Russian Orthodox Church theologically justifies the support of "SMO"

Tsypin calls not to identify the Gospel with pacifism. Photo: cypliv

Archpriest Vladislav Tsypin, Deputy Chairman of the Moscow Church Court, Doctor of Theology and Professor of the MDA, published a theological rationale for the Russian Church's support for the war in Ukraine on the Pravoslavie.ru resource. The priest called his work "Special operation in the light of the Christian doctrine of war and peace."

Father Vladislav Tsypin believes that on the battlefields “not sparing the blood of the Little Russians and Galicians, the post-Christian West seeks to bring Russia to its knees,” since the United States is losing “short-term hegemony over the world.”

According to the priest, the West has set as its task the reduction of the world's population, and "the blood of Little Russians has been put at the service of this super-task by the rulers of Ukraine ... who can hardly be suspected of rampant Ukrainianism."

According to Fr. Vladislav, "simple-minded Little Russians" protect their country from the invasion of the Russian Federation, because "they trust these clowns." Because of this, “streams of human blood continue to flow on the battlefields.”

The ROC theologian believes that "the military campaign unfolding in the steppes of Novorossia has a religious dimension", which "needs to be comprehended in the light of the Christian doctrine of war and peace."

However, Tsypin did not specify whether one should likewise reflect on the shelling and destruction of Kyiv and the rest of Ukraine.

He recalled that regarding the relationship of the Church to the world, “in the minds of many of us, there are prejudices on this score, up to the identification of the gospel teaching with the pacifist ideas of Leo Tolstoy, which, as is well known, were rejected by the Church in the most point-blank way.” According to the theologian, it is impossible to identify the gospel teaching with pacifism.

MTA Professor cites a number of fragments of the Old Testament and the sayings of the holy fathers, designed to prove that the Church allegedly approves of participation in hostilities. The theologian crowned them with quotes from the social concept of the Russian Orthodox Church: "The Church ... does not forbid its children to participate in hostilities when it comes to protecting their neighbors and restoring trampled justice."

The theologian called Ukraine "a separatist formation in the space of a single Russian world" and "a failed state", while the Ukrainian language – "Little Russian or Galician dialect".

According to the professor, in 2022, the Armed Forces of Ukraine were allegedly preparing a strike deep into the DPR and LPR, and therefore “Russia’s patience at the sight of the unheard-of suffering of civilians in Donbas” was exhausted.

Tsypin also expressed confidence that the core of the Armed Forces of Ukraine “is made up of Nazis who profess racist Satanism. The instigators of the war with Russia are the militant Uniates of Galicia – traitors to Orthodoxy – and schismatics from the OCU, as well as "the Europe-conscious" – idolaters of LGBT-slanted Western values.

Earlier, the UOJ wrote that according to Metropolitan Leonid (Gorbachev), as Ukraine was being conquered, the ROC would take away the eparchies of the UOC.

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