‘A Solid Lord for Solid Lords’: The Sacralisation of Aggressive War against Ukraine
The Decree of the President of the Russian Federation on the protection of traditional values emphasises the religious component as the basis of state ideology. This constitutes a fundamental contradiction with the constitutional principles of the Russian Federation. According to Article 14 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, Russia is a secular state where no religion can be established as state or compulsory, and religious associations are separate from the state and equal before the law. Moreover, Article 28 guarantees freedom of conscience and religion, including the right to profess any religion or not to profess any.
Nevertheless, the Decree openly advocates the use of religion as a key instrument of colonial policy and ideological control. The document emphasises that ‘Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Judaism and other religions, which are an integral part of Russia’s historical and spiritual heritage, have had a significant influence on the formation of traditional values shared by believers and non-believers alike’. However, the most fundamental provision is as follows: ‘Orthodox Christianity plays a special role in the formation and strengthening of traditional values’.
Thus, Orthodox Christianity – in fact, contrary to Articles 14 and 28 of the Constitution – is proclaimed as a privileged, almost state religion, which is called upon to provide maximum assistance to the Russian Federation in the implementation of its neo-colonial policy and accompanying aggressive wars. This turns the Russian Orthodox Church into an institutional tool of state propaganda and mobilisation of the population to support the Kremlin’s imperial ambitions.
This trend culminated in Vladimir Putin’s statements during a Christmas service in January 2026, in which he proclaimed that ‘the Russian military, on behalf of the Lord, is carrying out a sacred mission to defend the homeland in Ukraine’. The rhetoric of ‘holy war’ is by no means new in Russian discourse – suffice to recall the iconic patriotic song of the Great Patriotic War period, ‘Holy War’ (also known by its first line: ‘Arise, mighty country!’), which became the anthem of ‘defending the Motherland’ and appealed to messianic motifs of the struggle between good and evil.
However, there is a fundamental difference between Soviet and contemporary Russian rhetoric. Soviet propaganda, despite its use of religious terminology, remained within the framework of secular discourse, where the ‘sacredness’ of the struggle was more of a metaphor than a theological justification. The current invocation of ‘God’ in waging an aggressive, unprovoked war against a sovereign state indicates several important processes.
First, it demonstrates the Russian Federation’s open departure from the constitutional principles of a secular state. There is a de facto sacralisation of political power and military aggression, which is a sign of theocratic tendencies in a formally secular state. Religion is being transformed from a personal matter for citizens into a mandatory element of state ideology, imposed on the whole of society through the propaganda apparatus.
Secondly, this may indicate a deepening crisis of material and human resources for waging war in Ukraine. When rational arguments have been exhausted, economic incentives are insufficient, and human losses have reached critical levels, the regime resorts to the sacralisation of war as a last resort to mobilise and justify senseless sacrifices. Clear evidence of the practical implementation of Viktor Pelevin’s ironic ‘formula’ that ‘a respectable Lord is only for respectable gentlemen’ becomes evident: religion is becoming a tool for manipulating those segments of the population that do not have access to economic benefits and social mobility, instead receiving promises of spiritual reward for serving the Empire.
Thirdly, the instrumentalisation of Orthodoxy in the context of the war against Ukraine has a specific colonial significance. Since a significant part of the Ukrainian population also belongs to the Orthodox tradition, Russian propaganda tries to present the war not as an interstate conflict, but as a ‘civil war’ or ‘struggle for the souls of lost brothers.’ This is a classic colonial narrative, where the metropolis claims the right to ‘enlighten’ and ‘bring back into the fold’ its former colonies.
Thus, the transformation of the Russian Federation from a constitutionally secular state into a de facto theocratic structure with the privileged status of the Russian Orthodox Church is not only a violation of its own legal norms, but also evidence of a deep systemic crisis of the Putin regime, which is forced to resort to increasingly archaic and irrational methods of legitimising its aggressive foreign policy.
