Tag Archive for: Orthodox Church

Ukraine’s Holy War Comes To America

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Republicans are demanding the Trump administration investigate certain Russian Orthodox churches in the United States, claiming they may be compromised by Russian intelligence — but members of an Orthodox delegation pushed back against those assertions to the Daily Caller.

Three Republicans, led by South Carolina Rep. Joe Wilson, requested that the Department of Justice (DOJ) initiate a review and consider an investigation into whether Russia has sought to “recruit, leverage, influence, or otherwise compromise the independence” of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia (ROCOR), according to a Thursday letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi obtained by the Caller.

The letter asks the DOJ to look into whether the New York-based ROCOR maintains ties to Russia or its intelligence services through the Moscow Patriarchate.

“Such an inquiry should assess potential espionage activity, coercive activity, recruitment of agents, and other national security risks arising from Russian state exploitation of religious organizations connected to the Moscow Patriarchate,” the letter stated.

The letter claims the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, previously served as an officer of the KGB and now provides “explicit theological justification for Russia’s war against Ukraine, portraying it as a ‘holy struggle’ against the West.”

ROCOR Letter by erinvannatta

During an August visit to Ukraine, state officials and national leaders from across Ukraine’s Christian denominations told the Caller their congregants and clergy were actively being persecuted by occupying Russian forces in Crimea. They pointed to allegations of murder, arrests and the destruction of places of worship.

These leaders agreed that the ROC and Kirill played a key role in pushing for the war and Russia’s persecution of Ukrainian Christians.

The U.S. State Department designated Russia as a “Country of Particular Concern” in 2022 under the Religious Freedom Act. Trump recently gave this designation to Nigeria over the mass murder of thousands of Christians by radical Islamist forces.

The letter references reports documenting ROCOR-affiliated clergy participating in or condoning persecution of Christians within the occupied Ukrainian territories.

The letter comes as a response to Wilson’s discovery that leaders within the ROCOR and other Orthodox churches engaged in “lobbying efforts claiming to represent interests of Ukrainian Christians.”

Wilson shared a screenshot on X of an email calling on Orthodox Christians to join the delegates on Capitol Hill in support of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC). The email claimed the UOC is “facing increasing pressure and persecution in Ukraine.”

The UOC has historically been affiliated with the Moscow Patriarchate, while the larger Orthodox Church of Ukraine was established more recently as a separate Orthodox church independent of Russian influence.

The congressman responded to the email Monday on X and asserted the ROC is an extension of Russia’s government. He later posted a clarification saying he was only speaking about the ROCOR “operating under the umbrella of the Moscow Patriarchate” and that “most Orthodox churches are NOT affiliated with Moscow.”

“This development raises legitimate concerns that ROCOR or other entities subordinate to Patriarch Kirill could serve as vehicles for intelligence collection or sabotage operations directed at U.S. policymakers,” the letter read. “The vast majority of Orthodox Christians around the world are not subservient to Moscow, but remain proudly Orthodox affiliated with other spiritual leadership.”

A priest of ROCOR and a member of the delegation told the Caller on Wednesday that his church does not have administrative ties with Russia, and it was founded as a Soviet-era response to Russia’s embrace of communism. He said ROCOR only holds spiritual ties with the ROC, along with every other Orthodox church. The priest claimed Wilson’s comments demonstrated an ignorance of Orthodoxy.

Along with ROCOR leaders, the delegation also consisted of Catherine Whiteford, co-chair of the Young Republican National Federation and an Orthodox Christian; senior Orthodox bishops and clerics of the churches of Antioch and Serbia; and a lawyer working for Robert Amsterdam, a lawyer who represents the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC), Amsterdam told the Caller in a statement.

The Orthodox Church in America was also part of the delegation, according to The Hill.

The pan-Orthodox delegation represents around 80% of Orthodox faithful in the U.S., including many of Wilson’s constituents, the ROCOR priest told the Caller.

The lawyer representing Amsterdam’s firm in the delegation told the Caller the delegation had not suggested halting U.S. aid to Ukrainian forces but was only speaking to the rights of UOC members who face unfair treatment from the Ukrainian government for alleged relations with Moscow.

The ROCOR priest also clarified that the delegation’s main focus was to raise awareness and support for the UOC.

Wilson told the Caller in the statement that the UOC maintains a direct connection to the ROC.

“[The UOC] declared intent to separate from the Moscow Patriarchate in 2022 after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, but it is not formally independent and retains remnants of Moscow leadership from Soviet occupation, which pose substantiated threats to the safety of Ukrainian civilians and soldiers,” his statement read.

His statement clarified that the UOC is different from the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, which was established in 2019.

“It is prudent to highlight these factual complexities in church leadership to preserve religious freedom. Well-meaning people should be aware that there are efforts led by Patriarch Kirill to subvert the Christian message to justify invasion and atrocity,” Wilson’s statement concluded.

Viktor Yelensky, head of the State Service of Ukraine for Ethnic Policy and Freedom of Conscience, also told the Caller in August that the UOC was investigated and found to hold a connection with the ROC through the Moscow Patriarchate and is now facing a full-scale crackdown by the Ukrainian government.

Amsterdam said that his firm has not worked with the ROC.

“The firm has never been in touch or worked with the Russian Orthodox Church or any of its leadership, clergy or officials,” he said.

Amsterdam also challenged Wilson’s claims, saying the UOC is independent of the ROC. He pointed to the UOC gaining the right to self-governance and broad autonomy in 1990 and declaring full canonical independence from the Moscow Patriarchate following Russia’s attack on Ukraine in 2022.

“Since then, it has undertaken a range of practical measures to prove its separation from the Russian Orthodox Church,” Amsterdam said. “The UOC has provided vast sums in humanitarian aid, and many of its parishioners have and continue to serve in the Ukrainian army on the front lines.”

The Caller previously spoke to leaders of the UOC in Cherkasy and Dnipro, Ukraine, who emphasized that their church has cut ties with the ROC in every way but canonically, which they claim has no bearing over the teachings or administrative processes of the church.

Those leaders, along with local parishioners of the UOC, told the Caller that severing the canonical tie would create another schism instead of preserving the UOC as part of the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.

The UOC members also said they have faced the unfair seizure of churches, harassment and injury resulting from misinformation regarding their alleged relationship with Moscow.

Amsterdam said the November meetings are meant to “present vital evidence and raise awareness of the persecution of the UOC.” He pointed to Pope Francis, JD Vance, the United Nations, Human Rights Watch, the Church of England and the World Council of Churches for having spoken out against the alleged persecution of UOC parishioners and clerical leaders.

Amsterdam emphasized that the churches involved in the delegation have been serving “the spiritual needs of millions” in the U.S. for decades.

“Even at the height of the Cold War, the United States left these churches to worship peaceably,” Amsterdam told the Caller. “It is shocking that there are sitting congressmen willing so blatantly to violate the founding principles of this nation — the freedom of religion and the freedom of speech — and put these churches and their parishioners at risk of reprisals.”

Wilson’s letter urges the DOJ to assess whether Russia or its intelligence services sought to compromise the ROCOR. It also requests that the DOJ “determine whether any clergy, staff, or volunteers of ROCOR or other Russian Orthodox institutions affiliated with the Moscow Patriarchate” maintain operational or financial relationships with the Kremlin.

Finally, the letter asks Trump’s DOJ to “evaluate whether hierarchical, financial, or property ties between the Moscow Patriarchate and U.S.-based Russian Orthodox entities create vulnerabilities to coercion, sanctions evasion, or state-directed influence.”

“Given the continuing Russian war against Ukraine with mass murder of civilians and kidnapping of children and the well-documented role of the Russian Orthodox Church–Moscow Patriarchate in supporting the invasion, I urge the Department to treat this matter with appropriate urgency,” Wilson wrote.

The letter’s other signatories include Republican Nebraska Rep. Don Bacon, who called on the ROC on Tuesday to condemn Putin’s actions, and Republican Georgia Rep. Austin Scott.

The DOJ offered no comment to the Caller.

Reps. Bacon and Scott have not responded to the Daily Caller’s requests for comment as of publication.

AUTHOR

Derek VanBuskirk

Reporter

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

A Child’s-Eye View of Communism’s Absurdities

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Candid childhood memories of life behind the Iron Curtain

It is a truism to say that children have a grasp of reality different from adults; a clearer and more honest grasp that in most cases they lose with maturity. Rare is the man or woman who retains that innocent capacity to see through grown-up hypocrisy and pretence, presented to us so vividly in Hans Andersen’s memorable fairy-tale, The Emperor’s New Clothes.

In this humorous memoir of growing up in a city (unidentified) of 40,000 in the southern Urals of the Soviet Union in the 1970s-1980s, Fr Alexander Krylov, of Russian-German origin, manages to retain the undeceived eyes of childhood as he relates the absurdities and contradictions of life under Communism.

God and family

So many memoirs of living under the Soviet regime are, understandably, riven with bitterness and anger; the suffering has been too great to forget. The young Krylov, an only child, was protected from this by the love and faith of his family: his Catholic mother and grandmother and his Orthodox father.

The latter died when he was aged seven; showing unusual understanding for his age, Krylov realised that he was now “the one man in the family.” A certain independence of outlook seems to have characterised him from the start — probably because, despite the constant atheist propaganda impressed on him at school and in the wider society, “God’s presence in everyday life was… self-evident for our family.”

Much of this was owing to his grandmother’s influence for, as the family breadwinner, his mother had to work long hours outside the home. This grandmother, who had grown up in a German-speaking colony in Russia, resembled a traditional Russian “babushka” in her fortitude, her generosity and her strong faith that years of living in Leonid Brezhnev’s decrepit Soviet society could not erase.

In this world, all its citizens were officially atheist yet, as Krylov relates, everyone in his neighbourhood “knew” who the believers were and what religion they followed. His grandmother “saw an ally in every human being who was seeking God — Jews, Orthodox and Muslims” because — especially in death — “common prayer was much more important than any disagreement.”

There were no churches in his city and he only saw the inside of an Orthodox church (in western Ukraine) before starting school, aged six. Overwhelmed by its icons, candles and awe-inspiring atmosphere, Krylov told his mother, “Let’s stay here forever.” Undeterred, his grandmother erected a homemade altar in their small apartment, with its holy pictures, holy water, hymns and secret celebrations of the great Christian feasts. A candle would be lit in the window at Christmas; it was “somehow implicitly clear that God does not abandon human beings as long as a light is burning in at least one window on Christmas Eve and at least one person is waiting for the Christ-child.”

Economic woes

The author takes a gentle swipe at western society, obsessed with dietary fashions, when he explains, in a chapter titled “Healthy Diet”, why Soviet citizens had no choice but a healthy diet. Trying to survive in a corrupt and inefficient command economy, almost all families had an allotment with fruit trees and vegetables, to compensate for what they could not buy in the shops: everything possible was pickled, canned, stored or preserved. For some reason chickens were plentiful:

“Thanks to the poor work of the chemical industry, they were raised with no additives and usually looked as though they had walked by themselves from the chicken factory to the grocery store.”

I laughed aloud as I read this and other reminiscences, narrated in the candid way of a man who has not lost the artless gaze of a child. (After a distinguished academic career in Moscow, Fr Krylov decided to become a priest aged 42, on Easter Monday 2011 and was ordained in 2016.)

Another anecdote describes how he briefly worked in a grocery store where the shelves were often lacking common items buyers craved. Organising the shop’s store room, he noticed many such items, piled them on a trolley and wheeled it through into the shop, to the delighted surprise of the customers. The teenage boy could not understand why the manageress looked so discomfited and why his employment was suddenly curtailed.

Inner life

Just as the late Russian poet, Irina Ratushinskaya, who spent four years in the Gulag for writing “subversive” poetry, commented she was told so often as a child “there is no God”, that she began to believe in Him, Krylov reflects: “The prohibition against owning a Bible in the Soviet Union could only confirm its importance.”

In a telling incident in his teens, he describes a classroom meeting where these young Soviet citizens planned “to put socialist democracy into action.” This meant denouncing a fellow student who would not obey the rules. Krylov, who had befriended him, defended him in front of his classmates. They then turned on him, aware that he too was somehow “different.” The author comments, “Although I was always present, I lived my own life”. This hidden, inner life, which they sensed though it was never made explicit, presented an existential threat to his fellow student ideologues.

Inevitably, Lenin’s image was everywhere. Joining the Communist youth group, the Young Pioneers, one wore a red neckerchief and star. “Depicted on this star were the head of Lenin and three tongues of fire. I shared with no one my impression that this star depicted the head of Lenin burning in hell.” This was the response of a child whose private faith, never mentioned in class, helped to protect him against the atheism he was forced to listen to in public.

Finally, aged 15, overhearing the jocular remark of a friend’s father that vodka was “opium for the people”, Krylov comments: “Suddenly my eyes were opened: [I realised that] Communism had simply become a new religion.”

If the Emperor in this case was not exactly naked, nonetheless the short, discrete chapters of this kindly memoir remind readers that his clothes were uncomfortable, unsuitable, ill-fitting and threadbare.

This review has been republished with the author’s permission from The Conservative Woman.

AUTHOR

Francis Phillips

More by Francis Phillips

EDITORS NOTE: This MercatorNet column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.