Tag Archives: Peace

The Universal Prayer for Peace

His Beatitude Daniel of Bucharest and All Romania has issued a prayer for peace, which is to be read on 24 August in all the Local Orthodox Churches and among Non-Orthodox who sincerely want peace. This date will mark three and half years, 1,277 days, of the latest phase in the tragic, fratricidal conflict taking place in the post-Soviet Ukraine. We have translated it into English and Slavonicised Russian and publish it below. On the eve of the discussions in Anchorage Alaska between the two belligerents, may this prayer come to be used by all who wish for peace. His Beatitude has performed a great service of mediation, which we hope all will follow.

O Lord Jesus Christ, our God, Who art the source of life and of peace in heaven and on earth, pour out the grace of Thy peace on the world troubled by war and hatred. Extinguish misunderstandings and strife between people, and pour humility, peace and goodness into the hearts of all. Calm the warlike and grant them wisdom. Give help to those who suffer, protection to refugees and exiles, and comfort to those who are estranged and saddened, and grant us all the will and strength to help with all our hearts our fellow men who suffer from war.  As Thou hast say: Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the sons of God!  Teach us to seek peace in our hearts, peace between people and among the nations, as in hearts where there is peace, there is no more strife, love of power or fear, but the comfort of the Holy Spirit, the love of God and of our fellow human-beings. For this we humbly pray to Thee, O Christ our God, for peace among people in every land, for peace among the nations and for the good estate of the whole world, that we may live in good understanding and be able to do without let or hindrance deeds pleasing to Thee, glorifying the love of mankind of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto the ages of ages, Amen.

 

Господи Иисусе Христе, Боже наш, Источниче жизни и мира на небесах и на земле, излей благодать Твою на мир, охваченный войной и ненавистью. Устрани разногласия и погаси вражду между людьми и излей в сердца всех смирение, мир и благость. Усмири воинствующих и даруй им мудрость. Ниспосли помощь страждущим, защити беженцев и изгнанников, утеши оставленных и опечаленных, и даруй нам волю и силы всем сердцем помогать нашим ближним, страдающим от вражды. Ибо Ты сказал: «Блажени миротворцы, яко тии сынове Божии нарекутся»  Научи нас искать мира в наших сердцах, мира между людьми и народами, ибо в сердцах, в которых царит мир, больше нет ни раздоров, ни властолюбия, ни страха, но утешение Святого Духа, любовь к Богу и нашим ближним. Об этом мы смиренно молим Тя, Христе Боже наш: о мире между людьми в каждой стране, о мире между народами и о благосостоянии всего мира, чтобы мы жили во взаимопонимании и беспрепятственно совершали угодные Тебе дела, прославляя Человеколюбца Бога – Отца и Сына и Святого Духа, ныне и присно и во веки веков, Аминь.

Meanwhile, in Alaska…

‘The circus left town, but the clowns stayed on’.

Russian saying

The US war against Russia continues in the Ukraine, although the CIA has at various points also tried extending it to the Baltics, Georgia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Armenia and Azerbaijan. President Trump’s bullying threats of illegal secondary tariff-sanctions against those who buy Russian oil, thus against India, although only against India’s gem and diamond industry (he had, as usual, completely misjudged the situation, thinking that India would be a soft touch), and also against Brazil and China, all failed. (Strangely, he did not threaten Europe, which hypocritically buys large amounts of Russian oil from India). In return, India has cancelled its order for further second-rate US warplanes, which Pakistan’s Chinese warplanes easily shot down; China can at any moment withhold its rare earths; Brazil is largely economically independent anyway.

As for his threats to Russia, the latter openly mocks them, as the 30,000 anti-Russian Western sanctions have only made Russia stronger. Trump’s war against BRICS, which is what all this is, has only consolidated its member-nations – the vast majority of the world – against the weaponisation of the dollar and against illegal US sanctions. So, like all bullies who are faced with those who are stronger than himself, Trump cancelled all his threats with excuses, leaving Kiev, whose leader ‘kills everybody’ (as Trump describes him) and the Western European elite in panic. So President Trump sent his real-estate agent envoy Witkoff to Moscow to sue for peace, cap in hand, and beg for a personal meeting with President Putin. Russia holds, as Trump would say in his poker mind, all the cards.

As Trump’s policies are destroying the US economy, his war against Iran failed, the Israeli Gaza genocide and the compromising Mossad/Epstein/Maxwell files hang over him, and Russia is victorious in the routed Ukraine, he is in urgent need of some PR victory. He needs to regain the lost support of his MAGA base. So why not hold a photo opportunity-meeting with the Russian leader? This will take place on 15 August, the feast-day of St Herman of Alaska and the 80th anniversary of the joint US/Soviet victory over Japan. It will be in what used to be called ‘Russian America’, known as Alaska, though Trump still calls it Russia. After secret Russo-American talks, the meeting was carefully prepared there by RF Kennedy a week before it was publicly announced.

The bankrupt US elite has no more money (37 trillion of debt) or any more obsolete arms to send to Kiev. The equally bankrupt Kiev/EU/UK elites are desperate, but there is nothing they can do either, except to continue to lie. Their favourite lie is that all that Russia wants from the Ukraine is some extra land. How absurd for what is by far the largest country and one of the least populated in the world! The war in the Ukraine had only one cause – the expansion of NATO to the east, when the US had time and again promised ‘not another inch to the east’.

In any case, Western arms are ineffective against the more advanced and far more plentiful Russian technology and are greatly depleted anyway. Moreover, disaffected Western peoples are opposed to their elite’s infantile militarism, and their astronomically expensive support for the bandit regime in Kiev (as also for the genocidal regime in Tel Aviv). This is all unacceptable in Western countries whose basic infrastructure is crumbling into third world status. Clearly, when Moscow, on the verge of military victory in the Ukraine, refuses to make any concessions in Alaska, as winning sides do not make concessions, Trump will be left with the ‘offramp’ or exit strategy (escape-route) that he really wants.

This is to walk away from the Kiev regime, stating as his reason the blindingly obvious, that Kiev, which depends on the war and its money to remain in power, does not want peace. This will leave the old Soviet and new Nazi Ukraine to the fate that its leadership has chosen for it, to disappear from the map. Once he has walked away from Kiev, he will claim that he is not responsible for the Western rout and blame it on Biden and the European dictatorships of Starmer, Macron and Merz. He will remain unstained, unlike Biden who was stained by the US rout in Afghanistan. And then Trump will be able to quit NATO, which is what he ultimately wants.

Perhaps, however, the US and Russia will at last come to an agreement about the new Eurasian Security Architecture, meaning a US retreat from its bankruptingly expensive arms spending. The US can leave the Ukraine to Russia on condition that all other national borders in Europe are guaranteed. This will give Trump the chance to grandstand as the great peacemaker and say he has ended the war and brought peace to Europe. True, winning the war will leave the military winner Russia, as the ultra-cautious Russian lawyer-President knows, to win the peace.

But that will be another story, which will also entail radical changes in the over-centralised, bureaucratic and so politically failed policies of the Russian Church, as well as the abolition of the absurd and $20 million CIA gangster fantasy of the ‘Orthodox Church in the Ukraine’. The time of reckoning is coming for all. It is all recorded in the Book of Life.

 

 

Fourteen into Twenty-Four: The Patriarchs and First Hierarchs of the Fourteen Local Churches Meet on Mt Athos, 8 February 2026

On 6, 7 and 8 February 2026 the Patriarchs of Constantinople, New Jerusalem, Bucharest, Belgrade, Sofia, Tbilisi, Antioch, Alexandria and Jerusalem, and the First Hierarchs of the five other Local Churches, of Skopje, Warsaw, Nicosia, Prague and Tirana, together with Metropolitan Tikhon of the OCA, the Metropolitans of Kiev, Minsk, Riga, Uzhhorod and Kampala, the Metropolitans of the two Metropolias in Moldova, and senior hierarchs from the Diaspora, together with their delegations, met in the Skete of St Andrew. This church, built by the Russian Tsar Alexander II, is the largest church on the multinational Holy Mountain, which is under the jurisdiction of the Patriarchate of Constantinople.

They were at last able to meet in freedom to resolve the only two issues which have troubled and divided the Church for generations. Firstly, they met to put an end to the schisms between the Patriarchates of New Jerusalem, Constantinople and Alexandria. Secondly, they met to grant canonical status to the many millions of Orthodox living in, and to Orthodox who for generations have been born in, Western Europe, the Americas and Oceania, entrusting their destiny in each case to organisation by the Patriarchate with the most Orthodox living on those territories, with the guidance of the Mother-Churches of the minorities.

By repentance for past errors, including allowing the CIA to penetrate the Patriarchates of Constantinople, Alexandria and New Jerusalem, directly through allowing its agents to be planted inside them, and indirectly through adopting its oligarchic mentality, and by the prayers of those present and of the monastics of the Holy Mountain of Athos, they reached the following resolutions:

New Jerusalem

As many will know, before this meeting the Patriarchate of Moscow and All Rus had been renamed the Patriarchate of New Jerusalem and All Rus and its headquarters had been moved to the New Jerusalem Monastery outside Moscow. It also refrocked all Russian Orthodox clergy who had been defrocked for political reasons since 24 February 2022 in Russia, Lithuania, Western Europe and elsewhere.

In accord with the Church of Constantinople, the newly-appointed Patriarch of New Jerusalem and All Rus and his Synod granted autocephaly to three new Local Churches, whose faithful had for centuries lived on its canonical territory. These are:

The Kievan Rus Orthodox Church (Kievan Rus is the new country established last year, whose territory corresponds to most of the western and central parts of the old Soviet Ukraine), headed by Metropolitan Onufry of Kiev. All Orthodox in Kievan Rus are called on to join this new Church, as the Patriarchate of Constantinople has now given up its jurisdiction there.

The Belarussian Orthodox Church, headed by the Metropolitan of Minsk.

The Baltic Orthodox Church (covering the territories of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland), headed by the new Metropolitan of Riga. All Orthodox in Finland, Estonia and Lithuania are called on to join these new Churches, as the Patriarchate of Constantinople has now given up its jurisdiction there.

Additionally, in accord with the other Patriarchs present, the new Patriarch of New Jerusalem and All Rus and his Synod granted autocephaly to a fourth new Local Church, the Carpatho-Rus and Hungarian Orthodox Church, whose territory covers the Zakarpattia province of the old Soviet Ukraine and Hungary. It is headed by the Metropolitan of Uzhhorod and Budapest, but has deaneries for Greeks, Serbs and other Orthodox nationalities present in Hungary under the new Church.

Constantinople

As many will know, before this meeting the new Patriarch of Constantinople, previously the Archbishop of Athens, and his Synod had moved the headquarters of the Patriarchate from Istanbul in Turkiye to Thessaloniki in Greece, with the absorption of the Greek Orthodox Church. This move was financed by a very generous donation made by the government of the Russian Federation for its infrastructure costs. However, Turkiye, together with Greece, remain the canonical territories of the now Greece-based Patriarchate of Constantinople and a bishop remains in Istanbul.

The Patriarchate of Constantinople recognised the (North) Macedonian Orthodox Church as an autocephalous Local Church.

The Patriarchate of Constantinople recognised the autocephaly granted by the Patriarchate of New Jerusalem to the four new Churches on the territories of Kievan Rus, Belarus, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland, Carpatho-Rus and Hungary, and will recognise any autocephaly granted in the future, if necessary, to Orthodox in Central Asia, Japan, China and Korea by the Patriarchate of New Jerusalem and All Rus. All Non-Russian Orthodox on those territories must already join the local jurisdictions of the Patriarchate of New Jerusalem there in their own deaneries.

It recognised that the Patriarchate of Bucharest has sole authority to establish a Western European Orthodox Church for Orthodox living in its at present 21 countries of Iceland, Ireland, Great Britain, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, France, Monaco, Germany, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Austria, Portugal, Spain, Andorra, Italy, San Marino, Malta, since Bucharest has by far the largest number of Orthodox on those territories. It will be headed by the Romanian Metropolitan of Paris and Western Europe, but will have dioceses and deaneries for Greeks, Russians of all three Russian groups, Kievan Russians, Moldovans, Serbs, Bulgarians, Georgians and other Orthodox nationalities in Western Europe.

In return, all Local Orthodox Churches recognised that the Patriarchate of Constantinople has sole authority to establish a new Northern America Orthodox Church (USA, Canada, Greenland, Bermuda and St Pierre et Miquelon) and a new Local Oceanian Orthodox Church, in concert with all the Local Churches represented on those territories, since it has by far the largest flock there. Notably the Patriarchate of New Jerusalem cedes jurisdiction of its own parishes, withdraws the Tomos of Autocephaly of the OCA, and cedes jurisdiction of the churches of the OCA and ROCOR in Northern America, including the abolition of the OCA Synod in Washington and the ROCOR Synod in New York, to the Patriarchate of Constantinople. However, the first First Hierarch of the Northern American Orthodox Church will be Metr Tikhon, formerly of the OCA. Orthodox of Non-Greek nationality both in Northern America and Oceania, under the Metropolitan of Sydney and All Oceania, will be cared for in their own dioceses and deaneries under the new Local Church.

Alexandria

The new Pope and Patriarch of Alexandria and his Synod ceded jurisdiction of all African countries, except for Egypt, to the Patriarchate of New Jerusalem, thus returning to its Patriarchal territory of 100 years ago. All clergy defrocked by the Patriarchate of Alexandra for political reasons since 2019 were refrocked. In return, the government of the Russian Federation made a very generous donation to the Patriarchate of Alexandria and to St Catherine’s Monastery in Sinai to continue Church life in Egypt and Sinai.

In accord with the other Patriarchs present, the Patriarch of New Jerusalem and All Rus and his Synod jointly granted autocephaly to all Orthodox on the territory of Africa, outside Egypt, founding the African Orthodox Church, headed by the Metropolitan of Kampala and his Synod of African bishops.

Antioch

The Patriarch of Antioch and his Synod was granted sole authority to establish a Latin America and Caribbean Orthodox Church, as it has by far the largest flock there. Orthodox of Non-Arab nationality in Latin America and the Caribbean will be cared for in their own dioceses and deaneries under the new Local Church.

Bucharest

The Patriarch of Bucharest and his Synod and the Patriarch of New Jerusalem and All Rus and his Synod jointly granted autocephaly to all Orthodox on the territory of Moldova, forming the Moldovan Orthodox Church. The Patriarchate of New Jerusalem refrocked all Orthodox clergy, who had been defrocked for political reasons for joining the former Metropolia of Bessarabia.

As mentioned above, the Patriarch of Bucharest and his Synod was granted sole authority to establish a new Local Church of the 21 countries of Western Europe (see above). Orthodox of Non-Romanian nationality will be cared for by self-governing dioceses and deaneries of their respective Local Churches, but under the new Western European Orthodox Church.

In this way, the number of Autocephalous Orthodox Churches, now standing at 20 after the absorption of the Greek Orthodox Church into the Patriarchate of Constantinople and of the OCA into the Northern American Orthodox Church, and the foundation of the six new Autocephalous Churches, will be brought to 24 Local Churches, once the four new Diaspora Churches have been established within the next twelve months.

The ending of the schism between New Jerusalem, Constantinople and Alexandria was confirmed in the church of St Andrew by the concelebration of all those present on the Sunday of the Prodigal Son, 8 February 2026. This meeting is already being called ‘The First Athonite Council’ and ‘The Bread and Water Council’, since that was the only food and drink provided during the three days for the participants in the Council.

 

 

 

 

Peace for the Ukraine – and for the Orthodox Church?

US Disengagement?

Even before Trump had been elected, the US elite had realised that it had to disengage from its Ukraine project. Russia had not been weakened, regime-changed, dismembered and destroyed, as had been the US plan all along. Instead its economy was booming, becoming the fourth biggest in the world, President Putin was more popular than ever and BRICS had taken off. As for the illegal Western sanctions, they were ignored by 90% of the world and damaged only the West. The US puppet, Zelensky, in his bunker in Kiev is clearly delusional, taking, they say, cocaine and desperately threatening invasions of Russia, without troops, arms and munitions, and even nuclear war, without nuclear weapons.

The claim by President-elect Trump during his campaign that he would achieve peace in the Ukraine within 24 hours, even before he entered the Oval Office was all presupposition and hubris. How could he end a war which the US had already lost. and Russian victory is ending anyway? Peace does not depend on him, even if the tragedy began as a US proxy war. Peace depends on the actions of the Russian military and President Putin. Indeed, peace may come through Russian military victory and Ukrainian military collapse even before Trump assumes office. That would probably be very welcome to Trump, enabling him to begin as President unburdened of the curse of the Ukraine, which has ruined everything.

The fact is that the President-elect does not want to solve the conflict in the Ukraine, what he wants is to disengage from it, so that the US can save money and at last ‘pivot to Asia’. The Ukraine is now a distraction from US strategic interests. Trump wants to run away from Kiev, just as the US ran away from its failed wars in Saigon and Kabul. Trump can do this very easily, if Kiev collapses before Trump’s inauguration. He can simply blame Biden for everything. This will be his ’exit strategy’. The puppet-master has changed and so the puppets must change too. After all, Trump has from the outset stated that the war would never have begun, if he had been President at the time. And that may well be true.

Peace Talks?

But who can Russia talk too? The Russians cannot talk to the Ukrainians, as their President is illegitimate and talks with Russia were literally outlawed by Kiev in 2022. The Russians cannot talk to Europeans, as they have shown themselves to be delusional liars and treaty-breaking traitors ever since 2014. This can be seen from their refusal to implement the so-called Minsk Accords, which they openly confessed were simply delaying tactics. In any case, the narcissistic and so delusional European ruling class is discredited and hated by the peoples of Europe and represents only the past and its own selfish interests. That ruling class is unable to talk to Russia because it is incapable of dealing with reality – its defeat.

In any case, Russia will certainly not sit down and talk now, when it is on the brink of victory. Would the Allies have stopped in January 1945 to talk to Hitler? Russia will not stop now, victory is in sight. Anyway, as we said, Kiev has literally outlawed talks with Russia and its President is illegal, as his term of service ended earlier this year, like that of his Parliament. The war has continued for so long only because of Biden’s support and EU and UK backing. And bankrupt Europe cannot replace the US, as Europe has run out of money and arms and cannot let its own troops die there. And it is troops that the Ukraine needs, for it has lost nearly a million soldiers, 517,000 of them in the unfinished year of 2024 alone.

As a result, with no-one to talk to, the Russians are taking back more and more territory from the Ukraine, 100 years after it was illegally handed over to the Ukraine by the anti-Russian Bolsheviks. There will be no ‘frozen conflict’ or ‘stalemate’ here, just Russian victory. ‘Frozen conflict’ was possible two years ago. The only people the Russians could talk to now are the Americans – but under Trump. Trump is a businessman and wants to disengage from a loss-making business and must sack Zelensky. As the Americans no longer have any diplomats, the hope is that Trump will appoint the only European politician left – Victor Orban – to talk not only to the Russian President, but also to the Russian Patriarch.

The Russian President

The Russian President could express the following terms to Trump’s representative, perhaps Orban: Firstly, drop all 16,000 illegal anti-Russian sanctions and absurd criminal charges. Then, recognise as Russian the four Russian provinces which have already joined Russia, and, if they have been taken by Russia by then, the next four once Russian provinces of the south and east, including Nikolaev and Odessa on the Black Sea coast, and the three more once Russian provinces to the north-east (Chernigov, Sumy, Poltava). The Russian President would leave the rest to become again the real Ukraine, perhaps to be called ‘Kievan Rus’ (Kiyivska Rus’), more or less mirroring Belarus to the north.

Such a nationally homogenous, Ukrainian-speaking Kievan Rus would consist of 14 administrative areas, just over half of the original 27 (including the two that were in the Russian Crimea), its new easternmost provinces being Kiev, Cherkasy and Kirovohrad. This would represent an area of about 260,000 square kilometres and a pre-war population of about 16 million. This would draw Ukrainian refugees back from Europe. Kievan Rus would be a neutral, sovereign and independent nation, that is, demilitarised (free of NATO) and denazified (free of the EU) which are racist, anti-sovereignty organisations. Agreement could then be reached and Russia would by treaty guarantee the territorial integrity of all European nations.

Of course, they would have to make a condition that Moldova should carry out referenda for any groups among its border population, such as those in Transdniestria and Gagauzia, who may wish to join Russia. Similarly, referenda must be held for Romanian and Hungarian minorities on the borders of Kievan Rus who may wish to ‘go home’. If the three tiny Baltic statelets were at last obliged to grant human rights to their Russian minorities, there would be no threat from Russia to them. With such an agreement, the Western half of Europe would be secure and could slash its military spending. Then Trump would see his dream come true and abandon NATO, which could be dissolved, just like the EU.

The Russian Patriarch

The Russian Orthodox Patriarch also has to be involved in these talks. Leader of by far the largest Local Orthodox Church, the whole Orthodox Church of 200 million has been in chaos ever since the British-orchestrated palace revolt or ‘Russian Revolution’ of February 1917. Without the Russian Church, several key Local Orthodox Churches were taken over through political interference by Great Britain and, after the Second World War, specifically in 1948 with the forced removal by the CIA of Patriarch Maximos V of Constantinople, by the USA. Freedom for the Orthodox Church, the end of Western interference in its internal affairs, is essential for peace in the Ukraine and for justice in Church affairs.

There would have to be an agreement with the Russian Church, which has also suffered as a result of American policy in the Ukraine and elsewhere. This is principally because of the Zionist neocon ideology, implemented by Nuland, Pompeo, Blinken, Biden etc. This established a fake Church in the Ukraine, permitted the open persecution of the real Church there and also sanctioned the Russian Patriarch personally. What could the terms of the Patriarch be and what concessions could he grant in return? Here there has to be mutuality, as there have been excesses on both sides. Here are Russian Orthodox terms to be imposed on the Greek Churches by the USA, with compensation from the USA:

  1. Closure of the fake Church in the Ukraine, the OCU, with Constantinople withdrawing its absurd Tomos, which justified it. All stolen property is to be returned to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (see Concessions 1, 2 and 3 below).
  2. Release of all Orthodox in Finland, Estonia and Lithuania from the uncanonical jurisdiction of Constantinople, introduced from the 1920s on, on condition that all Orthodox there be granted a new Autocephalous Baltic Orthodox Church (see Concession 5 below).
  3. No more interference by Constantinople in the affairs of the Polish Orthodox Church and, especially, in those of the Church of the Czechia and Slovakia.
  4. Granting to the Russian Church of jurisdiction over all Africa, except for Egypt, which has its own historic Greek Orthodox Patriarchate, based in Alexandria (thus returning to the pre-1920s situation). This is on condition that Moscow establishes an Autocephalous African Orthodox Church there by 2050.

Russian Concessions:

  1. Immediate resumption by Moscow of communion and concelebration with the Churches of Constantinople, Alexandria and other Greek Orthodox Churches.
  2. Immediate rescinding of all ‘suspensions’ and ‘defrockings’ of clergy in Russia, the Ukraine, Moldova, Lithuania, Western Europe and elsewhere, which were carried out for political reasons because of clergy disagreements with political, nationalist or uncanonical sectarian ideologies, imposed by certain Russian bishops.
  3. Autocephaly for the Kievan Rus Orthodox Church within twelve months.
  4. Autocephaly for the Moldovan Orthodox Church on the remaining national territory of Moldova within twelve months, in concert with the Romanian Orthodox Church, in order to reunite all Moldovan Orthodox in one Church. The Moldovan Diaspora in Western countries would come under the care of the Romanian Orthodox Church.
  5. Autocephaly for all Orthodox (about 500,000 in number) in the three Baltic States and Finland, forming an autocephalous Baltic Orthodox Church within twelve months.
  6. All Russian Orthodox in the Diasporas in Western Europe, the Americas and Oceania are to be instructed, under threat of excommunication, to merge by negotiation into new Local Churches, to be founded on those territories by 2050. This would be conditional on all other Local Churches which have Diaspora jurisdictions issuing the same instructions to their Diasporas.