Joy is the Most Powerful Weapon

Photo from a nearby attack in 2024, after this post was written.

I’ve heard my Jewish friends talk about how disconcerting it is to attend high holy days with armed guards, or Melkites talk about what it’s like in the West Bank to pass through countless checkpoints to get to church. Perhaps I was naïve to think that was in the past for our Church.

But today, the feast of St. Mary of Egypt, I ventured onto Ukraine’s left bank for the first time in three months—onto territory that some thought would become partitioned into an “East Ukraine” puppet state—to our mother church in Kyiv. There were checkpoints. There were searches. And there were men with really expensive automatic rifles checking papers at the gates of the cathedral.

Indeed, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church’s presence here—on territory that was once called a spiritual desert—is at the center of the Russian ideology that led to this war. We, the Uniates, with our high tolerance to suffer for our values, our desire for actionable reconciliation and practical unity, our stubbornness for peace at home, are all wrapped up into Putin’s stated hatred for Ukraine. All one needs to do is read his essays. We are the Church that isn’t defined by always being “against everybody,” by cynically pitting the East against the West or exploiting the global Left and Right. We aren’t any more of a construct than he is. We just are. We just love. We rejoice.

“All of creation rejoices in you, O full of grace, the ranks of Angels and the human race, hallowed Temple and spiritual Paradise…”

And for now, this joy is hampered by arms and checkpoints, but it is joy nonetheless. Joy is the most powerful weapon, accessible only through truth.