Father Artemy Vladimirov on the war in Ukraine [Video]

One very common sort of “bandwagon” idea floating around among many people is “war is not Christian.”

There are certainly several corollaries: “War is immoral (except when…)”, “Side X should just stop fighting and return to negotiations…”, “War is okay if you are the little guy against the big guy, but if you are the big guy, you are by definition a bully.”

There are many. I invite my readers to submit the variations on this theme that you know.

At first when the war in Ukraine broke out, I jumped on the “war is bad” bandwagon.

It wasn’t an honest jump.

In my heart I completely supported Russia’s move, but I was a bit afraid of its reality, because I know the United States and its government and people’s present state of delusion and insanity. Russian leader Vladimir Putin is often accused by the West of being “cold”, “thuggish” and so on.

However, on balance, Vladimir Putin is dispassionate, pragmatic and very practically minded. It may be easy to cast this as “cold”, but look who is making the accusation: A country full of people who are emotional, unstable, with the psychological constitution of spoiled brats, utterly faithless and fearful, in other words, completely driven by the passions.

This is not to say that all Americans are so out of control, but many are, and the present makeup of both the government of the country and the choices of its people are anything but Christian: Rather than trusting God, we are telling each other and the government that the government’s job is to take care of us.

But what is it when we truly trust God? The answer is surprising:

War is inevitable. Evil must be fought.

Our stories and culture is full of this face. The Lord of the Rings, The Chronicles of Narnia, Star Wars, The Marvel Cinematic Universe, and so many other collections of both old and modern great stories feature war. None of these stories feature conquest, but they do feature war in the sense of “sometimes you have to fight, when you’re a man.”

Further, all the wars and battles presume the existence of God, good and evil.

I will scandalize you all now: Only a secularist, a person with no faith in God, can honestly try the experiment of not fighting, and even then that person will fail.

It is simple enough to understand: Even a Godless person has principles that he or she think are important, and when someone violates those, how many such people just roll over and take it? Not many.

But Christianity tells us that war is inevitable. It even shows us that at the End of all things there is war in heaven itself, Michael and the Lord’s angels fighting against the Beast, Satan and his angels. The victory is certain, but the war is and will be fought.

As in heaven, so on earth.

And here we are, with a new war being fought that is actually a proxy conflict of two opposing ideologies: Secular Globalism versus Christian Traditionalism.

Now I bring to you a sermon preached by Father Artemy Vladimirov, translated and reprinted by Russian Faith, (but with slight edits if and where I found the language to be (in my opinion) not represented quite correctly). Father Artemy and Father Andrey Tkachev are both very well-known Orthodox Christian priests in Russia.

(Interestingly enough, my attempts to search for Father Artemy in Google are blocked when I do it on American-localized VPN locations. I guess the US thinks he is trouble. Let’s break that wall down.)

I know Father Artemy personally, and was actually surprised, because this is one of the most loving, gentle men I have ever met. But on this matter, he is solid steel. It is worth reading his words and considering what he says, because he shows us the true nature of this conflict, seen through the eyes of someone deeply in the Christian faith.

No one likes to be told he is wrong. But the anti-war view is wrong. It is not Christian. Evil is real and it must be fought, and fought in the manner that Archangel Michael did it “The LORD rebuke you!” but then any action taken is our service to the Lord. There is a sacred element to what is going on that must not be ignored.

Holy War Against the West – Fr. Artemy Vladimirov

This is “Holy War Against the West – Fr. Artemy Vladimirov” by pravoslavie on Vimeo, the home for high quality videos and the people who love them.

TRANSCRIPT

I congratulate you, brothers and sisters, on Thursday of Cheesefare week, or “Maslenitsa”, as people call it. We are approaching the beginning of Great Lent. On Saturday, we will honor the venerable fathers from the beginning of time, who have shone forth in the feats of repentance, fasting, and prayer. Let us seek their blessings, as we approach these holy forty days.

The following Sunday morning will begin with the remembrance of Adam being expelled from paradise. We are all the children of our forefathers, and though we ourselves have also sinned, we carry the cross of repentance together with them. We also rejoice, however, because the Redeemer has come into the world. He made the earth a gateway to paradise, offering us His grace to acquire eternal unity with Him, the Lord, to acquire salvation.

Forgiveness vespers will be this coming Sunday, and we will mutually forgive one another of any sins and offenses.

Those who attended the services on Cheesefare week could not fail to notice that on every day of this week, the Gospels are read about the suffering of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, as if this were Passion Week, right before Pascha. Indeed, during Cheesefare week this prepares us for fasting, and for the Last Judgment, reminding us how much the Lord did, and how much work he undertook for us, accepting the torment and the Cross. He awakens gratitude and love in us, and if we acquire it, then we will joyfully labor in Great Lent.

It seems that the passion gospels are also read these days for another reason. More precisely, they correspond to these dramas and tragedies that we are all experiencing now. Unfortunately, not all of our Russian compatriots understand what is happening. Feeding on incorrect information sources — and I’m not referring to the youth — certain cultural forces are cooperating with fascism.

“No war!” proclaim Galkins, Palkins, and other popular figures. For some reason, for eight years, they have been arranging evenings of recreation and laughter, while here nearby, in the Donbass region, people were shot daily, killed, raped, and burned, and their homes were leveled to the ground by the Ukrainian-fascist snakes that are being fed by Europe.

Now Russia is at war, as it always has been, with the collective West. What does the West give birth to? ISIS and neo-fascism. Here are their children. Behold their offspring! Here is the fruit of their spirituality, and of their life aspirations. They can only turn the planet into chaos. They can only raise cannibals.

And it’s really a shame for those of our compatriots (we don’t have such parishioners here), who today, twisted within the virtual world, are in solidarity with Kolomoisky, Avakov, Yatsenyuk, “bloody pastor” Turchinov, with fascists, cannibals, monsters of the human race, who by God’s permission are there, in the midst of our brothers in Ukraine, exercising their tyranny.

“But Father, in Suma and Chernigov, the Ukrainian people swear by heaven and earth that Russian troops in Energodar are using people as human shields, trying to keep anyone from taking control of the nuclear power plant there.”

For eight years, and I must say not eight, but twenty-five years, inhabitants of Ukraine have been teaching their children this lesson: “Kill yourself a Russian.” For twenty-five years they would jump on one leg, saying, “Whoever doesn’t jump is from Moscow!”

How many of those languishing in cells in Kharkov and Kiev are Russian people who did not agree to sell their souls to fascism? Who can count the number of girls who were raped? How many of our fellow countrymen have had their organs cut out and sent to Europe? It goes without saying that all of this will come out into the open.

Russian peacekeeping troops are carrying out a special operation in order to apply the Nuremburg process to all of Europe. Those who closely follow politics notice when the modern leaders of Germany ask, “What genocide?” It is like they are laughing and mocking. Thus they show their solidarity with Hitler.

But what else would you expect from foolish Europe? What’s worse was when Orthodox people, almost two hundred priests, sent an appeal to His Holiness Patriarch Kirill, asking him to help stop the war.

Is Russia really at war with civilians? Is Russia really bombing kindergartens and schools? The Fake News Factory – CNN – portrays such footage.

In fact, we are inflicting pinpoint strikes on military structures, on command centers where NATO puppets are coordinating this system of enslaving the Slavs. The next day, they pull corpses out of the morgues, laying them out in Kharkov around the building where the military command staff met, and they make fake news.

These people are lurking in deserted, dilapidated kindergartens and school buildings. They are Ukranian-Nazi drug addicts, as Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin calls them, knowing they are high on heavy narcotics.

These are people who have nearly lost their human appearance, like an animal, now showing its attitude towards Slavs and Ukrainians of Kharkov and Kiev, blocking their way out of the city, which is why the cleansing is being carried out so slowly. Russian peacekeepers are trying to avoid any casualties among the civilian population.

Meanwhile, the civilian population and the youth are being fed propaganda. For twenty-five years, they have been teaching the youth in Ukraine to pour Molotov cocktails in Odessa and Kharkov. They think this operation is a masquerade, a continuation of Maidan, even though it is eradicating fascism from Europe.

I repeat that what is being done now is not some kind of local, not a local operation. Today we are talking about cleansing Europe from any trace of fascism, which can give nothing to the world except ISIS and Bandera. They cover it up carefully. Lavrov demands that Europe be cleansed of nuclear weapons from the United States of America. This is what we are talking about.

We worked ahead of the curve, because if this operation had not begun, military operations would now be going on in the Voronezh, Belgorod, and Kursk provinces. And of course, if it is forgivable for Kharkovites and residents of the cities of Suma, Khitomir, Tiraspol, and Ternopil not to understand what is happening, it is because they caved in before fascism!

They ate and drank and prepared lard for winter, while next door in Novorossia, people were dying every day, and a genocide was being committed against baptized Russian people. Today, they are dissatisfied, finding themselves in bomb shelters, in the subway, leaving their big cities, and they are hindered by fascists, these non-humans, from whom Ukraine needs to be cleansed.

And today we must pray with special feeling and love for our army, commemorating the five hundred dead Russian soldiers, praying for the health of one thousand five hundred wounded Russian soldiers who suffered in the first days of this operation, sacrificing themselves for us.

We repeat once again that this operation in Ukraine is of a global nature. Russia, as always, is liberating the world from fascism, from a digital concentration camp. And a sign that Putin has messed up all the plans of the golden billion, which had almost triumphed in victory, turning the entire population of the earth into cattle, can be seen today in the abolition of QR-codes throughout our capital, and throughout Russia. This shows the exceptional merit of our President.

And this is evidence that the plans of Schwab, these globalists, and these Nazis will not come true — not in Russia, and not in any parts of the world that stand together with Russia, for which we thank the Lord.

Therefore, today, from all of us who cannot actively participate — Here in our congregation is a woman who signed up as a volunteer nurse. She will go to Ukraine as a qualified nurse, to help our wounded soldiers in field hospitals. Today, by deed and especially by prayer, we must unconditionally support Russians who are bringing liberation to the world.

Without delaying our reflection today, let’s say that this special operation in Ukraine was inevitable. This is the only way to force Europe and the Western world to partner with us. Diplomacy is good when diplomats have a revolver on the table. This is the only way for Russia to escape from the slavery in which, to a certain extent, we were bound for 30 years after the lawless collapse of our country.

All these sanctions are just a bunch of belching, proving the impotence of the West in the fight against Russia, which is regaining its sovereignty.

And one does not need to be a prophet to say that in six months, in a year, Russia will have all the conditions necessary for enormous economic, spiritual, and moral growth, because now all the bonds and chains are crumbling — those shackles which had been binding us, thanks to Mikhail Gorbachev and his own passivity in the nineties, which anyone can verify, if you know what materials to read, to analyze what is happening.

I want to congratulate everyone for having received the Holy Mysteries of Christ.

Let us rejoice at the fact that our capital is freed from digital control. Dear pensioners, rejoice! Now you can travel without restrictions.

We will prepare for the beginning of Lent, and for what we believe will be a special Pascha in 2022, when all Russian people from Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus will be able to march from Vladivostok to Kaliningrad as a single immortal regiment. Let’s hope that in the near future we will be joined by Moldova, Kazakhstan, and unfortunate Ukraine. Georgia is on the way, refusing to participate in the sanctions.

But you can guess what will happen to the Baltic states. Today, they serve as a transfer shipping base, supplying weapons for the extermination of the Slavs.

Please accept my blessings. Now we can all go home for private prayers, for victory over the dark fascist horde.

Glory to Thee, O God. — Glory to Thee, O God. — Glory to Thee, O God.