Paper short abstract:

The war of the Russian Federation in Ukraine is a culmination point of upheavals in the post-Soviet sphere. In my paper, I analyze the role of Orthodox Christianity in these processes and for the preparation, interpretation and implementation of this war in the Russian Federation.

Paper long abstract:

Although there existed indicators for an imperialist tendency of the Russian Federation already for several decades, the escalation into a full-scale war against Ukraine came as a surprise even to most people in academia. Among other reasons, President Vladimir Putin referred to the religious dimension of the war in his programmatic speech on February 21, 2022. Putin’s reference to religion in this speech and in his historical interpretation deserve particular attention because they gained relevance both in domestic and global perspective. Moreover, Putin’s interpretation has been confirmed by Patriarch Kirill who gave further reasons for the aggression in Ukraine by mentioning the persecution of Russian Orthodox Christians in Ukraine and a widespread immorality. In this presentation, I am going to analyze the role of Orthodox Christianity for such developments based on fieldwork in Russia since the early 2000s.

Since the 1980s, the former socialist sphere is witnessing upheavals with major repercussions in the economic, political and religious sectors of society. In particular, it is the religious sphere – once persecuted and confined to the private domain – that is reemerging in public life and contributes to ongoing efforts of nation building, a re-ideologization of society at large and new interpretations of the past. For this, I will give ethnographic examples that show how Orthodox Christianity is deeply entangled with the political sphere. In this way, I challenge widespread descriptions that emphasize cooperation and legitimization but neglect the difficulties in the relation between the Russian Orthodox Church and the Russian state.