Though I am 100% behind Russia's SMO in ukraine and have Russian stepfamily and in-law family as well as my son's godmother (one of my wife's nieces),which I consider just tradition as our child and I are both atheists, but I have watched this service out in the battlefield and never really understood religion's need to be a part of it. It seems to convey a religion's wishes that you go kill enemies and they hope you don't die, so you can go out with your god blessed weapons and kill more enemies.
Blessing weapons seems cringe to me. In fact blessing soldiers to basically go out and kill others, by a religious organization seems even more cringe. Religions are supposed to teach parishioners that the trinity dude said everyone should love one another and care for one another which to me doesn't include killing one another. Now mankind sometimes gets itself in positions where it must go to war as a request from friends (and they may later join your side totally) and that means conflict, war, military weapons, and the accompanying deaths that occur, but there is no choice or else extreme harm, death, repression, etc could happen to the side you are fighting for. And I can see how religion can help believers when they learn they have lost someone in the conflict, in whatever role they are part of. Religion is known to be a comfort during bad times for religious believers.
But all conflicts can be traced to many humans non-belief in humanism. Either one side is oppressing another side, such as we still see in the ukrainian constitution against non ethnic ukrainian citizens such as Russians, Tartars, Romas, etc., or there are two or more parties fighting over land borders or resources which could not be settled diplomatically. But still, sense would blessing soldiers to go out and kill and not get killed themselves, make?
Would it not make more sense for religions to stick to humanitarian work and helping believers who have lost loved ones, or having other personal issues related to the conflict, spiritually?
I was only a christian until my late teens when the hypocrisy was so blatant, that I could no longer pretend I did not see it, and humanism allowed me to care about and have close friends with the only requirement that they treat me in a caring way. Now I have friends who are gay, my kid's best friend is Trans and they also have many friends. But I understand my lifestyle isn't for everyone which is why I say religion should be helping believers who have lost in any wars, and religion could do a lot about heading up and directing humanitarian needs, which to me seem a better use of church resources. Maybe I am wrong, or maybe someone explain to me to goodness of priests saying these words over soldiers and weapons, if someone doesn't mind. I would appreciate it. I do not hate religion, and this is something I'd honestly like to understand and my wife not good at explaining and she's more a "goes to the church once a year" to light candles for her mom and dad and pay the priest to pray for them I thing, I only went once and she spoke too fast for me to understand. And the nearest Russian Orthodox church is 2 hour drive each way.
You say you don’t hate religion, but in the same comment you mock Christ by calling Him the “trinity dude”..? I appreciate that you admitted you don’t understand it, but not understanding something does not give you the right to mock said thing. My best advice to you, if you truly want to understand it, put in more effort to attend Mass on Sundays, attend Bible studies, there are even plenty of Orthodox YouTubers that make great videos explaining the faith.
Don’t take this as an attack either. I pray you find your way back to Christ and allow your children to let Christ into their hearts.
Been there, done that. Not exactly the "Russian Orthodox" faith but that's irrelevant, as christianity is christianity. I used the term "trinity dude" because first no one has ever been able to show proof sufficient enough for me to believe that there is a "god(s) or goddess(ess)" and so I just used something which I felt closely enough represent what most christians think of, without me having to use the term as though I was affirming it's validity, which I do not. So christians believe that their supreme being is made of 3 parts, two which they claim to know are to be depicted as male, hence Trinity=3, dude=male. That is as close as I could get. Secondly, I've watched Patrick and other independent reporters, most who aren't in the Donbas anymore and some unfortunately are gone to young. Plus I have grown up around a Russian stepfamily since the age of less than 3 and even though I carry no Russian blood, I was proud of my stepfamily and because of the super red farming town I grew up in, paid the price for that when the bigger boys found a tiny kid that was easy to beat the shit out of and call a commie and pinko his stepmother was a Russian (and it was the 1960s) and because the bullies' parents were xenophobes and bigots, just like the ones today who are the Russophobes and the homophobes that need to be stuck on an island with all the other fascists and Transphobes until they learn to play nice with the other kids on the playground. My wife was born in Soviet Russia and pieces of the drone that Russian air defense shot down over the bomber training base in Ryazan hit but only 2-3 blocks from our flat my wife owns there, as those flats used to be the Air Force military housing units for officers [my father-in-law was a major running numerous maintenance facilities there and we had numerous interesting conversations regarding RussiAmerican military interactions during the Cold War of the 1960s-1970s, anyway off topic, sorry] and hers is the flat she lived in from birth until one month after 9/11 when she got her visa and flew to the u.s. when she was 36. And everything was fine she has her own studio business and respected among her peers until 2/2022 came and the Facebook posts kept coming and the dirty looks when out in public and the snide whispers in the checkout line because, even though her english is good, she has a well defined Russian accent. It got to the point that I convinced her to let me go with her even in daylight because many americans are mentally unstable, dangerous people. In April 2022 a former colleague of mine, left a voicemail with a death threat for my family because my wife is Russian and by extension our kid is half Russian. So I know all I need to know about christianity, Russia, bigotry, Russophobia, all I wanted to understand was why was the church blessing soldiers and weapons, which is the question you did not answer, sir. Nobody mocked you and certainly not your supreme being as I do not believe there is such a thing. And the mere fact that you believe it is all fine and good, but entirely irrelevant to the discussion. If I was going to mock your faith, whatever it is, I would have written a long paragraph or two doing it, but I don't feel the need to mock someone's honest beliefs, that's up to them, but at the same time I do not feel I am under any obligation to word my questions in a manner which would suit a believer. If you feel I've offended you by mocking you, my apologies, as I have done a very, very poor scholarly job of it.
I’m pretty sure since you used to be Christian, then you know Christ’s name is Jesus, and could have used His name instead.
As for the Russian priest blessing the soldiers and the weapons, which I believe was just the drone, correct me if I’m wrong, the best answer I could give you as someone who isn’t a theologian, is that the priest is invoking God to protect the soldiers in their fight as I believe the stance of the Russian Orthodox Church on this conflict would be that the Russians are fighting against evil.
In saying that, you’re asking this really good question in the wrong place. The chances of someone that would actually be able to answer your question being on here are minuscule at best. Again, engage more intently with the Orthodox Church, join Orthodox forums online, ask a priest directly. I’m not sure why you left the faith and I’m not judging you for it, like I said I pray that you allow Christ back into your life, including your children.
Also, my parents are from Iraq but I was born and raised in the states. I was only 4 when 9/11 happened but I still remember it clear as day, my mom, grandpa, and uncle sitting on the couch, my mom with her hands on her face terrified, my uncle speechless, and my grandpa saying what’s happening, how can this happen, etc.., and me standing in front of my mom looking back and forth between the tv and my mom, concerned because of her reaction. By the time I was 7 and in second grade, I was getting called all kinds of racial slurs by my white class mates like camel jockey, terrorist, sand *n word*, osama bin laden (mind you I’m Christian lol) so I can say I know what you and your wife have been through and feel for you both. Americans can be really dense and stubborn to open their eyes and take in all perspectives. Ive been following this whole series of events since the Maidan riots in 2014 and even wrote a paper in my junior year in high school in favor of Russia.
Nabil, I believe this is more like a good conversation, interestingfor me. I'm not going to spend a lot of time researching the question of why priests of the Russian Orthodox faith (I believe other religions do as well) because I sleep for 18, and occasionally 16 hours per day. This is due to a bodywide nerve disease, a brain injury to the along the right side (including resulting epilepsies), the 10-20 migraines including the 5-7 severe migraines each month and the numerous medications I must take for all of these, in order to have the best quality of life possible for me. I am 62, a late parent with a kid born when I was 41. I was taught starting at 6 years old that everything the Bible said was true and actually happened and was not just poetry or myth. But as I got older with a fascination for science, the Bible wasn't matching up to science discoveries and religious organizations were going into archeological sites and trying to make discovery match biblical texts, rather than making the discoveries and seeing where they lead you, which is what science does. And yes, science makes mistakes, which is why science never claims an absolute, other than some forms of mathematics I've heard (maybe they seen it change idk). But the Bible claims absolutes, so when it makes a mistake, it has to twist itself
really far in order to keep the Bible looking unchanged or incorrect. Now, trying to thing of things right off the top of my head is difficult since my injures have been speeding up my cognitive decline in the last 5 years or so. I assure you it is not a pleasant thing to go through and understand it will not be reversing! LOL But, if you can laugh at yourself in a non-depracating fashion, it's not so bad. So basically the topic was right there and that's why I asked the question. I figured there might be a parishioner(s) subscribed to Patrick's substance that might be able to answer the question and if not, I would lose any sleep over it and likely would forget the question is on my notepad until I had some reason to see the list again as my short-term memory is suffering a fair amount as well. I had forgotten we even chatted before, but the email received saying you replied to my post made me curious, so I opened it, read it and then remembered we had chatted before. But I had to read all the posts and replies to
read familiarize myself with what was said before. Ah, welcome to my world! LOL
A former intern and a long (24 yrs now) time friend of mine grew up in Afghanistan and one of his older brothers and him escaped that country when both Russia and the u.s. were fighting there and some members of the Mujahideen led them out of Afghanistan on the route through Pakistan. He went back years later BY HIMSELF through the same route and network to bring his mother back to the u.s. and said it was their religion's supreme being or prophet (idk anything about Islam) which helped them, he's a Muslim and his wife's a Polish christian. But I'm falling asleep and having to retype many mistakes, so I need to take my afternoon medications then go to sleep. Thanks for the chat and maybe we will catch up again soon. Take care and best wishes to you and your family. 🤠
@PatrickLancasterNewsToday No offence to any other Faith, that is fighting the Luciferians. e.g Chechen Muslims ☪️. Good Luck Russia and its Internal Republics 🇷🇺 🪆. The Lord of Host is with you. Enjoy the Song 🎵.
"Oh Lord, Save Thy People and Bless Thine Inheritance.
Grant victory to Orthodox Christians over their adversaries and by virtue of Thy Cross preserve Thy Habitation. "
Amen+
Lord is my shepherd I shall not be in want he makes me lied down to green pastures he restores my soul…..
I hope you were blessed too Patrick. You are a brave man reporting to us from the war front
So moving. Thank you Patrick
Though I am 100% behind Russia's SMO in ukraine and have Russian stepfamily and in-law family as well as my son's godmother (one of my wife's nieces),which I consider just tradition as our child and I are both atheists, but I have watched this service out in the battlefield and never really understood religion's need to be a part of it. It seems to convey a religion's wishes that you go kill enemies and they hope you don't die, so you can go out with your god blessed weapons and kill more enemies.
Blessing weapons seems cringe to me. In fact blessing soldiers to basically go out and kill others, by a religious organization seems even more cringe. Religions are supposed to teach parishioners that the trinity dude said everyone should love one another and care for one another which to me doesn't include killing one another. Now mankind sometimes gets itself in positions where it must go to war as a request from friends (and they may later join your side totally) and that means conflict, war, military weapons, and the accompanying deaths that occur, but there is no choice or else extreme harm, death, repression, etc could happen to the side you are fighting for. And I can see how religion can help believers when they learn they have lost someone in the conflict, in whatever role they are part of. Religion is known to be a comfort during bad times for religious believers.
But all conflicts can be traced to many humans non-belief in humanism. Either one side is oppressing another side, such as we still see in the ukrainian constitution against non ethnic ukrainian citizens such as Russians, Tartars, Romas, etc., or there are two or more parties fighting over land borders or resources which could not be settled diplomatically. But still, sense would blessing soldiers to go out and kill and not get killed themselves, make?
Would it not make more sense for religions to stick to humanitarian work and helping believers who have lost loved ones, or having other personal issues related to the conflict, spiritually?
I was only a christian until my late teens when the hypocrisy was so blatant, that I could no longer pretend I did not see it, and humanism allowed me to care about and have close friends with the only requirement that they treat me in a caring way. Now I have friends who are gay, my kid's best friend is Trans and they also have many friends. But I understand my lifestyle isn't for everyone which is why I say religion should be helping believers who have lost in any wars, and religion could do a lot about heading up and directing humanitarian needs, which to me seem a better use of church resources. Maybe I am wrong, or maybe someone explain to me to goodness of priests saying these words over soldiers and weapons, if someone doesn't mind. I would appreciate it. I do not hate religion, and this is something I'd honestly like to understand and my wife not good at explaining and she's more a "goes to the church once a year" to light candles for her mom and dad and pay the priest to pray for them I thing, I only went once and she spoke too fast for me to understand. And the nearest Russian Orthodox church is 2 hour drive each way.
You say you don’t hate religion, but in the same comment you mock Christ by calling Him the “trinity dude”..? I appreciate that you admitted you don’t understand it, but not understanding something does not give you the right to mock said thing. My best advice to you, if you truly want to understand it, put in more effort to attend Mass on Sundays, attend Bible studies, there are even plenty of Orthodox YouTubers that make great videos explaining the faith.
Don’t take this as an attack either. I pray you find your way back to Christ and allow your children to let Christ into their hearts.
Been there, done that. Not exactly the "Russian Orthodox" faith but that's irrelevant, as christianity is christianity. I used the term "trinity dude" because first no one has ever been able to show proof sufficient enough for me to believe that there is a "god(s) or goddess(ess)" and so I just used something which I felt closely enough represent what most christians think of, without me having to use the term as though I was affirming it's validity, which I do not. So christians believe that their supreme being is made of 3 parts, two which they claim to know are to be depicted as male, hence Trinity=3, dude=male. That is as close as I could get. Secondly, I've watched Patrick and other independent reporters, most who aren't in the Donbas anymore and some unfortunately are gone to young. Plus I have grown up around a Russian stepfamily since the age of less than 3 and even though I carry no Russian blood, I was proud of my stepfamily and because of the super red farming town I grew up in, paid the price for that when the bigger boys found a tiny kid that was easy to beat the shit out of and call a commie and pinko his stepmother was a Russian (and it was the 1960s) and because the bullies' parents were xenophobes and bigots, just like the ones today who are the Russophobes and the homophobes that need to be stuck on an island with all the other fascists and Transphobes until they learn to play nice with the other kids on the playground. My wife was born in Soviet Russia and pieces of the drone that Russian air defense shot down over the bomber training base in Ryazan hit but only 2-3 blocks from our flat my wife owns there, as those flats used to be the Air Force military housing units for officers [my father-in-law was a major running numerous maintenance facilities there and we had numerous interesting conversations regarding RussiAmerican military interactions during the Cold War of the 1960s-1970s, anyway off topic, sorry] and hers is the flat she lived in from birth until one month after 9/11 when she got her visa and flew to the u.s. when she was 36. And everything was fine she has her own studio business and respected among her peers until 2/2022 came and the Facebook posts kept coming and the dirty looks when out in public and the snide whispers in the checkout line because, even though her english is good, she has a well defined Russian accent. It got to the point that I convinced her to let me go with her even in daylight because many americans are mentally unstable, dangerous people. In April 2022 a former colleague of mine, left a voicemail with a death threat for my family because my wife is Russian and by extension our kid is half Russian. So I know all I need to know about christianity, Russia, bigotry, Russophobia, all I wanted to understand was why was the church blessing soldiers and weapons, which is the question you did not answer, sir. Nobody mocked you and certainly not your supreme being as I do not believe there is such a thing. And the mere fact that you believe it is all fine and good, but entirely irrelevant to the discussion. If I was going to mock your faith, whatever it is, I would have written a long paragraph or two doing it, but I don't feel the need to mock someone's honest beliefs, that's up to them, but at the same time I do not feel I am under any obligation to word my questions in a manner which would suit a believer. If you feel I've offended you by mocking you, my apologies, as I have done a very, very poor scholarly job of it.
I’m pretty sure since you used to be Christian, then you know Christ’s name is Jesus, and could have used His name instead.
As for the Russian priest blessing the soldiers and the weapons, which I believe was just the drone, correct me if I’m wrong, the best answer I could give you as someone who isn’t a theologian, is that the priest is invoking God to protect the soldiers in their fight as I believe the stance of the Russian Orthodox Church on this conflict would be that the Russians are fighting against evil.
In saying that, you’re asking this really good question in the wrong place. The chances of someone that would actually be able to answer your question being on here are minuscule at best. Again, engage more intently with the Orthodox Church, join Orthodox forums online, ask a priest directly. I’m not sure why you left the faith and I’m not judging you for it, like I said I pray that you allow Christ back into your life, including your children.
Also, my parents are from Iraq but I was born and raised in the states. I was only 4 when 9/11 happened but I still remember it clear as day, my mom, grandpa, and uncle sitting on the couch, my mom with her hands on her face terrified, my uncle speechless, and my grandpa saying what’s happening, how can this happen, etc.., and me standing in front of my mom looking back and forth between the tv and my mom, concerned because of her reaction. By the time I was 7 and in second grade, I was getting called all kinds of racial slurs by my white class mates like camel jockey, terrorist, sand *n word*, osama bin laden (mind you I’m Christian lol) so I can say I know what you and your wife have been through and feel for you both. Americans can be really dense and stubborn to open their eyes and take in all perspectives. Ive been following this whole series of events since the Maidan riots in 2014 and even wrote a paper in my junior year in high school in favor of Russia.
Nabil, I believe this is more like a good conversation, interestingfor me. I'm not going to spend a lot of time researching the question of why priests of the Russian Orthodox faith (I believe other religions do as well) because I sleep for 18, and occasionally 16 hours per day. This is due to a bodywide nerve disease, a brain injury to the along the right side (including resulting epilepsies), the 10-20 migraines including the 5-7 severe migraines each month and the numerous medications I must take for all of these, in order to have the best quality of life possible for me. I am 62, a late parent with a kid born when I was 41. I was taught starting at 6 years old that everything the Bible said was true and actually happened and was not just poetry or myth. But as I got older with a fascination for science, the Bible wasn't matching up to science discoveries and religious organizations were going into archeological sites and trying to make discovery match biblical texts, rather than making the discoveries and seeing where they lead you, which is what science does. And yes, science makes mistakes, which is why science never claims an absolute, other than some forms of mathematics I've heard (maybe they seen it change idk). But the Bible claims absolutes, so when it makes a mistake, it has to twist itself
really far in order to keep the Bible looking unchanged or incorrect. Now, trying to thing of things right off the top of my head is difficult since my injures have been speeding up my cognitive decline in the last 5 years or so. I assure you it is not a pleasant thing to go through and understand it will not be reversing! LOL But, if you can laugh at yourself in a non-depracating fashion, it's not so bad. So basically the topic was right there and that's why I asked the question. I figured there might be a parishioner(s) subscribed to Patrick's substance that might be able to answer the question and if not, I would lose any sleep over it and likely would forget the question is on my notepad until I had some reason to see the list again as my short-term memory is suffering a fair amount as well. I had forgotten we even chatted before, but the email received saying you replied to my post made me curious, so I opened it, read it and then remembered we had chatted before. But I had to read all the posts and replies to
read familiarize myself with what was said before. Ah, welcome to my world! LOL
A former intern and a long (24 yrs now) time friend of mine grew up in Afghanistan and one of his older brothers and him escaped that country when both Russia and the u.s. were fighting there and some members of the Mujahideen led them out of Afghanistan on the route through Pakistan. He went back years later BY HIMSELF through the same route and network to bring his mother back to the u.s. and said it was their religion's supreme being or prophet (idk anything about Islam) which helped them, he's a Muslim and his wife's a Polish christian. But I'm falling asleep and having to retype many mistakes, so I need to take my afternoon medications then go to sleep. Thanks for the chat and maybe we will catch up again soon. Take care and best wishes to you and your family. 🤠
@PatrickLancasterNewsToday No offence to any other Faith, that is fighting the Luciferians. e.g Chechen Muslims ☪️. Good Luck Russia and its Internal Republics 🇷🇺 🪆. The Lord of Host is with you. Enjoy the Song 🎵.
Best wishes from the UK.
https://youtu.be/6ak0Z7drDTk?si=vg70u4osY-BREhxd