Editor’s note: Any attempt by Russian Protestants to restore relations with fellow believers in Ukraine will have to engage with the raw pain expressed by Rev. Dr. Soloviy. Initially, the dominant Russian Protestant response to the 24 February invasion was horror. Leaders of the Unions of Evangelical Christians-Baptists across the former USSR—including those of Ukraine and Russia—appealed to Putin to turn to peaceful negotiation. Briefly posted online in early March, a petition signed by some 250 Protestant representatives, mostly in cities across Russia, further condemned their nation’s actions as fratricide, and called for repentance.
As with public demonstrations in Russian cities, however, vocal opposition quietened in the wake of the passage of legislation allowing up to 15 years’ imprisonment for criticism of the Russian armed forces (see “Russia Criminalizes Sanctions Calls, ‘Fake News’ on Military,” Bloomberg News, 4 March 2022, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-04/russia-topunish-sanctions-appeals-and-fake-news-onmilitary).
The Kremlin has subsequently co-opted some religious representatives in the promotion of its narrative defending its invasion as a “special operation” to “deNazify” Ukraine, as during the Second World War. Addressing a 29 March parliamentary roundtable entitled “World Traditional Religions Against Nazi and Fascist Ideology in the 21st Century,” leading Pentecostal bishop Sergei Ryakhovsky affirmed his strong support “for everything said” by other religious representatives at the event. This included denials of civilian casualties caused by Russian shelling of the besieged Ukrainian port of Mariupol, calls for Ukraine to be “cleansed” from Nazism, and claims that Russia was currently “a weapon in God’s hands.” Muslim leaders present provided particularly aggressive rhetoric. Applauded by Moscow Patriarchate representatives, if not Bishop Ryakhovsky, the chief mufti of Chechnya proclaimed Russia’s actions a jihad in which demonic opponents should be beheaded, while fellow North Caucasus mufti Ismail Berdiyev concurred: “We have to destroy them totally… there must not be any Ukraine” ([in Russian] “Kruglyi stol na temu: ‘Mirovye traditsionnye religii protiv ideologii natsizma i fashizma v XXI veke’,” 29 March 2022, State Duma of the Russian Federation, http://duma.gov.ru/multimedia/video/events/71233/).
Participation by Bishop Ryakhovsky in this event sparked outrage in Russia’s Pentecostal community. In an emotional video address, dissident pastor Albert Ratkin accused him of swapping “the Word of God, truth, and purity for nice offices, buffets, and canapes” ([in Russian] “V Gosdume Rossii episkop Riakhovskii rasskazal, kak ubivat’ s liubov’iu,” YouTube, 13 April 2022, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=02- 3ApXwSuo). In his open letter, Bishop Vitaly Kogan (Maksimiuk) of the Association of Siberian Pentecostal Churches said that he could not believe his ears: “What happened, Sergei Vasil’evich [Ryakhovsky]? Most Christians in Russia are silent now, and I do not judge them. But it is one thing to stay silent, and quite another to speak in support of those who are razing peaceful Ukrainian cities to the ground and crushing a fraternal people with tanks” ([in Russian]“Episkop Vitalii Kogan (Maksimiuk) Sergeiu Riakhovskomu: Ia bol’she ne podam tebe ruki,” Baznica.info, 15 April 2022, https://baznica.info/2022/04/episkop-vitalij-kogan-maksimyuk-sergeyuryaxovskomu-ya-bolshe-ne-podam-tebe-ruki”).
Bishop Ryakhovsky defended his actions in his own video response by claiming that the government roundtable had been about fascism in general terms, not Ukraine specifically. He declined to address the invasion of Ukraine or the recently discovered atrocities against civilians north of Kyiv ([in Russian] “Lichnoe obrashchenie Sergeia Riakhovskogo,” YouTube, 15 April 2022, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=duONRSQCmWk).
Even after Bucha, however, some Ukrainian and Russian Protestants have sought dialogue. In a discussion of Christian leadership during war, Pastor Yuri Sipko, a former leader of Russia’s Union of Evangelical ChristiansBaptists, agreed with Pastor Anatoli Kaliuzhny of Kyiv’s New Life Church that “subservience to the powers of this world”—such as by serving on state bodies in the belief that this would protect the Church—constituted “denial of the truth for the sake of worldly recognition” ([in Russian] “Khristianskoe liderstvo i voina,” YouTube, 5 April 2022, https://www. youtube.com/watch?v=H3KIh8qFTMo.)
Pastor Sipko also offered his own heartfelt response to the atrocities discovered outside Kyiv in a 5 April public social media post, here translated from the original Russian:
Bucha gives me no peace. Especially the lies of public officials — the streams of lies convince me that the process of dehumanization has gone so far that it cannot be reversed.
In response to the fact that atrocities have been discovered, the Ukrainian authorities say, “We are documenting everything. We are investigating everything. We will identify the perpetrators. Punishment is inevitable.”
The Russian authorities say, “It’s all fake. It’s all staged. It is all part of a global information attack against Russia.” Childish denials.
So what is the conclusion?
It is obvious. Before the Russian forces arrived, the town was thriving. When they left, it was a cemetery.
I am a Russian citizen, so this is particularly shameful and painful.
It is one thing for our military to cause such destruction in our name. It is another for Christians to line up to declare their support for this insanity. Religious leaders are not shying away from expressing hatred towards the whole Ukrainian people and calling upon our government to destroy Ukraine without mercy.
Public records that show the leaders of religious organizations fully support the government’s actions make all of them accomplices. And so I bowed before God! The Lord is weeping. I also wept.
It is Lent. We are approaching Easter. And we have been killing Ukraine for 40 days. We have been crucifying Christ for 40 days!
To what depths have Christians sunk if they approve of this? Pilate showed more humanity.
