The Church of England’s Synod is debating the war in Ukraine today. There will be a vote on a motion that sounds uncontentious: Synod affirms the peace-making efforts of various churches, calls for the highest possible protection of religious freedom, and calls for UK political parties to work for a peaceful international order.
But sometimes blandness is offensive. It is a failure of Christian responsibility to debate the war in Ukraine with an air of neutrality. Synod should be sending a clear message that Russian Orthodoxy is a pariah church, a cheerleader of fascism. But, as I recently said in relation to Justin Welby, ecumenical diplomacy seems the only consideration.
The briefing paper attached to this motion is a swamp of obfuscation. It puts huge emphasis on the need to respect religious freedom in Ukraine. That sounds unobjectionable, unless you know that it’s a quiet encouragement of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, still loyal to Moscow (unlike the independent Orthodox Church of Ukraine).
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