Putin, the Church, and Ukraine

On the 9th June 2014, I wrote that,

"If Patriarch Kirill could raise Putin's status to sainthood, as Pope Francis recently did with John Paul II, he would do so gladly, and with all the pomp and splendour at his command. And if, in the process, the Russian people are once again reduced to serfdom, then so be it. Was it not during the era of the Czars, when the vast majority of Russians were serfs, that the Russian Orthodox Church was at its zenith?
Ironically, the utter failure of the Bolsheviks to excise the power of the Russian Orthodox Church from the heart of the Russian people has given Putin the perfect vehicle with which to emulate St. George, with the active help and support of Patriarch Kirill. One can only wonder at what is currently being disseminated amongst the people of Russia by the footsoldiers of the Russian Orthodox Church. The deafening silence of the Russian pulpits about the evil been done by Putin in Ukraine has, after all, its historical counterpart in Germany under Hitler. There is, truly, nothing new under the sun."

And now (6 Oct. 2014) it is emerging that the " .. role that Kirill's resurgent church played in the release of the [OSCE] monitors sheds light on how a close cooperation between the state and the church in Russia is now playing out in Ukraine.

What the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) presents as its humanitarian mission in east Ukraine, Western Diplomats see as a pattern of cooperation in which the church is acting as a "soft power" ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin" (Gabriella Baczynska and Tom Henegan) (see also Forbes)

It is well know that "[i]n the early 1990s and later on, Kirill was accused of having links to the KGB during much of the Soviet period, as were many members of the Russian Orthodox Church hierarchy, and of pursuing the state's interests before those of the Church. His alleged KGB agent's codename was "Mikhailov". (Tony Halpin)

Furthermore, "Kirill [was accused] of profiteering and abuse of the privilege of duty-free importation of cigarettes granted to the Church in the mid-1990s and dubbed him "Tobacco Metropolitan". The Department for External Church Relations was alleged to have acted as the largest supplier of foreign cigarettes in Russia. Kirill’s personal wealth was estimated to be $1.5 billion by sociologist Nikolai Mitrokhin in 2004, and at $4 billion by The Moscow News in 2006. However, Nathaniel Davis noted that "...There is no evidence that Metropolitan Kirill has actually embezzled funds. What is more likely is that profits from the importation of tobacco and cigarettes have been used for urgent, pressing Church expenses. The duty-free importation of cigarettes ended in 1997".(Wikipedia) and (Forbes)

Kirill in 1981

Like Putin, Patriarch Kirill also has expensive tastes in watches. Lest this be made public, a picture of him wearing a $30,000 Breguet watch was doctored so that the watch vanished from his wrist and was not on public view. However, sometimes things do go awry, as the pictures below goes to prove. They forgot to 'doctor' the reflection of the watch on the table.

Now you see it (un-doctored)                                          Now you don't (doctored)

The Kyiv Patriarchate, which has 2,781 parishes, split from the Moscow Patriarchate’s Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which has 11,358 parishes, in 1992, after Moscow refused to recognize the Ukrainian church’s independence.(KyivPost Oct. 2 2014)

The conflicts that now exist amongst the Russian and Ukrainian Orthodox Christians in Ukraine have been amplified by the growing schism between the followers of Patriarch Filaret, of the Kyiv Patriarchate, and those of Patriarch Kirill. 

As reported by the KyivPost (Oct. 2 2014), 

"[t]he Kyiv Patriarchate, which describes itself as patriotic and pro-European, has strengthened its position after supporting the EuroMaidan Revolution that drove President Viktor Yanukovych out of power. It has also taken a strong stand in support of Ukraine's defense against Russia's war. Now it is hoping that the wave of patriotic sentiment will help unify the two major Ukrainian Orthodox groups into a single independent church."

Patriarch Filaret

Furthermore, that "[t]he unification of the Moscow Patriarchate's Ukrainian Orthodox Church and the Kyiv Patriarchate will inevitably happen because Ukraine has become an independent state and must have its own independent church", said Filaret. (KyivPost)

Given the preponderence of parishes of the Moscow Orthodox Church in Ukraine, one can only begin to imagine what the Ukrainian members of those parishes, who sympathise with the EuroMaidan revolution, must be going through. Even more depressing for them, how do they now respond towards their priests from whom they seek spiritual guidance? And what about those priests themselves, who take their orders from Patriarch Kirill? 

Let us not forget that Patriarch Kirill "called the "12 years of Vladimir Putin's rule a "miracle of God (my emphasis)" and criticised his opponents, at a gathering where religious leaders heaped praise on the [then] prime minister." (Reuters Feb 8, 2012)
 

Where Kirill praised Putin

And now?

How does Putin's 'religious' oligarch sleep at night?

(to be continued)