Many of us have wondered how members of the Russian Orthodox Church can justify the church’s pro-war stance in Ukraine, where so many people are suffering as a direct result of Russian brutality.
An article in El Pais provides an insight into those clergy who have decided to take a different view and question, in some cases only very mildly, the stance that their church and its leadership are taking. This is clearly not easy in an atmosphere where clergy have been required to pray for Russia’s victory in Ukraine at every Mass since 2022, when the Kremlin launched its full-scale invasion.
Some priests have joined a rival church, the Orthodox Apostolic Church, which, while Orthodox, is independent of the Russian Orthodox Church, and importantly independent of the state, though always under threat of closure.
One priest was expelled simply for daring to replace the word “victory” with “peace” in the Mass prayer and another suspended for three years for officiating at Alexei Navalny’s funeral in 2024. Another was removed after refusing to allow children in his Sunday school to sew camouflage nets and raise money for the war. Dozens more have been persecuted for calling for an end to the war, and some have been imprisoned or blacklisted under the label, ‘foreign agents’. And some leave the country, often with the help of certain organisations set up to show solidarity with clergy who have been ostracised.
According to a report presented to the UN, Russian authorities have opened criminal cases against at least 16 clergy members and administrative proceedings against another 30, as well as at least 19 canonical trials going on within the Russian Orthodox Church.
Let us remember in our prayers those who are standing up for the Christian values of peace, justice and respect in an atmosphere of fear, where the official church is a standard-bearer for the government and its brutal war.
Read the story in English in El Pais here.