Newsletter #16: war in Ukraine and gay parades
In today's newsletter: litmus tests, Ukraine, Tolstoy, liturgy, gay parades, and Patriarch Kirill.
Happy Tuesday! Here’s what else is in the newsletter today:
Prayers for Ukraine, and Tolstoy
Ukrainian choir, Ukrainian liturgy
LGBTQ+ identities in the Catholic Church
Bad faith, litmus tests, and critiques of the Church
Litmus tests, Patriarch Kirill on Ukraine, and gay parades
Prayers for Ukraine, and Tolstoy
I had the privilege of singing with a choir for an ecumenical prayer service for Ukraine on Sunday. If you’d like to watch, the recording is available online here. (The pastor of our local Ukrainian Catholic Church gives some remarks starting at about 1:12:30.)
During the service, we sang one of my favorite choral works, Stephen Paulus’s Pilgrim’s Hymn. The piece was originally written for a one-act opera based on Tolstoy’s The Three Hermits. In Tolstoy’s story (spoiler alert!), a bishop and some pilgrims travel to a monastery on a fishing boat. On their way, they hear about a nearby island where three hermits live, seeking “salvation for their souls,” and the bishop goes to the island to visit them. The hermits tell the bishop that the only way they know how to seek salvation is by praying, “Three are you, three are we, have mercy upon us.” So the bishop attempts to teach them Christian doctrines and the Our Father. But they struggle to learn. He spends the night teaching them and, when he is convinced they have learned, he departs. But when he is leaving on his boat, they run after him on the water “as though it were dry land.” They tell the bishop that they tried to learn his teachings, but they had already forgotten, and asked to be taught again. The bishop responds, "Your own prayer will reach the Lord, men of God. It is not for me to teach you. Pray for us sinners."
In the opera, Pilgrim’s Hymn is first sung as the bishop is leaving the island. The text, written by Michael Dennis Browne, is as follows:
Even before we call on Your name To ask You, O God, When we seek for the words to glorify You, You hear our prayer; Unceasing love, O unceasing love, Surpassing all we know. Glory to the Father, and to the Son, And to the Holy Spirit. Even with darkness sealing us in, We breathe Your name, And through all the days that follow so fast, We trust in You; Endless Your grace, O endless Your grace, Beyond all mortal dream. Both now and forever, And unto ages and ages, Amen
You can listen to the Pilgrim’s Hymn sung as part of the evening prayer service for Ukraine here:
It was fitting that we sang a piece inspired by Tolstoy for the service. Tolstoy was a Russian man who could have excelled in war. He was praised for his courage during the Crimean War, but he was terrified at the loss of life. He left the army, focused on writing, and married. At the age of fifty, he underwent his most serious moral transformation. He sought the meaning of life in the teachings of Christ. He developed radical anarcho-pacitifist Christian views. And it was during this period, in 1885, that he wrote The Three Hermits.
The following year, in 1886, Tolstoy wrote Church and State (published in 1891). In the essay, Tolstoy writes how faith “invests life with meaning.” He writes how there is an amazing “absurdity” in the men who seek to spread the revealed faith but who also “damn, execute, and kill one another,” sometimes in the name of faith. Tolstoy argues against compelling another to change his faith “by violence, cunning, or deception.” He calls such conversions “false miracles” and “impossible,” since one cannot cause belief by force. These views push Tolstoy to condemn even “the idea of Church,” which many priests take to mean nothing more than: "Everything I am about to say is truth, and, if you will not believe, I shall burn you, or damn you, and in every way work you injury."
Because of his theological views, and his critiques of the Orthodox Church’s support of the Russian State and its wars, Tolstoy was excommunicated from the Russian Orthodox Church in 1901. Nonetheless, he continued to promote his Christian views, often through his writing, and argued that citizens should refuse to engage in warfare.
Ukrainian choir, Ukrainian liturgy
by Tucker Moore
The choir from St. Constantine’s Ukrainian Catholic Church in Minneapolis sang this setting of the Sub Tuum Præsidium Sunday night in prayer for peace in Ukraine during an ecumenical gathering of the Ukrainian Catholic, Lutheran, Episcopal, and Roman Catholic communities in the Twin Cities. It’s the oldest Marian prayer, dating to the 3rd and 4th centuries, and it was strikingly sung below the baldachino on which stands Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception above the high altar of the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis.
“Beneath your compassion, we take refuge, O Mother of God: do not despise our petitions in time of trouble, but rescue us from dangers, only pure, only blessed one.”
The Evening Prayer was a liturgy nerd’s thing of dreams, drawing on the inherently ecumenical practice of marking the close of day in candlelit hope. The image of the setting sun serves as a reminder of humankind’s frailty and mortality. And yet we still await the dawn of new days.
But it was the extra-liturgical components — children in traditional Ukrainian dress preserving their sung culture in real-time alongside the more guttural singing of their parents and grandparents draped in Ukrainian flags — that brought the prayer for the peace of Ukraine from the well-constructed liturgy guide into the hearts, minds, and souls of those gathered.
LGBTQ+ identities in the Catholic Church
I was recently invited to give a lecture at the Catholic University of America on LGBTQ+ identities in the Catholic Church. I spoke about Elizabeth Anscombe, the ex-gay narrative, and what it means to believe someone. You can check out the lecture below:
Bad faith, litmus tests, and critiques of the Church
I’m grateful for the positive reception of my remarks at Catholic University, and also the interest of many self-identified “conservative” students who attended the lecture initially with skepticism. The lecture has elicited some interesting questions about the nature of these types of events, and their place in Catholicism and Catholic education. I received a number of questions by email from one student who attended the event. The student expressed some of those concerns about the event and its relation to the promotion of Christian orthodoxy. If you’re curious, I’ve provided my response to the student below:
“Hi ______,
Thanks for coming to the event and for your question. I’m not sure I’ll be able to allay all of your concerns, but I do have a few thoughts.
One of your concerns seems to be the question: Where is all of this heading? You seem concerned about whether the issues I’ve raised are part of a long-term game to undermine the Church on questions related to sex and sexuality. I’m not sure that’s the most helpful question here. Consider an analogy to the clergy abuse crisis. As survivors came forward and raised issues with the Church, many were criticized, accused of just wanting to attack the Church and weaken the institution. For some (but not all) of the survivors, this was actually the case. But the problem with this argument is that it prevented many in the Church from facing real problems. In a way, the ‘long game’ doesn’t matter if what’s being raised are real problems that are harming the Church and Her children. Insofar as those problems are not addressed, there will certainly be long-term harm to both the Church and those children. There’s no way for me to lift the veil and prove my intentions, so what I usually invite people to do in those settings is to consider, not my motives, but the substantive arguments being raised.
As a matter of principle, I don’t answer ‘litmus test’ questions (questions raised in order to determine whether I’m ‘one of the good guys’ or ‘one of the bad guys’). In this context, that usually means questions about whether I affirm or reject a certain position. So in this exchange, I won’t share my personal view on the Catechism. You’re welcome to engage my writing, in which the answer to that question may become clearer.
In terms of my younger self (the self who held that we shouldn’t identity as ‘homosexual’ because it identifies us with our sexual desires, which is contrary to the positions of the Church), there are two issues. First, the argument functions so as to shut down the ability of people to talk about their experiences, and they’re reductive. Same-sex desires are much more than just a desire to have sex. (If you’re interested in reading more in-depth, I have an essay from 2019 in Logos Journal titled, ‘A Catholic Perspective on Homoerotic Desire’). Second, it’s just contrary to the catechism. The catechism talks about ‘homosexual persons.’ Clearly the Catechism thinks this type of language is acceptable, and helpful. I agree.
If you’re interested in reading more about these questions by LGB Christians with a ‘traditional Christian sexual ethic,’ there’s quite a bit at spiritualfriendship.org. It might be worth digging through.
I haven’t answered all of your questions (I have to hop off to catch a flight), but I hope this helps with at least some of them.
Best,
Chris”
I got a follow-up email, again pushing back against me for publicly “criticizing the Church.” The student also argued for the value of litmus tests, particularly in trying to sift through the culture wars. I had a few thoughts in response:
“Hi ____,
Prudence is good when giving a public critique of the Church. Perhaps because I have worked with so many victims of sexual violence in the Church, I am inclined to be more open to public critique. Public critique is often helpful to remind people that part of being the Church is seeking accountability for abuses, falsehoods, and other harms against the vulnerable. In any event, you and I just have different views on where the line falls for public critique.
I should also say that in my talk I wasn't ‘implicitly’ accusing prominent Catholics of gaslighting. In a number of circumstances, I explicitly made that accusation. Those Catholics may be well-meaning, but so were the Church leaders who covered up abuse. Their intention was not to harm the vulnerable, but to ‘protect the Church’ and the Church's reputation. Despite their good intentions, what they did caused harm, for which they ultimately needed to be held accountable when it was uncovered.
…
But I think our main point of disagreement in your last email has to do with the search for intentions. You said that in the ‘fog-of-culture-war,’ it's ‘critical to distinguish good-faith actors from bad.’ I actually see it the other way around. It's the search to distinguish such actors which drives much of the culture wars. What this comes down to is often a search for hypocrites, which is an endless search. Hannah Arendt explores this when she writes about the terrors of the French Revolution in On Revolution. She sees hypocrisy as a key sin of a post-revolutionary world:
‘The revolution, before it proceeded to devour its own children, had unmasked them, and French historiography, in more than a hundred and fifty years, has reproduced and documented all these exposures until no one is left among the chief actors who does not stand accused, or at least suspected, of corruption, duplicity, and mendacity… [No revolution] was complete without self-purges in the party that had risen to power. Yet the difference is marked. The eighteenth-century terror was still enacted in good faith, and if it became boundless it did so only because the hunt for hypocrites is boundless by nature.’
In the hunt for hypocrites, no one is safe, and trust becomes a death-sentence. And often the bad faith actor doesn't know he is such. The wolf in sheep's clothing often thinks he's the sheep. This is why it's often important to place a focus on objective actions and arguments, rather than scrutinizing intentions and potential pathologies.
This is one key way in which the ex-gay movement departs from the natural law tradition: rather than focusing on objective actions and directly associated inclinations in order to identify whether a thing is disordered, it seeks to dig into the deep subconscious in order to identify a pathology it insists must be present. The implications can be horrific, as when we excuse the sexual abuse of a child by a priest because he is under an ‘illness.’ He may be under an illness, but a preoccupation with the illness can hide the objective character of his actions. This approach diverges both from the natural law tradition, and from the Catholic understanding of sin. Bob Schuchts (one of the Catholic reparative therapists I discussed in my talk) has written: ‘I have come to discover that underneath every disordered desire, whether toward the same or opposite sex, there resides a healthy need that remains unmet.’ This statement does away with the reality of concupiscence and, in doing so, departs from the Catholic understanding of sin and the fallen nature of humanity. It also creates excuses for all kinds of horrible actions that various persons want to hide behind a ‘pathology.’
All that is to say that I have no doubt Bob Schuchts, Christopher West, et. al. have good intentions. But that has little to do with what I am trying to sort through: the ways in which their arguments and positions diverge from the reality of the human person and the tradition of the Church. You are welcome to try to explore whether I am working under good or bad intentions (or both). But I also suspect that will not be the most helpful approach for you, as it can function to distract from the actual arguments and positions at hand. I have no way of proving my intentions, and I have been scrutinized enough in this work that I know better than to try. This is partly why I refuse to submit to litmus tests. I've found that persons who insist on litmus tests are less interested in what I have to say and are more interested in trying to draw battle lines in a war where the battle lines are rarely indicative of the real ‘sides.’ I am trying to resist the culture wars by refusing to submit to its tests and divisions.
Anyways, thanks for the email, and have a blessed Lent.
Best,
Chris
Litmus tests, Patriarch Kirill on Ukraine, and gay parades
My engagement with the student above is relevant to the current Russian aggression against Ukraine, and, particular, to recent remarks by the Russian Orthodox Patriarch of Moscow. Last Sunday, the Orthodox Church celebrated Forgiveness Sunday. This is a very important celebration in the midst of Lent, where Orthodox Christians are called to offer one another forgiveness for any sins committed. During Forgiveness Vespers, the faithful will each approach the priest and make a prostration, praying, “Forgive me, a sinner.” In many churches, the laity will form two lines and make this act before one another as well, so that each member of the community can seek forgiveness for any sins committed against one another.
On Forgiveness Sunday, His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow offered a sermon to the Russian Orthodox Community. In it, he discusses the war in Ukraine, though not perhaps in a way that Christians across the world had hoped for. Kirill speaks of the hostilities as part of a broader conflict:
“Therefore, what is happening today in the field of international relations is not only of political importance. It's something else and much more important than politics. It's about human salvation, where humanity will be, on which side of God the Savior, who comes to the world as a Judge and Creator - on the right or left. Today, many people go there, to the left side because of weakness, stupidity, ignorance, and most often out of unwillingness to resist. And everything related to the justification of sin condemned by the Bible is today a test of our loyalty to the Lord, for our ability to profess faith in our Savior.”
Kirill dled not speak at all about the suffering of the people of Ukraine (who now comprise the largest refugee crisis since World War II). Instead, he speaks of Donbass, the region of Ukraine which for several years has been controlled in part by pro-Russian separatists and which Russia first invaded during the present war. Kirill speaks about a push to destroy the traditional Orthodox values of the people of Donbass and the encroachment of Ukraine’s acceptance of Western democratic ideals:
“For eight years, attempts have been made to destroy what exists in Donbass. And in Donbass there is rejection, fundamental rejection of the so-called values, which are offered today by those who claim world power. Today there is such a test of loyalty to this power, a kind of pass to that ‘happy’ world, a world of excessive consumption, a world of visible ‘freedom’. Do you know what kind of test it is? The test is very simple and at the same time terrible - it's a gay parade.”
Kirill criticizes Ukraine for not accepting the traditional Orthodox values of the people of Donbass (which Kirill associates with Russia), and sees the Ukrainian control of that region as part of an effort to destroy a religious heritage. But Kirill’s view is not shared by Christians in the region. Christians throughout Ukraine (who largely hold very traditional Christian values) have spoken of the religious tolerance of the country, which is contrasted with the religious intolerance of Russia. Archbishop Borys Gudziak, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Archeparch of Philadelphia, shared in The Pillar:
“Why did Russia annex part of Ukraine and invade another part? And why is it threatening invasion now? … The Russians are killing Russian speakers, they’re killing members of the Russian Orthodox Church, and the reason is because Ukraine is a nascent and, in many ways, a vibrant democracy… Ukraine has freedom of religion, and no church is favored by the state. No church, legally, is limited in its activity, as is the case in Russia.”
It is true that Ukraine has increased support for its LGBT citizens. In 2015, the Ukrainian Parliament banned LGBT discrimination in the workplace, but the country has not legalized same-sex marriage or adoption. And while the country had a large pride parade in September, the country hosted a large (primarily religious) counter-protest nearby. Unlike Russia, religious and LGBTQ+ communities have been learning to manage tensions and coexist. Now, both communities are being expelled from the country by Russian attacks.
Patriarch Kirill seems to not comprehend the Ukrainian suffering. He has no words of consolation for those suffering the Russian invasion. And this, in part, may be due to his reading of the invasion through the lens of the culture wars. For him, the test of good and evil does not hinge upon violent aggression (as it does for Tolstoy), but upon “gay parades.” And it is this focus which, in important ways, seems to hide the present war from him.
It is not that Patriarch Kirill condones war. It is, rather, that certain imaginative frameworks can function so as to hide war. Kirill is unable to condemn the war, because his moral frameworks prevent him from condemning the cultural “side” with which he associates (the autocratic Orthodox Russian regime) and defending the “opposing” “side” (the Ukraine which is embracing Western democracy and broad religious and other liberties). He cannot acknowledge injustices which do not coincide with the narratives established by his side of the culture wars. He also cannot see how both sides of the culture wars, in reality, share narratives that are mutually reinforcing, that need one another for vitality.
During the sermon, Kirill critiques a sort of illiberality which he sees increasingly in Western democracy:
“The demands for many to hold a gay parade are a test of loyalty to the very powerful world; and we know that if people or countries reject these demands, they do not enter that world, they become strangers to it.”
What Kirill does not seem to comprehend is how this dynamic cuts both ways. If certain Western powers use the absence of a parade to make certain peoples strangers, Kirill seems to be using the presence of a parade to make certain peoples strangers. The people of Ukraine became a stranger to the Patriarch because of his preoccupation with parades. That is, rather than really condemning the illiberality of Western stranger-making, Kirill mirrors it. This is part of the danger of war, cultural or otherwise: the more we engage in war, the more we start to resemble our opponent. Opposition, like desire, has an irresistible mimetic component.
What Kirill helps to demonstrate here are the horrors of the culture wars. Being pulled into them can prevent us from seeing wars where actual blood is shed, children are ripped from their homes, and cities are destroyed. And Kirill creates an opening for Putin to frame the war in terms of eschatology and religious values. Like many leaders in religious states, Putin has an opening to present his war as a religious crusade, as an attempt to promote and defend his religious values against “Western secularism.” He can hide the grab for power and empire under a veneer of “religious” zeal.
Here, Putin and Kirill might receive Tolstoy’s rebuke of Constantine: “On the one land, Christ, the Son of God, appeared for no other purpose than to redeem him, Constantine, and all the others. Because Christ died, Constantine can live as he pleases… Genuine faith may exist everywhere except where it is obviously false, - that is, addicted to violence. Everywhere, but not in Government-imposed faith.” That is, when the emperor is a Christian emperor, and the government a Christian government, then anything and everything they might do becomes marked as blessed. War is always religious war. The action of the emperor is always the will of God. Any action of any opponent is always evil. The distinction between good and evil loses significance, as the division becomes solely between the identified evildoer who must always be opposed and the identified good-doer who must always be defended. Because Christ died, Putin can do as he pleases. And the hearts of both the Church and the state die.
As we pray for the people of Ukraine, let us also pray for Patriarch Kirill and for the Russian Orthodox and Ukrainian Orthodox Churches. There are many Orthodox Christians in Ukraine who long to be fed by their leaders. They are homeless and starving. As we pray for the love of the pastor, let us, the sheep, minister to one another. Let us love and care for one another. Let us see one another, in wartime and in peace. Let us love one another, even as our nations’ leaders go to war. Let us never be blinded to one another’s sufferings by our ideologies. And let us wish for one another the peace of Christ.
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