From Chaplains of Maidan to Military Chaplains: One Year after the Tomos

 

 

 

 

Post by Catherine Wanner, Professor of History and Anthropology, The Pennsylvania State University, and Tetiana Kalenychenko, Coordinator and Facilitator of the Dialogue in Action Project, and Lecturer in Religious Studies at National Pedagogical Dragomanov University.

The role of religious organizations in addressing social and cultural policies has only intensified since the Maidan protests of November 2013-February 2014. One of the signature accomplishments of former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, whose slogan was “Army, Language, Faith,” was securing the Tomos that led to the creation of a canonically recognized Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU). In an already crowded religious landscape, the question now is how this new church might shape social and political policies. Will the OCU take a lead from its northern neighbor and maintain a close alliance with the state? This is a distinct possibility given the priority President Poroshenko placed on the creation of this church in the first place for building national solidarity and his active role in bringing it into existence. (more…)

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U.S. Interference in Ukraine’s Autocephaly: An Ineffective, Unnecessary, and Unlikely Affair

Robert C. Blitt is Professor of Law at the University of Tennessee Knoxville

At first glance, extending the Tomos to a newly established Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) may appear to have emerged with lightning speed, particularly in the traditionally deliberative world of Orthodox Christianity. But the reality attests to a much longer campaign to secure autocephaly for Ukraine, and to a larger, ever-seething rift among Orthodox churches over canonical legitimacy and control.

The Long Reach of U.S. Foreign Policy and the Tomos

Boosters and detractors of OCU autocephaly are divided over claims of government interference in the process of issuing the Tomos. An assessment of the effectiveness of Ukrainian and Russian government intervention is set aside for another occasion, though indications are plain intervention was the norm rather than the exception. In the case of the United States, some outside observers have claimed the U.S. government manipulated the Ecumenical Patriarch with millions of dollars in bribes to foster a schism in the Orthodox world, and that consequently, “the State Department, will have the blood of the little Ukrainian grandmothers and old men on [their] hands.” Parties more intimately engaged, including high-level officials from the Russian government and the Moscow Patriarchate, have espoused similar claims, if couched in more diplomatic terms. (more…)

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