FILE – Priests take part in a procession celebrating Orthodox Easter at the Iversky Monastery, a monastery of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate), a monastery damaged by shelling, outside Donetsk, Ukraine
Ukraine’s entangled political history with Russia has its counterpart in the religious landscape, with Ukraine’s majority Orthodox Christian population divided between a free-minded group based in Kiev and loyal to its patriarch in Moscow.
But while there have been appeals to religious nationalism in both Russia and Ukraine, religious loyalty does not reflect political allegiance in the midst of Ukraine’s fight for survival.
Even though Russian President Vladimir Putin justified his invasion of Ukraine as a defense of the Moscow-oriented Orthodox Church, leaders of both Ukrainian Orthodox factions are fiercely condemning the Russian invasion, as are Ukraine’s significant Catholic minority.
“With prayer on our lips, for God, for Ukraine, for our neighbors, we fight against evil – and we will see victory,” said Metropolitan Epiphany, head of Ukraine’s Kiev-based Orthodox Church.
“Forget mutual quarrels and misunderstandings and … unite with love for God and our Motherland,” said Metropolitan Onfri, the head of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which is under the Orthodox Patriarchate of Moscow but has broad autonomy.
It appears that the United Front is also complicated. On Thursday, a day after Onfree posted the message, his church’s website began publishing reports that claimed its churches and people were being attacked, referring to an attack on rival church representatives. Is charged.
Divisions between Ukraine’s Orthodox bodies have resonated around the world in recent years as Orthodox churches struggle over how and what side to take. Some American conservatives hope they can put such conflicts aside and unite to try to end the war, while fearing war may also increase divisions.
What is the religious landscape of Ukraine?
Surveys estimate that a large proportion of Ukraine’s population is Orthodox, with a significant minority of Ukrainian Catholics worshiping with the Byzantine Liturgy similar to Orthodoxy but loyal to the Pope. The population consists of Protestants, Jews and small percentages of Muslims.
Ukraine and Russia are divided by a common history, both religiously and politically.
They trace their lineage to the medieval kingdom of Kievan Rus’, whose 10th-century prince Vladimir (Volodymyr in Ukrainian) rejected paganism, was baptized in Crimea and adopted Orthodoxy as the official religion.
In 2014, Putin cited that history to justify his annexation of Crimea, a land he called “sacred” to Russia.
While Putin maintains that Russia is Russia’s true successor, Ukrainians say that their modern state has a different pedigree and that Moscow did not emerge as a power until centuries later.
That tension persists in conservative relationships.
Orthodox churches have historically been organized along national lines, with the patriarchs having autonomy in their territories while being bound by a common faith. The Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople is previously considered equal, but unlike the Catholic Pope, does not have universal jurisdiction.
FILE – People pray next to the body of Ukrainian Army captain Anton Sidorov, 35, who was killed in eastern Ukraine during his funeral in Kiev, Ukraine
Who rules Ukraine’s Orthodox churches today?
It depends on how events from more than 300 years ago are interpreted.
As Russia grew in power and the Church of Constantinople weakened under Ottoman rule, in 1686 the Ecumenical Patriarchate empowered the Patriarch of Moscow to appoint the Metropolitan (top bishop) of Kiev.
The Russian Orthodox Church says it was a permanent transfer. The ecumenical chancellor says it was temporary.
For the past century, the free-minded Ukrainian Orthodox have formed separate churches that lacked formal recognition until 2019, when the current Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew considered Ukraine’s Orthodox Church independent of the Moscow Patriarch – who made the move. opposed as illegitimate.
The situation in Ukraine was suspicious on the ground.
Many monasteries and parishes remain under the Patriarch of Moscow, said John Burgess, author of “Holy Rus’: The Rebirth of Orthodoxy in the New Russia”, although exact figures are difficult to find. Burgess said that at the village level, many people are not even aware of the alignment of their parish.
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Does this division reflect a political division between the two countries?
Yes, although it is complicated.
The former president of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, drew a direct link: “The freedom of our church is part of our pro-European and pro-Ukrainian policies,” he said in 2018.
But the current president, Vladimir Zelinsky, who is Jewish, has not placed as much emphasis on religious nationalism. On Saturday, he said he had spoken to both conservative leaders as well as top Catholic, Muslim and Jewish representatives. “All leaders pray for the souls of the defenders who gave their lives for Ukraine and for our unity and victory. And this is very important,” he said.
Putin has tried to capitalize on this issue.
Seeking to justify the impending invasion of Ukraine with a distorted historical narrative in his February 21 speech, Putin claimed without evidence that Kiev was preparing for the “destruction” of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church by the Moscow Patriarchate.
But the response of Metropolitan Onfri, who compared the war to “the sin of Cain”, the biblical character murdering his brother, indicates that there is a strong sense of Ukrainian national identity even in the Moscow-oriented church.
By comparison, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow has called for peace, but has not placed blame for the invasion.
The Ukrainian Orthodox Church has long enjoyed wide autonomy under the Moscow Patriarchate. In addition, it is increasingly Ukrainian in character.
“Regardless of church affiliation… you have a lot of new clergy who grew up in independent Ukraine,” said Alexei Crindach, national coordinator for the US Census of Orthodox Christian Churches. Crindach, who grew up in the former Soviet Union, said, “their political preferences are not related to the formal jurisdiction of their parishes.”
Where do Catholics fit in?
Ukrainian Catholics are mainly based in western Ukraine.
They emerged in 1596 when some Orthodox Ukrainians, then under the rule of the Catholic-dominated Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, submitted to the papal authority under an agreement that allowed them to keep specific practices such as their Byzantine Liturgy and married priests. .
Conservative leaders have long condemned agreements such as Catholicism and foreign encroachment on their flocks.
Ukrainian Catholics have a particularly strong history of resistance to persecution under the Czar and the Communists.
“Every time Russia takes over Ukraine, (the) Ukrainian Catholic Church is destroyed,” said Mariana Karapinka, communications chief for the Ukrainian Catholic Archeparchy of Philadelphia.
Ukrainian Catholics were severely repressed by the Soviet Union, with many leaders martyred. Many Ukrainian Catholics continued to worship underground, and the church has made a vigorous comeback since the end of communism.
With a history like that, Ukrainian Catholics may have a strong reason to oppose another takeover by Moscow. But they are not alone, Karapinka said. “Ukrainian Catholics were not the only group persecuted by the Soviets,” she said. “So many groups have reason to protest.”
Recent popes defending the rights of Ukrainian and other Eastern Rite Catholics have also sought to thaw ties with the Russian Orthodox Church.
But after the Russian invasion, Pope Francis personally visited the Russian embassy on Friday to “express his concern about the war”, the Vatican said in an extraordinary papal gesture that has no recent precedent.
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How has Orthodox scholarship changed beyond Ukraine?
The Russian Orthodox Church decided in 2018 to “break Eucharistic communion” with the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople as he moved to recognize an independent church in Ukraine. This means that members of Moscow- and Constantinople-affiliated churches cannot take communion in other’s churches.
Controversies have spread to the Eastern Orthodox Churches in Africa, where Russian Orthodoxy recognized a separate group of churches when the Patriarch of Africa recognized the independence of the Ukraine Church.
But many other churches have tried to avoid the grounds. In the US, as with many conservative jurisdictions, most groups still associate and worship with each other.
The war could provide a point of unity between American churches, but could further test ties, said Very Rev. Alexander Rentel, chancellor of the Orthodox Church in America, which has Russian roots but is now independent of Moscow.
“This split in world Orthodoxy was a difficult event for the Orthodox Church to process,” he said. “Now it is only getting more difficult because of this war.”
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