and an uncertain America,” Europe is investing more money in its own defense. Meanwhile, Germany is “Aiming To Survey National Readiness for Youth Military Service.” Achtung! With the U.S. providing Europe’s defense since the end of World War II, the Continent had a veneer of peace. Now that the Europeans don’t trust the fickle Americans to protect them, they are rearming. All for militarism! Militarism for all!
One might well applaud seeing the effete Europeans manning up. My family already did its bit, sending a great-uncle to fight on D-Day. In June 1944, as a young crack shot, he was among the 34,000 Allied troops who stormed Omaha Beach to help liberate France from the Nazi totalitarians. He ended up a decorated combat veteran, raised a family, and lived to a ripe-old age. If my long lineage of pioneers and cowboys had a motto, it would be: “We Will Fight You on the Beaches — or Anywhere.”
Today’s threats, however, including a seething competition among elite factions to command a totalitarian global government, are insidious. How will the proles beat those threats by fighting unwinnable wars? They won’t. I reject wasting any more of the world’s blood and treasure on unnecessary wars, or on the merchants of death who profit from them. Perhaps more prayer and repentance and less war would help the world.
That message would be nice to hear from Orthodox officialdom, wouldn’t it? Instead, the Russian Church “has ardently propagated the Kremlin’s ideology surrounding the offensive in Ukraine, painting it as a ‘holy war,’” reports The Moscow Times.
Propaganda such as that justifies the government-sponsored killing that war entails, but it is an odd message for the Orthodox Church to promote.
In a short documentary called “The Suspended” (with English subtitles), Fr. Andrei Kordochkin and Fr. Vadim Perminov express their views about the Russian Church’s pro-war stance. Both priests have faced personal upheaval for speaking out against Russian militarism, including being temporarily suspended from their sacerdotal duties.
“There is a lot of religious language, not only from the lips of Church leaders, but also from government ones,” says Fr. Andrei, a Russian emigré priest and academic living in Germany. “They say this is a ‘holy war.’ . . .”
Fr. Andrei continues: “On the part of the state, of course, there is a request to sacralize war. . . . [For a war, the government needs] to make sure that you want to kill and be killed. It is around this that the cult of war, the cult of death, arises within the framework of modern civil religion in Russia.
“That is, in general, it is suggested that this is the best thing that can happen to you. And the state, in general, in this paradigm, does not exist to provide people with decent living conditions. It exists in order to ideologically justify their death in the war for this state, as the best thing that can happen to them. The life option is not considered at all. Obviously, murder cannot be a sacred act. And, therefore, there is no holy war in Christianity, and there cannot be.”
Fr. Vadim concurs. “In my opinion, the Russian Church is now sick in its own way,” he says, alluding to the militarism that has affected the entire society. The priests hope that admitting that lamentable state of affairs publicly will be the first step in helping the Russian Church regain its primary mission of teaching repentance unto salvation.
In March 2022, early in the war in Ukraine, Fr. Andrei coauthored an open letter to the Russian government, calling for an end to the hostilities and offering “a pastoral message calling people to repentance,” he says. Three hundred clergy and scholars signed the letter.
Then came the crackdown. For their audacity to challenge Russian militarism, the priests have faced disciplines ranging from the temporary suspension of duties to imprisonment. Seemingly drawing inspiration from Orwell’s dystopian writing, the Russian Church has banned some of the priests from serving, or has even defrocked them, because they dared to pray for “peace” instead of “victory” in the war. The Mir Vsem (“Peace Unto All”) Foundation, begun by Fr. Andrei, tells the priests’ stories and solicits donations for them.
Aren’t these anti-war priests also serious casualties of the war — and harbingers of the negative effects of militarism?
Who will remember, passing through this Gate,
The unheroic Dead who fed the guns?
Who shall absolve the foulness of their fate,—
Those doomed, conscripted, unvictorious ones?
So begins the poem “On Passing the New Menin Gate” by the British writer Siegfried Sassoon. The poem describes a World War I memorial outside Brussels, Belgium, which is engraved with more than 50,000 names of the British soldiers who fought and died in the area between 1914 and 1917, and whose bodies never were found. They fed an insatiable war machine yet have no graves. A former soldier and one of the war’s fiercest critics, Sassoon denounces the memorial for reducing the men to “intolerably nameless names.” More than 30,000 additional soldiers’ names, from the remainder of the war, are displayed at a nearby cemetery.
All told, approximately 16 million people (soldiers and civilians) died in World War I. “The War to End All Wars” was its catchphrase. In reality, the first two world wars were both civilizational disasters. Now your government, wherever you live, is prepping World War III — and beyond. They covet your youngsters to use as cannon fodder for their wars, which they know will line their pockets and those of their cronies. Will you offer up your young? Have you not an ounce of skepticism — or resistance — yet?
The Primates of Local Churches should call for an end to the war, for the preservation of human lives, for setting aside certain interests in order to stop death and suffering. After all, human life is the most valuable thing on this earth. But we did not hear this from Patriarchs Kirill and Bartholomew. Both support their respective political forces and advocate for their interests.
https://spzh.eu/en/zashhita-very/85152-politics-or-the-gospel-why-do-patriarchs-bless-war-from-both-sides
Faith Protection
https://spzh.eu/en/zashhita-very/84354-prayers-as-toilet-paper-the-critical-mass-of-sacrilege
Prayers as toilet paper: the critical mass of sacrilege
31 January,2025
The incidence of blatant sacrilege by OCU supporters has multiplied to such an extent that it is time to draw conclusions. Both for Ukraine and the Phanar.
Throughout the years of existence of non-canonical denominations in Ukraine, in all contacts and negotiations about possible reunification, representatives of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) insisted on one condition – the repentance of those outside the Church. After all, without repentance, reunification with the Church is impossible. Opponents of the UOC, in response, claimed that these were just idle “wishes” from the UOC, an attempt to humiliate the opponent and excuses aimed at covering up the unwillingness to unite. In dealings with the Patriarchate of Constantinople, UOC representatives also repeatedly explained: both the Gospel, the teachings of the Church Fathers, and the entire history of the Church testify that without repentance, salvation is impossible, and so is reunification with the Church of Christ: “He who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate, but climbs in some other way, is a thief and a robber…” (John 10:1).
In this context, the gate is repentance. Whoever does not enter by it but tries to sneak in another way is a thief and a robber. Ignoring this has always led to bad consequences. But the Phanariots did not heed this simple truth and wanted to drag representatives of schismatic denominations “in some other way”. If repentance changes a person, cleansing them from sin, then the absence of repentance results in a person remaining as they were, infected by sin. And this sin will inevitably come to the surface.
This is exactly what we see today in the actions of OCU supporters. It has been written many times that true believers, Christ’s followers, cannot seize other people’s churches and property, as the supporters of the OCU do. But there is another phenomenon that clearly demonstrates the true face of the OCU. This is the sacrilegious attitude towards sacred objects, texts and images. Unfortunately, these are not isolated incidents; they have accumulated enough for us to draw conclusions.
Wiping with liturgical instructions?
At the end of January 2025, priest Georgiy Izay of the UOC published on his Facebook page a video showing how representatives of the OCU use the UOC’s liturgical instructions, with the order of services in Church Slavonic, as toilet paper.
Texts with prayers, including the name of Christ, the Mother of God and the saints, half-used for corresponding manipulations, are hanging in the toilet near the Trinity Church of the OCU in the village of Krekhaiv, Chernihiv region. Scraps of liturgical texts in Church Slavonic are also lying on the floor near the hole with waste.
Readers will likely ask: how did the OCU get the UOC’s liturgical instructions? The answer is simple – this church used to belong to the UOC community. Father Georgiy Izay, along with the faithful, built this church and decorated it. But one day, the supporters of the OCU took the church for themselves, along with everything inside. And now they have decided “to put it to good use”.
After this news was published on the UOJ website, the press service of the Chernihiv Eparchy of the OCU issued an official statement, denying any involvement in the incident: the toilet is not ours, the Instructions are not ours, and in general, it’s all a provocation aimed at discrediting us. However, these are poor excuses as no matter what toilet the liturgical instructions ended up in, they were taken from the church administered by the OCU. Especially since these texts are in Church Slavonic, which usually causes strong dislike among OCU supporters. This is also evident from the following example.
Is the Bible rubbish?
On 22 April 2023, OCU activists seized the Intercession Church in the village of Trebukhiv, Boryspil Eparchy, cutting off the doors with an angle grinder.
One of the invaders, Yaroslav Bondarenko, started to rummage through the candle box, pulling out Bibles and prayer books and showing them to the camera.
He said the following: “Here’s some rubbish we found. I think we’ll give this book to Bohdana (Drach, a member of the Brovary City Council – Ed.), she’ll utilize it.” He also referred to the prayer books with the Communion liturgy as rubbish. These books featured an image of the Lord Jesus Christ. However, this didn’t bother the OCU supporter – he promised to throw the prayer books in the bin. “Here, the girls found some Katsapian manuals. Complete rubbish, too,” he said. He didn’t even realise how sacrilegious his words and actions were. He posted all of these videos on his Facebook page.
The Bible and the Holy Fathers to the rubbish dump?
On 6 October 2024, a group of raiders from the OCU seized the Nativity of the Most Holy Theotokos Church of the UOC in the village of Novosilky, Kyiv region. Afterward, for an entire week, they took out icons, the Psalter, the Bible, the Gospel, prayer and spiritual books and threw them all onto a heap of rubbish. When the priest of the UOC community, deprived of its church and robbed, asked if he could at least take something, the OCU representatives cynically called a rubbish truck, loaded the icons and books along with the waste into it and drove them away
The Bible, the Word of God, remains the Word of God, no matter what language it is printed in, no matter what country it is published in. An icon remains an icon, no matter where it is made or in what temple it is located. Any believing person understands this very well, no matter what denomination he/she belongs to. But the OCU supporters do not want to understand this.
An altar with the Holy Gifts thrown onto the street?
Here’s another example. On 1 March 2019, OCU raiders seized the Intercession Church in the village of Kurozvany, Hoshcha district, Rivne region.
After that, the UOC community adapted a private house for worship, where they set up an altar and gathered everything necessary for the Liturgy. But on 12 April 2019, OCU activists raided this house, broke down the doors and threw the altar with the seven-branched candlestick and the Holy Gifts onto the street.
“Such was the fate of crosses, vestments and church vessels. The OCU supporters treated sacred items, intended for Eucharistic service, as if they were just ordinary furniture or dishes. This can only mean one thing: they simply have no understanding of the sacred or the holy, no religious consciousness. These people committed acts after which one should not even go, but simply run to confession. But they clearly didn’t see it that way.
Such examples could be continued, and there are plenty more. There are even more latent cases that didn’t make it into the news feeds. But it’s time to draw conclusions.
Conclusions
On 27th January 2025, at the very moment when OCU supporters were wiping their behinds with sacred texts, Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople, speaking at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, declared that the Tomos for the OCU “healed divisions and wounds of centuries”. And regarding the OCU, he said: “The development and maturity of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine demonstrate how solidarity and unity work in practice, not just in theory.”
Despite the brutal seizures of churches, violence, the violation of basic human rights and sacrilege against sacred things, the head of the Phanar continues to voice the narrative that his actions in Ukraine to create the OCU have led to untold blessings, unified everyone and healed “divisions and wounds of centuries”. The glaring discrepancy between these words and reality has already become obvious to everyone.
The question is not why Patriarch Bartholomew is so persistent. That’s clear. In his view, the Patriarchate of Constantinople cannot be wrong in principle, and to admit otherwise would be to tarnish the dignity of the “Throne of Constantine”. The question is: how did it come to this? Why are the people he has favoured and accepted into communion doing such things? Why are they committing sacrilegious acts and blatant lawlessness? Where did “His All-Holiness” make a mistake?
If we look at how the communists treated church relics, we’ll notice similarities to our times. Communist Party activists also threw Bibles in the trash, burnt icons, used them to line the floors of pigsties, and threw altars and iconostases into the street. But they didn’t hide their unbelief in God, their hostility towards Christ. At least they were honest about it.
Now, we see similar actions. But here, the people committing such sacrilege and desecration of sacred things call themselves Orthodox Christians. They are convinced that faith in Christ and desecrating Christ go hand in hand. That throwing a Bible printed in Russian into the trash is a good deed. That wiping themselves with liturgical instructions written in “Moscow” Church Slavonic is akin to a victory over the enemy. And Patriarch Bartholomew, instead of pointing out the inadmissibility of such actions (and thereby guiding them onto the path of truth), on the contrary, affirms them in this unworthy state and praises them as good, developed and mature. Ultimately, it turns out as the prophet Isaiah wrote: “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!” (Isaiah 5:20).
Therefore, we must start by calling things by their proper names, not deceive ourselves, and not lull our conscience with the tales that everything became wonderful in Ukraine after the Tomos. We must call sacrilege – sacrilege, and blasphemy – blasphemy. And then will come the understanding that, without repenting of all this, one cannot enter the Church and become a true Christian.
https://spzh.eu/en/news/84293-in-an-ocu-church-in-krekhaiv-prayers-are-used-as-toilet-paper-video
https://spzh.eu/en/news/83135-in-novosilky-ocu-activists-dispose-of-icons-from-a-seized-church-as-trash
https://spzh.eu/en/news/83073-unknown-individuals-vandalize-uoc-community-house-in-novosilky-again
https://spzh.eu/en/news/73422-ocu-activist-who-seized-church-in-trebukhiv-calls-bible-rubbish
https://spzh.eu/ua/news/73406-u-trebukhovi-rejderi-ptsu-zakhopili-khram-upts
https://spzh.eu/en/news/84317-four-criminal-cases-opened-against-uoc-believers-over-cherkasy-clashes
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/98_Q2sbJuh8
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/J-Pn53drxJU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZU49-1Gyy4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2NvsmiY9rs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYl14PCC-Yk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7cWvrc25Y8
Related:
Debate: “Did the U.S. Provoke Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine?”
https://reason.com/podcast/2025/02/08/did-the-u-s-provoke-russias-invasion-of-ukraine/
Debate on U.S. militarism and military interventions, worth watching:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxdXqAkgOVs
Related:
The wrong hymn sheetHow priests suspended by the Russian Orthodox Church are paying the price for preaching peace
“When this horror is over, people will ask: ‘Where was the church all this time?’ And the historians will say: ‘See, not everybody in the church supported the war.’”
https://novayagazeta.eu/articles/2025/01/24/the-wrong-hymn-sheet-en
The Drone Wars: You Are Not Prepared
https://corbettreport.substack.com/p/the-drone-wars-you-are-not-prepared
This article is a real treasure trove of information. I appreciate the clarity with which you’ve explained complex concepts, and the examples you’ve provided have been incredibly helpful in solidifying my understanding.
Thank you for your feedback. God bless you for being a thinking person — and a civil, clear-eyed commenter.
Call for a Christmas Truce between Ukraine and Russia!
РІЗДВЯНЕ ПЕРЕМИР’Я — УКРАЇНІ ТА РОСІЇ! РОЖДЕСТВЕНСКОЕ ПЕРЕМИРИЕ – УКРАИНЕ И РОССИИ!
https://www.mir-vsem.info/en/post/call-for-a-christmas-truce-between-ukraine-and-russia-%D1%80%D1%96%D0%B7%D0%B4%D0%B2%D1%8F%D0%BD%D0%B5-%D0%BF%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%B5%D0%BC%D0%B8%D1%80-%D1%8F-%D1%83%D0%BA%D1%80%D0%B0%D1%97%D0%BD%D1%96-%D1%82%D0%B0-%D1%80%D0%BE%D1%81%D1%96%D1%97-%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B6%D0%B4%D0%B5%D1%81
I believe a day is coming when leaders will demand their people to fight a war, and the people will refuse. War won’t end, but it will be much harder to justify with average people becoming friends across the globe via the Internet. There is an international culture now based upon 21st century technology that is anti-globalist while having members of all nations.
I agree with all the main points of the article. However, I would refrain from using the Associated Press or Reuters as legitimate news sources. They are deeply corrupt organs of the US/EU security state.
A very long and emotional anti-war report that sadly is dramatically lacking in reality. War is part of the human condition. Saying you want an end to war to preserve life is like asking everyone to hold their breath to preserve oxygen.
A very short and dismissive comment that sadly is dramatically lacking in circumspection, humanity, and decency, à la all tiresome and dulled militarists.
You’re both kind of right. Saying that you want an end to all war is like saying you want an end to Wednesday. You can write about it and protest and pass laws, but eventually there will be another Wednesday.
Aftermath, by Siegfried Sassoon
https://www.best-poems.net/siegfried_sassoon/aftermath.html
Good article, but I did note that neither Kirill or John X position on war were noted. Also found the recent announcement by John X about the collapse of the Asaad regime interesting.
“Where are the voices of reason? Novaya Gazeta Europe recently reported: “Patriarch Kirill dismisses nuclear fears, arguing Christians don’t fear ‘end of the world.’” The esteemed Russian Orthodox patriarch has demoted himself to the leader of a doomsday cult? Did you have that possibility on your End-Times Bingo Card?
Are tit-for-tat escalations more likely to decrease the world’s howling militarism or to increase it? What will an even more bellicose world look like? Importantly, given the mind-bending warmongering of Kirill & Co. on the one side and Bartholomew & Co. on the other, what will a more bellicose Orthodox Church look like? That is the unkindest cut of all. And even if peace is soon declared in Ukraine, the world’s growing militarism will persist.”
You mean, besides Kirill calling it a “holy war”? Which I mentioned several times. Sir, did you read the entire piece?
Where does Kirill call it a holy war, though? I’ve followed the links you provide yourself in this article and the closest I can find is the following Moscow Times quote:
—
The Russian Orthodox Church has ardently propagated the Kremlin’s ideology surrounding the offensive in Ukraine, painting it as a “holy war.” Patriarch Kirill, a longtime ally of President Vladimir Putin, said in the early days of the war that “sacrifice in the course of carrying out your military duty washes away all sins.”
—
Note, the word ‘said’ in the above snippet from the article you provide links to a Radio Free Europe article (and only a little research will show which three letter US agency funds it). Nowhere does Kirill say this is a ‘holy war’. What he allegedly said was that sacrifice in the course of military service washes away all sin. Note, again, that’s what he allegedly said as ‘reported’ by a CIA-run organization. Even if that’s what he did say, it’s ambiguous and doesn’t necessarily refer solely to the war in Ukraine.
I’m no ‘Putin shill’, and hate the wars going on all over, but as our own somnambulant in office would put it, come on, man. We Orthodox gotta do better than taking Reuters, AP and RFE as credible sources to base our knowledge upon.
The clearest sentiment was expressed in March at the XXV World Russian People’s Council “The Present and Future of the Russian World”
You can look at this at both the literal war level and at the spiritual level, because it is clear that the Russian Church is absolutely standing against globalists who are Satanists.
Thank you for providing that statement. As someone who followed the events in eastern Ukraine well prior to Russia’s SMO, and even prior to my conversion to Holy Orthodoxy, I can’t say I disagree with Patriarch Kirill, as presented here. Yes, the globalists are satanists, often openly so.
That said, however, nowhere in CSJ’s article was Kirill’s actual statement provided or referenced, nor was it so in the links…or the links of links! Instead, we’re served up globo-satanic sources interposing their propaganda as factual statements. Of course, this isn’t surprising given The Moscow Times was founded by a smut-peddling Dutch socialist who washed up in Russia in the wake of the bankster raid immediately after the fall of communism, and their commitments today are no less questionable. The ‘Radio Free” projects are all State Dept. propaganda outlets. So, of course, Kirill’s qualified statement (as being from a spiritual and moral point of view) is a matter of inconvenience for the satanist press, including the well-known collusion between state and private ‘news’ agencies like AP and Reuters.
From her own articles, it appears to me that CSJ isn’t so much anti-war, as she claims above, but rather anti-PutinR/anti-Russia, given that she cites State Dept-run and approved sources regarding the war in Ukraine. Nowhere can I find her on this site expressing outrage over the bloodletting in the Donbas prior to Russia’s intervention. Nor have I seen her wax anti-war regarding NATO’s history of encroaching east. Nor, again, Ukraine’s well-known fascist problem which even the likes of BBC, the Guardian, NBC, the Nation, all found problematic prior to the SMO. (These articles remain online, btw). That she bewails the editors over at Russian-Faith.com took issue with some of her de-contextualized opinions, and then openly bad mouths them, serves to heighten this sense of suspicion for me.
Yes, as a sin-laden and far from perfect Orthodox Christian, I do the best I can at maintaining a generalized anti-war position. And yet, I live in a fallen and often violent world where forces are at play, both visible and invisible, I cannot hope to comprehend fully in human-rational terms. The tragedy taking place among Orthodox Christians, in a place that is really center to the Russian-speaking people as a whole, is horrible to say the least. But, fracturing, dividing, and separation is the name of the game for the diabolic (literally!). The prince of this world is in the air, on air, in print, and online and often the content of our own thoughts. Perhaps more discrimination and discernment born of prayer and humility in the light of our Lord’s commandments is required than just being broadly ‘anti-war’ and digging up ‘the facts’ from anti-Christian, globo-homo MIC outlets. In sum, the Royal Path ain’t ideology.
I pray that during this Nativity season we can all allow a little Christ into the darkest chambers of our hearts and minds that we may live and breathe less like geo-politicians and more as ascetically-minded Orthodox Christians. God bless you all!
It’s strange to read this now, after so many posts supporting Russia’s mission in Ukraine.
Not posts by me, Madam.
I just realized that you’re the author. For months I’ve seen you comment below posts without realizing that CSJ is Cassandra St John. I’m going through my old posts to see if I’ve argued with you in the comments, but I don’t think I have.
I see that you hated my post about the Jews. I keep things red-pilled around here. You should see me in the workplace.
https://orthodoxreflections.com/collective-guilt-a-theology-of-the-jewish-culture-as-continuous-deicide/
Related news stories, with links:
Former Moscow politician Alexei Gorinov, the first known Russian to be imprisoned for denouncing the invasion of Ukraine, was sentenced to three more years on Friday on charges of “justifying terrorism” that he says he was framed for.
https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2024/11/29/alexei-gorinovs-last-word-in-court-lets-stop-this-bloody-needless-massacre-a87179
Russian conscript tortured and killed for refusing to fight in Ukraine
https://novayagazeta.eu/articles/2024/12/07/russian-conscript-tortured-and-killed-for-refusing-to-fight-in-ukraine-en-news
Latest massive missile strike on critical infrastructure is a war crime
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2024/11/russia-ukraine-latest-massive-missile-strike-on-critical-infrastructure-is-a-war-crime/
Revenues at the world’s top 100 global arms and military services producing companies totaled $632 billion in 2023, a 4.2% increase over the prior year
https://responsiblestatecraft.org/war-profiteering/
Meanwhile, in Ukraine: Zelensky hosts “military breakfast” in Kyiv Lavra’s Refectory Church
https://spzh.eu/en/news/83406-zelensky-hosts-military-breakfast-in-kyiv-lavras-refectory-church
Liberty is not living under a dictatorship, and poetry is next to godliness. Could some of the thousands of people reading this piece please use their God-given liberty to speak up for this anti-war poet who is imprisoned in Russia? See the letter-writing campaign at the link below:
Poet Artyom Kamardin, sentenced to seven years imprisonment for public reading of his anti-war poem, is at risk of torture and other ill-treatment while being transferred to a penal colony and during his imprisonment there.
https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/eur46/8805/2024/en/
I don’t really have anything to add except that I’m glad this website is willing to publish things no one else will.
We probably should change our tag line to, “A real free speech platform for Orthodox Christians.”
Just do it.
I think this blog has somehow lost its original focus and purpose, which I thought was upholding and strengthening the Orthodox Christian Faith. Going back to basics, Jesus said, (Matthew 24:6-31)
6 And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.
7 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.
8 All these are the beginning of sorrows.
9 Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name’s sake.
10 And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another.
11 And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many.
12 And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.
13 But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.
14 And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.
15 When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand:)
16 Then let them which be in Judaea flee into the mountains:
17 Let him which is on the housetop not come down to take any thing out of his house:
18 Neither let him which is in the field return back to take his clothes.
19 And woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days!
20 But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the sabbath day:
21 For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.
22 And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened.
23 Then if any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ, or there; believe it not.
24 For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.
25 Behold, I have told you before.
26 Wherefore if they shall say unto you, Behold, he is in the desert; go not forth: behold, he is in the secret chambers; believe it not.
27 For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.
28 For wheresoever the carcase is, there will the eagles be gathered together.
29 Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken:
30 And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.
31 And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.
So what is the purpose of war? There is no truly human Christian purpose. It is Satanic through and through and just exemplifies the nadir, the lowest point of the Fall of Man and human existence, our full and complete surrender to bloodthirsty Satan. How is this edifying?
Our job as Orthodox Christians is patient endurance (Rev. 3:10, James 1:4) and bringing people to the Faith. I don’s see how articles like this one accomplish either of those goals. One can read a lot about the philosophy of the inevitability of war in Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace, and one can marvel at CSJ’s plethora of geopolitical war knowledge, but what is the point of all of that? St Paul warned Titus to “avoid foolish controversies, genealogies, dissensions, and quarrels about the law, for they are unprofitable and worthless (Titus 3:9).
I would really like to see Orthodox Reflections lose this new angle and return to Orthodoxy, to help us all better prepare for what we know is coming…the sound of that Trumpet! Or are we more afraid of that than we are of war?