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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   31789 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 2, 2023

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Real European Christians unlike those Eastern Orthodox peasants.

Ukraine is majority Orthodox. The main internal religious conflict is between the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, long considered schismatic by other Orthodox churches but currently considered canonical by the Ecumenical Patriarchate and some other local Orthodox churches, and Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate), which is - as the name say - still at least formally connected to the Moscow Patriarchate and considered the only canonical church in Ukraine by a number of other Orthodox churches and in the process of being banned (not a good move in my opinion).

Their parliament is busy rushing through gay agenda bills.

I'm not sure what this refers to. The Ukrainian parliament was given a petition on legalizing same-sex civil unions and Zelenskyy gave verbal support for studying the issue in August, but insofar as I've seen, this has not processed since and is still evidently considered somewhat uncertain. The war has almost certainly made Ukrainians more positive about LGBT+ affairs (unsurprising, considering how strongly Russia has counterposed itself against that issue), but it doesn't seem anything is, at least, being rushed through.

and in the process of being banned

I share a bit of your concern here with respect to freedom of religion, but it's worth noting the actions of the Russian Orthodox Church (statements by Kirill, most notably) are quite relevant to the current war. It's not really a comparable situation to, say, the Vatican in WWII.

actions of the Russian Orthodox Church (statements by Kirill, most notably) are quite relevant to the current war

How so?

There've been reports of Russia using the Orthodox Church as a network for its spies:

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/31/world/europe/orthodox-church-ukraine-russia.html

https://orthodoxtimes.com/orthodox-church-of-russia-acquired-properties-in-norway-next-to-military-bases-in-recent-years/

And Russian Orthodox Church was basically taken over by state during USSR and even before it was strongly supporting Russian state.

Patriarch Kirill of Moscow is also supporting Russian invasion

On 9 March 2022, after the liturgy, he declared that Russia has the right to use force against Ukraine to ensure Russia's security, that Ukrainians and Russians are one people, that Russia and Ukraine are one country, that the West incites Ukrainians to kill Russians in order to sow discord between Russians and Ukrainians and gives weapons to Ukrainians for this specific purpose, and therefore the West is an enemy of Russia and God.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriarch_Kirill_of_Moscow#Support_for_the_Russian_invasion_of_Ukraine,_2022

main internal religious conflict is between the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, long considered schismatic by other Orthodox churches but currently considered canonical by the Ecumenical Patriarchate and some other local Orthodox churches, and Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate)

That is interesting to learn. I wasn't aware of the divided Orthodox churches, and mentally processed the news of the ban as a ban on the Orthodox Church as a whole.

The war has almost certainly made Ukrainians more positive about LGBT+ affairs

Is there some poll indicating this?

Ukraine is one of those countries where most Westerners interface with only a small educated liberal cohort so I suppose this skews understanding what is really happening on the ground vs what those people wish. For example from your post I am realizing that I drew the wrong conclusions about the legal enshrining of LGBTQ+ rights from browsing the English language Ukraine subreddit where any gesture in that direction is greatly amplified.

That is interesting to learn. I wasn't aware of the divided Orthodox churches, and mentally processed the news of the ban as a ban on the Orthodox Church as a whole.

The Orthodox church issue in Ukraine is really kind of infuriating in the way that it's a really thorny problem in the Orthodox world (and the Ukrainian church issues have been a minefield in online Orthodox discussions for a long time now), scarcely understood outside of the Orthodox circles at all, and most Orthodox sources one can find online are "Moscow partisans" (not necessarily members of Moscow Patriarchate affliated churches, but still holding their general perspective, ie. that UOC-MP is the only canonical church and OCU is schismatic and thus not really Orthodox, which allows for straightforward statements like "Zelenskyy is banning Orthodox church in Ukraine").

I can try to effortpost on this if someone is interested.

Sure go ahead!

Is there some poll indicating this?

Yes, here, for example.

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