Yeah, it’s a liberal echo chamber. We need TAW modern and TAW classic. This place has changed….
Liberal echo chamber..?
Reverence goes both ways. You revere a Jewish atheist who shuttered canonical Orthodox parishes accusing clergy of spying. You revere a country that is knocking down Catherine the Great statues and statues of Pushkin in favor of a gay inappropriate content star, Billy Herrington along with other secular scum whom the West admires with glee. LGBT activism is on fire in Ukraine and Zelensky has openly spoken about eventual gay "marriage" kicking in, and for now he said he's hoping for civil partnerships. Gay pride parades have been growing in Ukraine. So, you support a gay rights president, a cancel culture president, and someone openly hostile to canonical Orthodoxy. But hey, that's ok. We all have the right to our opinion. Forget the fact that you believe the Monroe Doctrine only applies to your country, but not to other super powers, but that's ok, too. You have that right.
Were you as passionately upset about Kosovo being stolen from the Serbs as you are the Crimea (which was illegally "given" to Ukraine by Khrushchev, that Russia annexed after an election? Were you as upset about NATO bombing Serbia to death as you are mean Putin bombing Ukraine?
You are in good company right now---Biden, Harris, Mitt Romney, Lindsey Graham, the ghost of Warmonger McCain, gay rights groups, the EU, NATO, and the military-industrial complex. Considering such great folks you're surrounding yourself with opinion-wise, what could go wrong!? And since we're all being told to back Ukraine, hey, why not, right? It's not like the media could ever be biased or have an agenda! And, as a smart guy, I know you also know that secular modernists are ALWAYS synced up with Holy Orthodoxy!!!
I understand this wasn't a reply to me directly, but since you seem to put "us" all in one basket, I will reply just for the record.
I don't revere Zelensky. I remember when he was elected and my wife and I were watching his old (not that old) comedy troupe bits on YouTube. However, his presidency has come to symbolize the resistance that people show in defense of their children and elderly. Without Putin's attempt to destroy Ukraine, Zelensky would probably have been a one-term president known to very few outside his home country. So if you are displeased with the fact that some people now have positive associations with Zelensky,
you can reasonably blame Putin.
All the Ukrainian people I know are pretty conservative socially, without giving it any particular thought. The "west" of Ukraine, imagined to by some kind of LGBT hotbed of smut, is filled with people who have never even heard of or considered any of the nonsense that you (rightly) believe to be nonsense. However, Putin has succeeded in creating a strong association between resistance to that nonsense (sexual sin and the arguments associated with it) and his version of "conservatism" (murdering Orthodox Christians, bombing MP parishes, killing helpless civilians on purpose, trying to execute an entire country, poisoning the citizens of his own country, etc. etc. So rest assured that, if Ukraine survives, at least some people will be more open to the promotion of sexual sin that they were, because Putin has pushed the false line that the only choices are his "murder Christians" policy and LGBT stuff.
For this, you can thank Putin and his enablers.
Right is right, wrong is wrong. There are certainly public figures who are "backing" Ukraine because, for various reasons, it is popular to do so in certain circles (just as it is unpopular in other circles). Yet, right is right and wrong is wrong.
Sometimes, it can be hard to evaluate whether a given action is right or wrong. But sometimes it's not so hard:
Is bombing Orthodox parishes, with the specific and stated intent of destroying and "punishing" the civilian population right or wrong?
It's wrong.
Is executing bound civilians who could pose no threat to anyone right or wrong?
It's wrong.
Is making war on little children and their parents (many of whom are now widowed mothers whose husbands have been killed defending their families from Putin's maruauders) by depriving them of electricity and food during the winter, sending false bomb threats to the Telegram chats for parents of kindergarteners so they can have an even more panicked day, right or wrong?
It's wrong.
Is enslaving an an entire jurisdiction of the Orthodox Church and getting the hierarchs to, in effect, worship you as a god, while also paying honor to famous murderers of the Orthodox, such as Feliks Dzerzhinsky, right or wrong?
It's wrong.
I understand your desire to believe that there is a Putinite "holdout" against a bunch of stuff which you rightly believe to be wrong. I also hoped for some time that there might be some truth to this notion. There is no truth to it.
There are many holdouts in the US. There are many holdouts in many countries.
Putin is not such a holdout. He is not conservative. He is, to all appearances, an aggressive, Bolshevik-style atheist. He is the poster child for disordered passions. Litvinenko was murdered for trying to make public evidence that Putin was protecting himself from being found out as a certain kind of extremely twisted pervert. In service of this (likely) and other (materially obvious) evil passions, his enablers have managed, over a quarter-century, to cook up a kind of modern Stalinism. This time, they hijacked the "rebirth" of the ROC that seemed so promising in the 1990s so that "dissidents" would not have even the Church to run to, as they did in the 20th century. This project has succeeded for the moment. In the end, it will fail.
Hundreds of thousands are already dead. Countless children orphaned. Millions displaced. Who knows how many young children kidnapped from their families and stolen off to Russia to be Russianized. Countless weeping widows, families poisoned or destroyed for generations. Families with Russian citizenship, Ukrainian citizenship.
Putin could end it all today. But he will not because in serving disordered passions, with more resources at his disposal than most monarchs had throughout human history, he has backed himself into a corner from which he believes there is no escape.
If you really think the "West" is so evil and Putin is such a nice, sweet Barry Goldwater, you might consider moving there and asking about a path to citizenship. The language can be learned, and lots of people do speak English. It sounds like I'm saying this with sarcasm (okay, the bit about Putin being Goldwater was sarcastic), but I mean it. If you're right, you'll be with at least some likeminded people and you'll have lots of ROC parishes to choose from.
The sex-centered "wokeness" of today means letting disordered passions speak with your voice, with worshipping those passions and their expression as god. Putin is more woke than any of these repellent figures in the West. The mob boss for whom you have such respect is more anti-Christian than any ethnically Jewish atheist.
I am sorry to tell you this, but I must.
Sympathizing with Putin and swallowing his incoherent lies and claims to be serving Orthodoxy, you are in danger of falling ever deeper into a serious spiritual illness. Like those suffering from classical spiritual delusion (prelest), you believe that you are pursuing Christ when you are dancing to the tunes of spirits that are not of Christ. I would say the same to someone pushing trans-naming ceremonies or whatever in place of Holy Baptism. If that person was sincere, he would be sincerely deluded.
"Learn the truth about what Putin, and his tragic and lamentable spiritual cohort Patriarch Kyrill, are doing to Ukraine. It is a shameful atrocity of epic proportions!" -- Patrick Barnes, founder of the Orthodox Christian Information Center, from which I got a ton of good information years ago--hardly an insane, atheistic, ecumenist pit of promotion of sexual anarchy. Mr. Barnes says it clearly.
I started this message in sinful anger, but not even particularly against you. I am sorry for any needless offense I may have caused, inappropriate sarcasm, or any over-verbosity. I will try to end this portion of this message with a prayer for a spirit of repentance for myself.
May the Lord remember you in His kingdom, guerney!
O God, save Thy people and bless Thine inheritance. Visit Thy world with mercy and compassion. Exalt the estate of Orthodox Christians, and send down upon us Thy rich mercies, through the prayers of our all-pure Lady, the Theotokos and ever-virgin Mary; by the power of the precious and life-creating Cross; through the protection of the honorable bodiless powers of heaven; through the supplications of the honorable prophet, forerunner, and Baptist, John; of the holy, glorious, and all-laudable apostles, of the Twelve and of the Seventy; of the holy martyrs, passion-bearers, and confessors the First-Martyr Stephen, Philip of Moscow, Tikhon of Moscow, and all the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia and Ukraine; the unmercenary physicians Zenaida, Philonella, and Luke the Blessed Surgeon; of the fools for Christ Isaac the recluse of Kyiv, Nicholas of Novgorod, and Xenia of Petersburg; of the holy and righteous ancestors of God Joachim and Anna, and of all the saints, hear us sinners who pray unto Thee and have mercy on us. Through the mercy, compassion, and love for mankind of Thine only-begotten Son, with whom Thou art blessed, together with Thy most holy, good, and life-giving Spirit, now and ever and unto ages of ages.
