Ukraine’s spiritual care for soldiers
One answer to Russia’s assault on religions in Ukraine is an expanding corps of military chaplains who prove care and solace to fighters on the front lines.
Military chaplains pray with soldiers in Ukraine's Donetsk region, on Dec. 25, 2023.
Reuters
Whenever the role of religion pops up in Russia’s war on Ukraine, it’s difficult for Ukrainians not to get angry. By the latest count, at least 630 religious sites have been damaged or destroyed by the Russian aggression. Dozens of priests, pastors, and theologians have been killed.
On Tuesday, Ukraine’s legislators passed a law banning any religious group in the country that supports the Russian Orthodox Church, which itself declared in March that the war has a “holy” purpose in defending a “single spiritual space” for “the Russian World.” To the Kremlin, that includes Ukraine.
Far less noticed during the war, however, has been a quiet effort by Ukraine to do what religion does best: provide spiritual solace.
Over the past two years, its military has begun to train dozens of clergy to be official chaplains and embed them with soldiers at the front lines. With help from NATO, Ukraine has now created the second-largest military chaplaincy in the world.
No matter what Ukrainian soldiers may think about the war in moral or nationality terms, many simply need help in dealing with trauma, grief, stress, and loneliness. And in a country with so many different faiths – the president, for example, is Jewish – the chaplain corps operates by a simple, ecumenical motto: “Being there.”
“We’re like doctors. We heal whoever comes to us, no matter who they are,” one chaplain, Master Sgt. Anatoly Ponomarjov, told The Christian Century.
He added, “People have their own particular practices, but here it’s a different microclimate, and we have to provide them with universal answers regardless of their religion.”
Another chaplain, Yevren Flysta, told The Associated Press last year that the soldiers are, first and foremost, “a spiritual person, and he must have strength, he must have support.”
Ukraine’s defenses during the war have been many: strong morale to defend its sovereignty, advanced weapons, and Western financial aid. But whether the country wins or loses, it has lately added another asset: spiritual security for its fighters.
One indirect battle for Ukraine’s future is Russia’s war on religious groups in the country. But for the soldiers, the war itself has become a way of reviving faith – there are, after all, no atheists in foxholes. Ukraine simply wants to make sure chaplains are there to provide compassionate care and spiritual solace.