Findings & Footnotes
-
- An excellent resource for keeping track of the religious aspect of the Russia-Ukraine conflict is Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe, published and edited by Paul Mojzes, a veteran specialist in thisfield. The monthly journal has published less on Russia, but it obviously frames the Ukraine situationin the context of Russia and its religious dynamics. The most recent issue (42:2) is devoted to the Ukraine war, including articles on the religious factors involved in Putin’s invasion; a chronology of church-related public statements on the war; the historical dimensions ofthe conflict within Eastern Orthodoxy between Moscow and Constantinople (the Patriarchate that a segment of Ukrainian Orthodox are now affiliated with); and several articles on non-Orthodox faiths and religious freedom in Ukraine, including the Jehovah’s Witnesses. Writing on the last topic, Roman Bogachev views the case of the Witnesses as a litmus test for religious freedom in the country and writes that there are “no complaints regarding the protection of the believers’ rights in Ukraine from domestic human rights activists or foreign observers, who in recent years have hardly received any complaints about forced conversion to a different religion. The unhindered operation of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Ukraine, especially in contrast to the temporarily occupied territories and some post-Soviet countries where this organization is banned (in particular, in Russia since 2017), is convincing evidence of the actual freedom of religion in this country.” He adds, however, that his research was conducted before the invasion and that the climate of religious freedom in Ukraine may drastically change. The journal is open access and can be downloaded at: https://digitalcommons.georgefox.edu/ree/vol42/iss2/12/
