Orthodox Churches and Politics in Southeastern Europe, Russia, and Ukraine

Orthodox Churches, like most religious bodies, are inherently political because they seek to defend their core values. To accomplish that, they need to engage in politics, among other ways by promoting certain legislation and seeking to block other legislation. For Orthodox Churches, the key fields in which their self-defense is staged are Nationalism (presenting themselves as protectors of the national being), Conservatism (defending traditional values such as the “traditional family”), and Intolerance of institutions and movements (such as feminism and New Age) that they find threatening. Nationalism and Conservatism put the Churches at odds with the communist regimes that governed most of Eastern Europe from around 1945 until 1989/90 but these represent less of a complication in the post-communist era.