Russian church fuels war effort with faith and propaganda

When Vladimir Putin was halfway through his first presidential term, I was living in Petersburg. I expressed my surprise that during most appearances, he was accompanied by the then Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia, Alexy II. This did not surprise Russians. They explained that it's Putin who stands by Alexy, not the other way around, because presidential power, like the Tsar's, comes from God, and the presence of the Patriarch legitimises the president's words.

Today, the same professor from the Petersburg University of Education, when asked about the relations between the Danilov Monastery and the Kremlin, simply waves his hand. This is not only because he fears talking to a journalist from the West, but because it's no longer the president standing beside the Patriarch, but the Patriarch standing with the president.

After the fall of communism, the Church hoped that its position would be restored and that it would once again hold sway over the governance of souls. However, the alliance with politics did not work out well. While Alexy II could enjoy a considerable degree of freedom in action and speech, Kirill from the beginning spoke with the voice of the Kremlin, especially on the issue of Ukraine. Already in 2009, he depreciated the independence of the Orthodox Church of the Kyiv Patriarchate, which was not recognised by Moscow, similar to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, established in 2018.

Kirill deemed that Kyiv betrayed the "true faith" and decided to reclaim it. Just before the outbreak of the full-scale war, he said, "we call Kyiv the 'mother of Russian cities,' (...). Here, Russian Orthodoxy began, and it cannot be abandoned due to circumstances beyond the control of this historical and spiritual connection."

In Kirill's view, Ukrainians and Russians are one nation, which "foreign forces want to divide." Therefore, from the beginning, he has actively supported the "special military operation" and calls for prayers for Russian soldiers fighting against "the most powerful forces that practically rule the world today."

"Every parish should help those on the front line. We must mobilise our parishioners to collect items and food," Kirill called a year ago at the Alexander Nevsky Lavra in Petersburg. And the Church sprang into action. Not only did fundraisers begin for soldiers' families and the soldiers themselves, but the Church also engaged in activities quite literally.

By autumn 2023, the Russian Orthodox Church was already integrated into the conscription machinery. In hindsight, one could say that at the time, it was doing so somewhat hesitantly. Today, as the resources of volunteers and "residents" of penal colonies are slowly depleting, priests have begun campaigning in churches, calling for defence against the "forces of evil."

The Church itself has long engaged in propaganda activities, calling the war in Ukraine "holy." According to the synod, it is a war against the satanic, corrupt West, which departed from true Christian belief centuries ago, and soldiers on the front line fulfil a divine mission, fighting for the unification of Russian peoples under one scepter.

Russia, and thus the Church, have reverted to the "trinity doctrine" formulated in imperial times, which posits that the Russian nation consists of Great Russians, Little Russians, and Belarusians, who make up one great Russian nation. Kremlin propaganda has also become the official line of the Church, contained in the document "The Present and Future of the Russian World."

Patriarch Kirill does not act purely out of love for Mother Russia. The Church derives financial benefits from cooperation with the Russian Ministry of Defence and fights for control over souls. The Kremlin promised Kirill that after victory, his power would extend to Ukraine as well.

Already, the Ministry of Defence is expanding the role of the Church in the military. As part of the ongoing propaganda campaign, the deputy head of the Main Political Directorate of the Russian Ministry of Defence, Oleg Veselkov, stated at the beginning of December that the Russian army created the position of a religious assistant.

Veselkov described it as "a confessor for the commander, who is always with him — on the front line, at the command post, among the troops." He noted that priests in the Russian army will now work with soldiers on an individual level directly on the front lines.

The first 30 young priests completed their training at the end of November and have already been sent to the front. One of the lecturers was Roman Silantyev, a well-known Russian ideologist of Pan-Slavism and Moscow's leading role in the unification of all Slavs. He conducted classes on "neo-paganism and the roots of Ukrainian nationalism."

Since the beginning of the war, at least seven Orthodox priests have been killed on the front line. Among them, two were killed in the last month. This is, however, a sacrifice that bishops are willing to bear.

In the occupied territories, the Russian Orthodox Church took over temples, church buildings, and lands in the dioceses of Dzhankoi, Berdiansk, Rovenki, and Kherson. In the occupied areas, Patriarch Kirill appointed Moscow-controlled bishops.

This happened because the authorities claimed that the Orthodox Church of Ukraine abandoned the properties and the faithful, so to protect them from destruction, out of the goodness of their hearts, they took them under their care. This sounds entirely like the Soviet narrative after the invasion of Poland in 1939 or during the occupation of the Baltic states and Bessarabia a year later.

Any grassroots resistance against the actions of the hierarchs is suppressed. When, in early March 2022, over 300 clergy of the Russian Orthodox Church published an open letter calling for reconciliation and the end of the war, stating that "the Ukrainian people must decide their fate, not under the gun, and without pressure from both the West and the East," bishops sent them to monasteries and ordered them to remain silent with all ruthlessness.

In the occupied territories, only priests with special ideological training are sent. For this purpose, an "inter-parish training centre for specialists of the Luhansk diocese" was created in the Luhansk region. It is overseen by Metropolitan Panteleimon, appointed by Moscow.

In this way, the Russian Orthodox Church has become a powerful tool of Kremlin propaganda. Under the guise of religion, Russians spread propaganda, justify war crimes, and try to create the appearance of legitimacy of authority in the occupied territories.