‘Evangelical Protestants Should Not Be Directing US Foreign Policy’

 

Masterclasses are all the rage right now, so we’ll hop on that bandwagon for a moment and say that if anyone wants a masterclass on why Evangelical Protestants shouldn’t be in charge of United States foreign policy, he will have a difficult time finding a better one than the opening segment of American Family Radio’s Today’s Issues for Monday, 18 Aug. 2025.

We have a lot of respect for AFR’s parent organization, the American Family Association, for its work in promoting Christian culture by combating abortion, pornography, the LGBT cult, and so on.  But the political and religious programming on AFR can be a real trainwreck sometimes.  So it was on Today’s Issues.

The segment in question featured a discussion of the Ukraine-Russia war in the wake of the meeting between Presidents Trump and Putin, and the commentators, who are supposedly well-informed on current events, couldn’t stop mouthing the dishonest talking points that permeate the mainstream Western press:

1.  Putin invaded the Ukraine without provocation and without justification for the sake of acquiring resource-rich lands.

This kind of statement was excusable in the opening days of the war, when passions were running high and reporting was chaotic.  But it has now been going for more than three years since the war began.  That is plenty of time to do the necessary research into the background of the conflict.  The commentators on TI have not done that research.  Let’s help them.

Many folks in the West live in a make-believe world where nothing happened in the Ukraine prior to 2022.  Pres Putin one day just woke up (so this fanciful thinking goes) and decided to go to war with the Ukraine because he’s an evil dictator who wants to re-establish the Soviet Union.

There is actually a very long history surrounding Western aggression toward Russia on her western marches, and Russia’s efforts to fend it off.  More recently was the US-EU sponsored coup in the Ukraine in 2014 that turned her into a puppet state of the West to be used precisely for destabilization operations against Russia.  The RAND Corporation’s 2019 document ‘Overextending and Unbalancing Russia’ specifically mentions weaponizing the Ukraine against Russia.  Thousands of people in the eastern provinces of the Ukraine, which culturally are very close to Russia, had also been killed by the murderous Kiev regime from 2014 to 2022, when Russia had finally had enough of Western treachery and took matters into her own hands to protect herself and her friends within the Ukraine from that Western puppet government.

But Western aggression against Russia extends much further back in time.  Ben Dixon wrote a series of essays that go into great depth on Western-Russian relations in centuries past (one of them is here).  We will simply note a couple of examples in this regard.  The first is one of the earliest examples of the post-Orthodox West’s attempts to subjugate Russia, via the Roman Catholics during the life of the wonderful prince St Alexander Nevsky:

A very troublesome time had begun in Russian history: from the East came the Mongol Horde destroying everything in their path; from the West came the forces of the Teutonic Knights, which blasphemously and with the blessing of the Roman Pope, called itself “Cross-bearers” by wearing the Cross of the Lord. In this terrible hour the Providence of God raised up for the salvation of Russia holy Prince Alexander, a great warrior, man of prayer, ascetic and upholder of the Land of Russia. “Without the command of God there would not have been his prince.”

 

 . . . The Teutonic Knights remained a dangerous enemy. In a lightning-quick campaign in 1241 Saint Alexander recaptured the ancient Russian fortress of Kopore, expelling the knights. But in 1242, the Germans succeeded capturing Pskov. The enemy boasted of “subjecting all the Slavic nation.” Saint Alexander, setting forth in a winter campaign, liberated Pskov, that ancient home of the Holy Trinity, and in spring of the year 1242 fought a decisive battle against the Teutonic Order. On the ice of Lake Chud both armies clashed on April 5, 1242. Raising his hands towards the heavens, Saint Alexander prayed: “Judge me, O God, and judge my strife with a boastful nation and grant help to me, O God, as to Moses of old against Amalek, and to my great-grandfather Yaroslav the Wise against accursed Svyatopolk.”

 

By his prayer, by the help of God, and by military might the Crusaders were completely destroyed. There was a terrible slaughter, and there was such a crashing of striking spears and swords that it seemed as though the frozen lake were in motion and not solid ice, since it was covered with blood. When they turned to flee, the enemy was pursued and slashed by Alexander’s army “as if they sped through the air, and there was nowhere for the enemy to flee.” Later, they led a multitude of captives behind the holy prince, marching in disgrace.

 

Contemporaries clearly understood the universal historical significance of the Great Battle of the Ice, and the name of Saint Alexander was celebrated throughout Holy Russia, “through all the lands, from the Egyptian Sea to Mount Ararat, from both sides of the Varangian Sea to Great Rome.”

 

The western boundaries of the Russian land were safely secured . . . .

The other comes from the time of the Protestant Reformation:

In the course of its centuries-old history, Valaam Monastery, located near the border of Great Novgorod with Sweden, was repeatedly ravaged by the Swedes. The latter were attracted both by a desire for profit and by a desire to plant the Latin faith in the surrounding lands.

 

Under King Gustav Vasa (1523-1560), the Reformation took place in Sweden. During the reign of his son John III, a military detachment of Lutheran converts, who, according to St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov), " still breathed a fanatical predilection for their newborn faith," pursued the Orthodox King, crossed the ice from the mainland to the island and attacked the Monastery. February 20, 1578 " 18 old men and 16 novices were martyred for their steadfastness in the Orthodox Faith." Their names with the note "beaten by the Germans on Valaam elders and servants" were entered into the Synodikon, which later ended up in Vasiliev Monastery: Hieromonk Titus, Schema-monk Tikhon, Monk Gelasios, Monk Sergius, Monk Barlaam, Monk Savva, Monk Konon, Monk Sylvester, Monk Cyprian, Monk Pimen, Monk John, Monk Samon, Monk Jonah, Monk David, Monk Cornelius, Monk Niphon, Monk Athanasios, Monk Serapion, Monk Barlaam, the novices Athanasios, Anthony, Luke, Leóntios, Thomas, Dionysios, Philip, Ignatius, Basil, Pakhomios, Basil, Theophilos, John, Theodore, and John.

2.  The second dishonest talking point regards the so-called kidnapped Ukrainian children taken by the Russian army.  War propaganda featuring fake atrocities committed against children is a hallmark of modern Western countries.  England used it against the Germans in WWI; the US famously used it against Iraq in 1990 – the much-ballyhooed testimony that Saddam Hussein’s goons were taking babies from hospital incubators and murdering them, which was later proven to be a fabrication.

The Western countries are stooping to this strategy once again vis-à-vis Russia.  But, again, a little research dispels the lies at once.  Mrs Helen Andrews, who possesses and displays a ruthless precision in her research and writing, put this claim to rest more than a year ago:

 . . .

The rest may be here:

https://orthodoxreflections.com/evangelical-protestants-should-not-be-directing-us-foreign-policy/

Or here:

https://www.helleniscope.com/2025/08/27/evangelical-protestants-should-not-be-directing-us-foreign-policy/

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Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!

Anathema to the Union!

‘Before Ukraine, Georgia Was The Trial Run At A Globalist Proxy War’

 

You’ve got to hand it to the globalists:  They are dedicated ideologues who never lose sight of their goals nor tire in their pursuit of them.  Most folks probably don’t realize it, but their effort to humiliate and subjugate Russia is one of those goals.

Many analysts looking at the current Russia-Ukraine war fail to look into the history underlying it.  They do not look back any further than the day the war appeared to begin in 2022, which leads to a distorted view of it.  To gain a proper view, we must look back beyond 2022.

The globalists in the West view Russia like they do every other country and people:  as a collection of resources (both human and otherwise) to be dominated and exploited.  Their conquest of a country can involve a number of tactics.  One of them is the poisoning of relations between Western countries and the targeted country.

We have seen this utilized many times over as it regards Russia.  One of the most glaring is the now infamous Russia hoax, in which the globalists claimed that the Russian government interfered with the 2016 United States presidential election.  The fallout from that continues, as yet another Deep State CIA actor has recently been fired for her part in the hoax.

But that was hardly the final try at creating enmity between the two countries.  The Leftist media were aghast that President Trump would meet with President Putin in Alaska to try to broker peace in the Ukraine.  Putin should have been persona non grata, in their view.  This, despite the fact that US and Russian leaders never stopped talking to each other during the Cold War, during which the leaders of the Soviet Union were godless communists.  How much more should the leaders of the two countries be in communication today, now that Russia has rejected communism and her government leaders are openly Christian?

An extension of that Leftist reporting bias was also seen in President Putin’s meeting with the Orthodox Archbishop of Alaska, Alexei.  Abp Alexei faced harsh denunciations for the friendly meeting, seeing it as giving tacit approval for Russia’s actions in the Ukraine.  But the meeting wasn’t meant to be political; it was much more about the spiritual ties between Russia and Alaska, which was once a part of Russia.  Michael Davis had a good write-up about the unfairness of the denunciations of Abp Alexei:

‘On August 15, 2025, among the snowy peaks of Anchorage, Alaska, a moment of profound spiritual significance unfolded as Russian president Vladimir Putin met with Archbishop Alexei of Sitka and Alaska.  . . .

‘The meeting occurred on the Feast of the Dormition of the Most Holy Theotokos, one of the most important feast-days in the Orthodox Church. Abp. Alexei, who had just led a three-day prayer initiative for peace in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, welcomed Pres. Putin in Anchorage, where he was attending a summit with U.S. president Donald Trump. The setting was St. Innocent Cathedral, a spiritual beacon tracing its roots to Russian missionaries who planted Orthodoxy in Alaska centuries ago. The exchange, described by an Alaskan Orthodox priest as “spontaneous yet warm,” was marked by a mutual gift-giving that carried deep symbolic resonance.

‘ . . . For an American Orthodox bishop to engage with an Orthodox head of state, even one as polarizing as Putin, is a recognition of the Church’s universal mission to bear witness to Christ in all nations. The Orthodox Church in America, with its 80 Alaskan parishes, stands as a living bridge between East and West, and Abp. Alexei’s willingness to meet Putin reflects the Church’s call to be a peacemaker, not a partisan. The meeting’s focus on spiritual unity, not political endorsement, aligns with the Orthodox Ethos, which seeks to heal wounds rather than sow division.

‘The exchange of icons was the heart of the event. The St. Herman icon gifted by Putin, now housed at St. Michael’s Cathedral in Sitka, is expected to draw pilgrims, reinforcing Alaska’s role as a spiritual hub. Alexei’s gift of the Athos-painted icon, prayed over for years, was a profound act of reciprocity, honoring the Alaskan faithful’s Russian roots while affirming their independence.

‘While no ceasefire emerged from the Trump-Putin summit, Abp. Alexei’s meeting with Pres. Putin was a spiritual triumph. As Alaskan Orthodox continue their prayers for peace, the St. Herman icon stands as a symbol of hope, urging reconciliation in a fractured world. For the faithful, this meeting reminds us that while kings may wield power, their hearts remain in the Lord’s hands—a truth that sustains our hope for peace, however distant it may seem.

‘Of course, the meeting was not without its critics. In a letter responding to this detraction, Abp. Alexei wrote (in part):

‘ “When I expressed gratitude in that public moment, it was not praise for present politics, but a remembrance of the missionaries of earlier generations—Saint Herman, Saint Innocent, Saint Yakov, and others—who brought us the Orthodox faith at great cost. Their sacrifice is our inheritance, and for that spiritual gift we must always give thanks.

‘ “As for the icons exchanged, some have condemned me for that, but I must be clear: the veneration we give to holy icons is directed not to the one who gives them, but to the saint or feast they represent. I cannot apologize for kissing an icon of Saint Herman or of the Dormition of the Mother of God. Even if the greatest sinner were beside me, the honor passes not to him but to heaven itself.

‘ “I know that sacred gestures can be misunderstood, and I grieve if this has caused confusion or scandal. But our vocation in such moments is not to join the anger of the world, but to keep the lamp of Christ burning, to obey His commandments to pray even for enemies, and to open whatever small door may be given for a pastoral word of peace.”

‘Amen. May God continue to bless peacemakers such as Abp. Alexei’ (‘Icon of Peace: The Meeting of Abp. Alexei and Vladimir Putin,’ uoj.news).

The globalists want Westerners to think that anyone who says a kind word about Russia or her leaders is a ‘Russian stooge’ or a ‘Putin lackey’, to keep the decades-long bitterness of the Cold War running so they can launch attack after attack on Russia until they have subjugated her to their power.  Those ‘stooges’ would necessarily include gentle, meek Christ-lovers like Abp Alexei, the Eskimo grannies in Alaska who are part of his flock, and Orthodox parishioners belonging to the Patriarchate of Moscow anywhere in the West.  It may sound absurd, but that is what is being promoted, as a story in French media makes abundantly clear.

It is worth pointing out in this respect that traditionalist Russians are some of the biggest supporters of the MAGA movement in the US, seeing it as a force that could dramatically weaken the globalists who threaten normative, Christian cultures all over the world.

The end goal of all the propaganda of the globalists against their enemies, as we said up above, is usually to start a big, blazing war that would see globalist puppets placed in power of the recalcitrant countries.  The globalists tried this with Russia in 2008, using the neighboring country of Georgia as the proxy of choice:

 . . .

The rest is at https://thehayride.com/2025/08/garlington-before-ukraine-georgia-was-the-trial-run-at-a-globalist-proxy-war/.

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Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!

Anathema to the Union!

‘Kosmas the Liberator’

 

The monk-martyr Kosmas of Aitolia (+1779) may appear at first glance to be an unlikely source of inspiration for Dixie, but a closer look reveals him to be a radiant source of hope.

He was born in 1714 in a rustic mountain village named Mega Dendron (Great Tree) to good Christian parents.  When he came of age, he left his home in search of deeper knowledge and wisdom.  We still have his own words about his education:

Later, in his teachings, he refers to the education he acquired: "My Christians, I wore out my life in studies forty to fifty years. I read the works of priests, and of the impious and the atheists and the heretics. The depths of wisdom I researched."

 

Elsewhere he said: "I learned many languages: Hebrew, Turkish, French, and from all the nations many things did I read."

His desire for God became so great at one point that he left the world and became a monk on the holy mountain of Athos:

Then he went to Philotheou Monastery. There he became a monk and took the name Kosmas and was ordained a priest. As he says himself: "I went, and on the Holy Mountain I wept for my sins for seventeen years."

But love for God overflows and becomes also love of neighbor.  This is what happened with St Kosmas; his heart broke for his fellow Greeks, who struggled under the heavy Turkish yoke.

Since the fall of Constantinople/New Rome in 1453, the Greeks had been ruled by the Muslim Turks, who did what they could to suffocate the Christian Faith amongst the Greeks and convert them to Islam.  Southerners should understand this tactic very well and sympathize with the Greeks, for the Yankees have done the same to Dixie:  They conquered our people in 1865 and have slowly tried to kill our love for Christ, to eradicate our Christian culture, and to replace them with the idol of Yankee Americanism (thanks to Fr Peter Heers for mentioning this similarity in a talk he gave recently).

Father Kosmas saw all that was happening to his fellow Greeks, and the Lord called him to act:

In studying the Gospels he thought by this he could help his brethren in the best manner. He prayed and he consulted with spiritual fathers and elders. He felt that he had to leave his beloved Mount Athos, to help the suffering people. St. Nikodemos continues: "The Nation was in danger of the following: On the one hand the Turks, on the other hand the Enlightenment - the atheistic Enlightenment - of France. The faith was constantly diminishing. Islam was in triumph. The Greek language was disappearing. Whole provinces forgot Romeik [Greek] and some spoke Turkish, others Slavic, others Arvanite and others Vlach. There was also foreign propaganda.  . . .  The Saint understood the risk. The pessimistic messages had arrived at Mount Athos. He received them. He had to interrupt his asceticism in the Monastery. The Nation, the Church of Christ, awaited him.  . . .

 

At Philotheou he felt the call from God to undertake this great work "of enlightening and regenerating his Christian brethren. The Greeks had fallen into ignorance in regards to their religion, and this resulted in much wickedness, with large numbers changing their faith from Orthodoxy to Muhammadanism. Kosmas felt this deepest. Therefore he requested and received the permission of his elders to undertake such a mission. Leaving the Holy Mountain, he went to Constantinople, met with Patriarch Seraphim (1757-1761) and received from him written permission to preach throughout Greece.

The superabundant humility of St Kosmas attracted the Grace of God to him, which endowed his preaching with great power:

 . . .

The rest is at https://www.reckonin.com/walt-garlington/kosmas-the-liberator.

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Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!

Anathema to the Union!

“The Elvis Connection to the Orthodox Church”

 

We assume that even in these times of vanishing historical memory that Elvis Pressley still needs no lengthy introduction.  Born in Tupelo, Mississippi, in 1935 and later migrating to Memphis, Tennessee, his mixture of various strands of Southern music (blues, Gospel, country, and so forth) produced the rock-and-roll genre that he overshadowed for many years.  Or we might go so far as to say that he ‘ruled’ it, for Elvis is The King of Rock.  In this way, he is the other half of Southern royalty, the consort of Lucy Pickens, who was named the Queen of the Confederate States.  Like her, he was wealthy, handsome, talented, and had Christian leanings.

Which is all fine and good, you might be saying, but how does any of this relate to Orthodoxy?  We’re mighty glad you asked.

The name Elvis is the English spelling of the Irish name Ailbhe, which, by the wonderfully arcane rules of the Irish Gaelic language, is pronounced Al-vee.  And the peculiar thing about the name Ailbhe is that there was an extraordinary Irish saint of the Orthodox Church who bore that name, St. Ailbhe of Emly (+6^th century), and one of the alternative spellings of his name is precisely . . . Elvis.

St. Elvis was a disciple of the famous missionary to Ireland, St. Patrick, who ordained him the first archbishop of Munster, with his see established at Emly.  In some ways, both he and Dixie’s Elvis are quite similar.

Both were Christians from their early days.  A couple of stories circulate regarding St. Elvis’s Christian birth:

“Saint Ailbhe was converted by British missionaries. Some traditions say that he was baptized by a priest while a boy in northern Ireland; another that he was baptized and raised in a British settlement in Ireland.”

For Dixie’s Elvis, the account is a little more straightforward:

“Raised in the charismatic Assemblies of God denomination, Presley went on to have a complex relationship to faith. He did identify as a Christian, and described Gospel music as 'the purest thing there is on this earth'.”

And though there is some ambiguity in Elvis’s later life regarding his faith in Christ (as there was about St. Elvis’s baptism), he had enough clarity and conviction to say in response to the title others had given him, the King of Rock-and-Roll, “'There's only one king', he said, 'and that's Jesus Christ.'”

It was also said of St. Elvis,

“He made frequent retreats and engaged in habitual recollection. Saint Ailbhe especially loved to pray in front of the sea.”

Dixie’s Elvis had a similar inclination:

“We do two shows a night for five weeks. A lotta times we'll go upstairs and sing until daylight – gospel songs. We grew up with it...It more or less puts your mind at ease. It does mine.”

. . .

The rest is at https://southernorthodox.org/the-elvis-connection-to-the-orthodox-church/.

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Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!

Anathema to the Union!