Ukraine Is Now 'Holy War,' Russian Church Declares

[Valdosta]

Ukraine Is Now 'Holy War,' Russian Church Declares (MSN)

The Russian Orthodox Church has approved a document that deems President Vladimir Putin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine a "Holy War."

The declaration came during a congress of the World Russian People's Council in which religious, political and cultural figures in the country met at the site of Moscow's Cathedral of Christ the Savior, a focal point for the Orthodox faith in Russia.

The head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, also heads the council and is an ally of Putin. He has been criticized for providing a religious justification for the war and failing to unequivocally condemn the killing of people in Ukraine.

...

Putin the Holy Tsar.

Edited to add:

Look what I found.

[Gidney N Cloyd]

1. Oh, holy shit...

[3auld6phart]

17. Ohh Pun

Intended I presume.

[Model35mech]

19. Yep, HOLY, that's the propaganda

It works for Russian Orthodoxy to be on the side of Putin.

If they don't their churches become museums.

I kid you not. That was the history under Soviet rules.

[brewens]

28. Remonded me of this.

[ripcord]

59. This is why the ROCOR exists

They feel they have to defend their religion from Russian leaders including the modern day idiots Putin and Kirill.

[dalton99a]

2. .

Last edited Sat Mar 30, 2024, 02:06 PM - Edit history (1)

[alittlelark]

3. I had a physical reaction to those photos - nausea

Revulsion - Truly Sacrilegious.

[PatSeg]

6. Same here

I am speechless.

[RussellCattle]

33. Me too. Nobody out does the Russian Orthodox priests when it comes to ridiculous.....

......way over-the-top vestments. They are a parody of a faith that has lost it’s way. Throw in the bombs and missiles and even the humor one might otherwise see in them vanishes.

[Igel]

62. If I considered them Christian perhaps I'd have the same reaction.

But I haven't.

"Small flock" is the description. Millions isn't a small flock. I have a narrow definition of "christian". I have a wide definition for "Xian".

[barbaraann]

4. I grew up in the U.S. Army.

The incongruity of a seeing an Army Protestant minister, a Colonel in his dress uniform covered with medals, was seared into my teenage brain and destroyed any chance I would ever be religious. I did, however, go to the Sunday evening fellowship for the refreshments because we never got snacks at home.

[hunter]

5. They worship a cruel and capricious god.

That god is not worthy of respect.

As in all human endeavors, religious institutions are frequently ruined by cowards, hypocrites, and the power-hungry sociopaths who lead them.

[ripcord]

57. Kirill has sold out to Putin

The ROCOR says he is full of shit, I'm paraphrasing btw.

[TomSlick]

7. This is the result of a merging of church and state.

The church will become subservient to the state.

[Igel]

11. Orthodoxy's usually been like that, historically.

Like Catholicism was. Or the Anglican church in Britain.

Sometimes the church is on top, sometime the dictator. What you don't find are functioning representational assemblies making decisions when you have church & state. When the emperor is weak or disputed, the church picks up the slack and helps (re)instate one; when the emperor is strong, the church does due obeisance. But usually one hand washes the other because both are in the same game, making sure that all power is in the hands of the "right" team.

[TomSlick]

15. And in so doing the church loses its mission and voice.

[Drum]

63. Church equals Brain. State equals Body. Neither can prevail without the Other.

[Qutzupalotl]

8. No such thing.

And certainly not with the way Russia is handling the war, going back to the starting invasion.

[oasis]

9. It's not going to help with

getting more potential"believers" worldwide to sign up with the church.

[slightlv]

23. That's the first thing I thought!

No way would I ever want to be associated with that church! The pics say so much about it... nevermind Putin! And have you noticed how much sacrilegious stuff there is this year around Easter? I'm not Christian, but it all offends me on the basis of what the religion is suppose to be about. I'd be sorely ashamed and embarrassed by it all if I were Christian this year...

[WarGamer]

10. History repeats...

1095 Clermont, France.

Pope Urban II gave one of the most consequential speeches in history.

You should shudder . . . at raising a violent hand against Christians; it is less wicked to brandish your sword against Saracens [Muslims]. It is the only warfare that is righteous, for it is charity to risk your life for your brothers.” Knights of Christ should offers themselves as a holy sacrifice to defend the honor of the church. And they should have compassion on their brothers” (Balderic of Dol).

Urban linked the campaign to a popular form of penance, the holy pilgrimage. The knights wanted to do penance for their sins, and Urban gave “whoever wishes to save his soul” an opportunity to do so (Gesta). He told the warriors that all who died in battle against the pagans “shall have immediate remission of sins” (Fulcher of Chartres). The knights were, in essence, armed pilgrims.

Urban also tied his appeal to a popular form of spirituality, monasticism. Crusaders took monastic vows (their obedience is another question). Thus the warriors became armed, mobile monks. Our Christian brothers are suffering and their lands taken, Urban said, in language that evoked a sense of offended honor. The knights should be willing to suffer with them, as Christ suffered, in order to retake their lands and the church’s holy sites.

[Grins]

12. Remember when all religion was banned in the Soviet Union...?

Yeah; good times.

[Celerity]

21. The government of the Soviet Union followed an unofficial policy of state atheism, aiming to gradually eliminate

religious belief within its borders.

While it never officially made religion illegal, the state nevertheless made great efforts to reduce the prevalence of religious belief within society. To this end, at various times in its history it engaged in anti-religious persecutions of varying intensity and methodology.

Believers were never officially attacked for being believers, but they were officially attacked for real or perceived political opposition to the state and to its policies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_anti-religious_legislation

[bahboo]

13. Corrupt leading the corrupt....

what a load of shit...

[KS Toronado]

14. What happens when you mix church & state!

And tsf wants to do that here?

[orwell]

16. Welcome to the other side...

...where black is white in red pill land.

Just a precursor of what to expect from Trump 2.0 if the madman is elected.

We all know how much he likes to follow the successful dictator's bible...

[surfered]

18. Yes, God wants you to kill civilian women and children.

[slightlv]

26. Well, they can point to many verses

in the Old Testament to support that statement. Jesus supposedly changed all that... which tells you how much Christianity is in vogue lately. These are all Old Testament believers... there and here. Be afraid of what the Dominionists (NAR) has planned for us, especially should *T win again. I say "especially" because no matter who wins, the NAR will never stop trying to make this country into a theocracy. I firmly believe when Biden wins again, one of the main things he needs to do is enforce the wall between church and state. To me, that means getting rid of all the religious departments and people in the government.. and taking a hard, long look at the tax exemption rule for churches. I think strongly it needs to be updated and reinforced... most vocally. I don't mind giving tax breaks to churches who are doing the real church work of charity, etc. But all these groups politicking from their podiums should have their exemptions struck.

[LiberalFighter]

20. If it is a holy war why did they wait until now?

[Gore1FL]

24. God acted immediately in 2022, but his will is limited to the speed-of-light, so it just got here.

That's my guess, anyway.

[RussellCattle]

37. I like it. God is two light years away, so we have some lag time in our favor. No?

[LiberalFighter]

41. I was watching a Bible thing on History Channel

It had bit with Abraham's angels going to Sodom. When they took their robes off they were in soldier armour and swords.

If they were god's angels why would they need mortal weapons?

[Gore1FL]

42. It may have had something to do with the Pillar-of-S.A.L.T. treaty! nt

[RussellCattle]

35. Good question. Is it still holy if Russia loses? Maybe they were hedging and Putin made a call.

[Gore1FL]

22. Russian Christians are as bad as American Evangelicals. They just dress flashier. nt

[lpbk2713]

25. Putin has issued a Jihad.

Fuck me.

It's no longer a three week Special Military Operation any more.

[RussellCattle]

39. Shit, that's it. Muslims. I knew I had heard of holy wars somewhere before.

[IthinkThereforeIAM]

27. No surprise...

... the Russian Orthodox church was one of, if not THE first organization that the Putinistas co-opted for just such a purpose. The Russian Orthodox church and clergy do whatever the KGB/FSB or whatever tells them to do, in exchange for not burning down the churches and putting the priests in the gulag.

[colorado_ufo]

29. Jesus saved his harshest words for hypocrites, especially religious hypocrites.

These pictures make me want to throw up.

[twodogsbarking]

31. The blessing of the missiles.

[colorado_ufo]

43. Maybe it was supposed to be the blessing of the missals,

and the dumbass priest got confused.

[twodogsbarking]

45. Oh, it was Father Rudy.

[twodogsbarking]

30. Religion is like a soap opera. Neither makes sense but people watch.

[dalton99a]

32. Patriarch Kirill worked for the KGB in the 1970s, Swiss media reports

https://www.euronews.com/2023/02/06/patriarch-kirill-worked-for-the-kgb-in-the-1970s-swiss-media-reports

Patriarch Kirill worked for the KGB in the 1970s, Swiss media reports
By Euronews with AFP
Published on 06/02/2023 - 21:26

Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill, a close supporter of Russian President Vladimir Putin, worked for the Russian intelligence service in Switzerland in the 1970s, according to two Swiss newspapers, citing declassified archives.

Le Matin Dimanche and Sonntagszeitung, two Swiss publications, say the police have verified that the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, was a member of the KGB.

The two media outlets were able to consult files within the Swiss federal archives.

In the early 1970s, the patriarch, who fervently supports Russia's invasion of Ukraine, was living in Geneva and officially represented Moscow at the World Council of Churches (WCC).

Kirill's mission was also to influence this council, which was infiltrated by the KGB in the 1970s and 80s.

.....

[Mblaze]

34. If you declare a "Holy War",

It is simply a war and it is very far away from being holy. Same with “spiritual war”; there is no spirituality in war.

The Russian Church seems to be completely separated from the message of Jesus Christ.

[lame54]

36. It fills the soul when a church declares war

[RussellCattle]

38. True that. It fills my soul with something dark and hard.

[keithbvadu2]

40. Sounds like our own political Christian pastors/evangelists.

[tornado34jh]

44. Let's face it, the Russian Orthodox Church is nothing more than an arm of the FSB

Part of this is religious politics

This explains it better than me:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_Moscow%E2%80%93Constantinople_schism

But this also ties into Russkiy Mir and all that. But then again, the Patriarch of the ROC used to be a KGB agent. It also ties into why Russia views Kyiv as the start of Russian Orthodoxy. In a way, it's the same way that Christian Nationalists use it to say that the US was never secular.

[Elessar Zappa]

46. Don't Russia and Ukraine share the same Church?

[Valdosta]

47. Ukraine was majority Roman Catholic and ...

... with an ethnic Russian minority.

The Russian Orthodox Church has been illegal there for about a year.

[Elessar Zappa]

48. Ah, ok, I thought most Ukrainians were Eastern Orthodox.

[Valdosta]

49. There is a Ukrainian Orthodox Church, but organizationally separate. n/t

[Emrys]

50. No, there was a schism.

There is an autonomous Orthodox church in Ukraine. It was also subject to its own split as a faction remained loyal to Moscow.

It's a bit of a complex situation which I wrote about at some length here in a reply a while back, but search doesn't show it up and our journals still aren't available, so I can't pull it up right now. Checking out Wikipedia will give you most of the picture.

Suffice to say that the Russian invasion of Ukraine has been seen to have elements of a holy war for quite some time. This formal declaration just adds an official imprimatur.

[Emrys]

56. Aha! I finally got Advanced Search to work and found my earlier posts.

Here they are, both posted late last December.

This first one's context was someone posting in an OP that Putin and his regime are godless because they bomb churches:

Putin and Russia aren't godless, they just pay lipservice to the Russian Orthodox Church,

which, under its current patriarch for life, Kirill, is as bloodthirsty, warmongering, Putin-loyalist and revolting as the rest of the regime, and thinks God is on their side.

Russia's activities in Ukraine, from plundering and destroying historical sites and artefacts to abducting thousands of children and trying to turn them into good Russians, along with atrocities against people in general and razing cities and towns to the ground, are unarguably genocide, and in some quarters are seen as a religious war, or at least one with strong religious undertones, with numerous clergy in the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine having been found to be treasonous.

Some background:

Originally posted here: https://www.democraticunderground.com/100218550676#post8

This second one's context was Ukraine's decision to start celebrating Christmas on 25 December, and it was responding to a claim that this would piss off various religious factions and please Roman Catholics. The more important aspect is the explanation of the Orthodox schisms.

The Russian Orthodox Church is a tool of Putin, the FSB and crooked genocide supporter Patriarch Kirill of Moscow (and should get no sympathy from any progressive, not just because it champions the war, but because of its horrible stances on homosexuality etc.), as has been its branch in Ukraine, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which has harboured many clergy who are traitors to Ukraine - part of Putin's hope for activating his pre-embedded allies in Ukraine during the invasion. This should be distinguished from the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (yes, we're in Llife of Brian territory), which is a breakaway that has asserted its independence from Kirill. (Somewhat confusingly, that is now also referred to informally as the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, but that's by the by.)

This initiative is part of the move to distance Ukraine from the Russian Orthodox Church and Putin's baleful influence. There's nothing stopping anyone, Orthodox or not, from celebrating the traditional holidays in Ukraine if they wish, as they do in other countries.

Contrary to your broad brush, some influential Catholics - I think wrong-headedly - don't like the idea, as this article from the Catholic Herald shows: Zelensky’s move against the Ukrainian Orthodox Church is a step too far.

The change in the state calendar doesn't stop anyone celebrating as they wish, like they do in other countries, as this article by a Canadian-Ukrainian shows, including the fact this calendar of observance is supported by some other Orthodox religious factions and that this acceptance of difference in religious calendars is not unique to Ukraine, but rather very much the overwhelming norm among Orthodox churches - as it is for Muslim, Hindu, Jewish and other communities thoughout the world who live in countries where their religion is not the majority (despite the predictable moans from often opportunistic racists and rightwingers):

When Zelensky changed the date of Christmas, it left Ukrainian-Canadians like me with a choice
...
With the exception of Russia and Serbia, most countries with majority Orthodox Christian populations observe Christmas on Dec. 25. Because the Russian Orthodox Church still uses the Julian calendar, used by the Russian Empire for several centuries, the Orthodox Church of Ukraine and the Ukrainian Greek Catholics decided to switch to the newer Gregorian calendar in an effort to distance themselves from Moscow. The change initiated by Mr. Zelensky serves to place a firewall between Ukrainian believers and the Russian Orthodox Church and its leaders, who’ve backed the Kremlin’s invasion. One could argue it also puts Ukraine more in sync with neighbouring EU countries such as Poland, where the birth of Christ is observed on Dec. 25.
...
I suppose that with Ukraine becoming more European and with an increasing number of Ukrainians celebrating Christmas on Dec. 25, it’s no surprise that support for the date change is quite high. In a Ukrainian government poll launched last December, nearly 59 per cent of the more than 1.5 million people who voted supported moving the date to Dec. 25.
...
Where does all this leave the enormous global Ukrainian diaspora community, including the millions who recently fled the war to safer havens such as Canada? I suspect many will shop for parishes and community organizations that fit in with their own beliefs and calendars. Until now, many Ukrainian church leaders have been more than happy to provide both dates as options to their flock, and I believe that will continue despite political decisions made in Kyiv. This year, flexibility on dates is being allowed by Ukrainian church leaders in Canada, and some churches, such as Holy Trinity Ukrainian Orthodox Metropolitan Cathedral in Winnipeg, will offer their flocks celebrations in December and January.

Where communities switch to just one Christmas, there could be confusion for some. There’s been a tradition in some Canadian communities for carollers from Ukrainian organizations to schedule house visits so that “old calendar folks” visit families celebrating on Dec. 25, and new calendar observants hit homes celebrating on Jan. 7. How will this work now, given that carolling is a top annual fundraising event for many Ukrainian community organizations in Canada?
...
As for me? I’ve already blocked out Boxing Day for my customary Christmas gift shopping and invited loved ones around for the traditional Christmas Eve dinner on Jan. 6. My opposition to Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is clear and cuts deep into my soul. But celebrating Christmas on Jan. 7 connects me with a family past of warm and fuzzy memories. Even though it overlaps with Russian traditions, it has always been how our family stayed connected with the past and helped keep our culture alive, especially when Ukraine was a subjugated nation. For me, it is also an added layer of insulation against the increasing crass commercialism of Christmas.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-when-zelensky-changed-the-date-of-christmas-it-left-ukrainian/

Originally posted here: https://www.democraticunderground.com/10143172143#post12

[RKP5637]

51. God is a hatchet guy like in a corp takeover. The goal is to kill everything on earth. Just follow him.

[moondust]

52. Utter blasphemy.

[Xolodno]

53. I don't know why so many are blowing up over this.

They've been doing this kind of stuff for centuries over there. Only time it didn't happen was during the USSR.

Catholic church did it as well for over a millennium.

[ck4829]

64. People are free to have opinions and reactions of their choice

People are free to think that this is not a holy war, that there is no such thing as a holy war, and that Putin is the fifth gunman

[RKP5637]

54. Thanks for posting this and the pictures! It's unbelievable!

[Hekate]

55. And this, my fellow Americans, is what you will get with White Christian Nationalism...

Our homegrown idiots really don’t get it — there will be only one flavor of Christianity allowed, decided on by Fearless Leader.

[Silent3]

58. Gee, not a "Special Holy Operation"? n/t

[SupportSanity]

60. [humor] Putin buys entire stock of Trump Bibles for Holy War. Trump is a billionaire again.

Trump now able to pay off all debts and buy more judges... erh, sorry, pay off all judgements.

There is no grift like religious grift.

I thought I'd add a little humor to counteract the Russian insanity.

[NickB79]

61. This is exactly what the US far right imagines when they talk about a Christian nation

They get raging boners at the thought of the MAGA State Church blessing missiles and tanks.

You'd think that priests, pastors and ministers across the US would see this and feel their blood run cold in their veins.