What does the Vatican really think of the war in Ukraine? Since the beginning of the conflict, Pope Francis has fueled the vagueness. He denounces the violence, without ever charging Vladimir Putin, yet at the origin of this aggression and the resulting massacres. An attempt to create opportunities for dialogue with a view to obtaining peace, suggests the Holy See. However, some statements, on the “barking of NATO”, or calls to pray for the daughter of Alexander Dougin, a Russian extremist particularly vehement with regard to Ukraine embarrass the faithful. For Bernard Lecomte, great reporter, specialist in Eastern Europe and biographer of John Paul II, these procrastination demonstrate the Argentinian’s inability to “dominate the religious problem” inseparable from the war in Ukraine.
L’Express: Why does the pope cling to a very conciliatory position regarding the war in Ukraine? Why doesn’t he openly condemn Putin and Russia?
Bernard Lecomte: Pope Francis is in the continuity of his modern predecessors, Benedict XVI John Paul II, John Paul I, Paul VI and John XXIII. All of them, in their own way, dreamed of reconciliation with the Russian Orthodox world, of a union of believers from the west and east of the Old Continent. “So that Europe can breathe with its two lungs”, to use John Paul II’s formula. Pope Francis is no exception. He met Russian Patriarch Kirill in Cuba in 2016 with this in mind. It is therefore difficult to totally reject Moscow. And at the same time, Francis wants to be a pacifist, and condemns all forms of violence.
On this crest line, Francis comes up against resistance, against European traditions, against the complexity of the religious problem in Ukraine, which he is unable to overcome. Several of his initiatives have failed, such as the Stations of the Cross in Rome, which on April 15 was to unite in prayer a young Ukrainian and a young Russian. Coming from Francis, the idea was strongly criticized by part of the Church and by the Ukrainian government. Some Catholics were recently enraged when he called for prayers for the daughter of Russian far-right theorist Alexander Dugin, who died in an attack. Like her father, she promoted violence against Ukraine.
How to explain his numerous declarations considered, at the very least, as clumsy by a part of the Church?
François is from the south, from Buenos Aires, Argentina. Unlike the Pole John Paul II, who knew Europe and the Moscow Patriarchate very well, or the Bavarian Benedict XVI, Francis perhaps does not have in his fiber the extraordinarily complex history of the great rupture between the west and east of the Old Continent, and of the various Christian, Catholic and Orthodox communities present in Ukraine.
It should be remembered that the whole of western Ukraine is predominantly Catholic, of the Byzantine rite but rallied to Rome since the 16th century, to escape the patriarchate of Moscow, which at the time was inventing an independent and Orthodox empire, a kind of “third Rome”, after Rome and Constantinople, another seat of the Christian faith. These Catholics are therefore deeply anti-Russian, because they have refused the patriarchate of Moscow. Conversely, the East is strongly orthodox, rallied to Moscow.
All the same, certain expressions were particularly shocking, and do not stem from a form of misunderstanding of Europe. François, for example, denounced the “barking of NATO”…
Who talks about NATO barking? Cheese fries. It is his doctrine. Ukrainians can’t stand the pope taking it back. But, again, the pope comes from Latin America, a deeply anti-American culture. He’s not one to let himself think that Americans are the saviors of history. This could partly explain these statements, to say the least singular.
The Vatican recently affirmed that the Holy Father’s interventions were “unequivocal” and condemned “the full-scale war in Ukraine, unleashed by the Russian Federation”, a war “morally unjust, barbaric and sacrilegious”. Does the pope change his position?
This press release marks a correction, on the part of the Secretariat of State. François’ charm is that he doesn’t listen to his advisers. He is very spontaneous and outspoken, which is why he is loved. He hates to follow the classic path indicated by diplomats, which on the other hand tends to annoy those in charge. Sometimes adjustments are necessary. Unlike the pope, Vatican diplomats believe to some extent that one cannot dismiss as comparable parties, aggressors and aggressors.
In his defense, the pope’s position is very uncomfortable. His communication must include the spiritual, the irrational, but the pope is also sovereign head of state, in a context of conflict between two other sovereign states. He must at the same time take into account the faith and the geopolitical reality of the world, which can give rise to contradictions.
Is a trip to Ukraine possible?
A pope has already been to kyiv, in post-Soviet Ukraine, it’s John Paul II. Demonstrations against his arrival surprised him. These were actually demonstrations organized by the Moscow Patriarchate. Today, the Moscow Patriarchate has less power and Francis has repeatedly shown himself in favor of such a move. If he comes, he will still be well received, but some believe that he has not taken a strong enough stand for Ukraine, when it is clearly being attacked.
How to qualify the links between the Pope and the Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill, close to Putin? The two avoid each other?
Around the pope, many were relieved by the announcement of the absence of Kirill at the congress of religious leaders in Kazakhstan, scheduled for mid-September. A photo of the pope and the patriarch arm in arm would not have pleased Ukrainian Catholics, once again. In kyiv, we are therefore relieved. It remains to be seen whether Kirill’s absence is linked to the positions of the two leaders.
Their relations are actually particularly cold. During their first discussion, the pope listened to Kirill lecture him that the most important Christians were the Russians. The pope said nothing, preferring this position to silence. Perhaps the role of a pope is to go beyond the warlike positions of each other, but to play at the same time the role of a disinterested intermediary, while being a proselyte in essence, is to run the risk of tripping over the carpet.
Is the war reconfiguring religious allegiances in Ukraine?
Apart from those who recognize the Pope of Rome, there are two Orthodox Christian communities in Ukraine, one which depends on the Patriarchate of Moscow and Kirill and another from Constantinople. With the war, part of the first is breaking with Moscow. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church announced its independence on May 27. It is colossal in religious history. A schism, as if the French and Belgians said no to the Pope of Rome. That these Ukrainians no longer pray for Kirill, the patriarch of all Russia, is the marker of a civilizational rupture. This will have very profound effects in Ukrainian society.