UPDATE: 07/08/23
It looks like Volodomyr Zelensky just had his audience with Patriarch Bartholomew.
From the looks of it, I’d say that Bartholomew is not all that sanguine to be in the company of the Cocaine Kid.
I’ll even go even further and say that he knows that the jig is up. You can see it on his face.
You know what else is written on his face? The realization that both men have the blood of hundreds of thousands on their hands, after displacing 6M people.
I wonder if Judas looked this remorseful.
UPDATE: Not sure he is really all that remorseful. All smiles here as he tells Zelensky he has the support of the Mother Church of all Ukraine. 
On the other hand, Zelensky doesn’t care. He has a mansion in Miami and another in Tuscany. I imagine he has a nice condo in Tel Aviv as well. He can bug out at any point if he has to. Bartholomew doesn’t have that luxury and he knows that.
And you know what else Bartholomew knows? That nobody lives forever; we’re all going to face judgment someday, if not in this world, then definitely in the next. There’s no escaping it.
As far as his legacy is concerned, it’s all come to naught. I’m not just talking about his geopolitical machinations, his neo-papalist power-grabs, or his attempts to marginalize the Russian Orthodox Church. On all accounts, he failed miserably. Things have blown up in his face at almost every turn. The greetings in the marketplace that he so coveted have receded into the distance. Davos, Dubai, and other destinations in between, mean nothing now.
Until now, he has been a clever, if cynical geopolitical actor, playing a weak hand. But he’s also a bishop and should know that the ends don’t justify means, even if those ends are good, which is this case, they are decidedly not.
You can see it in his face.
May the Lord have mercy upon him. May He have mercy upon us all.
The puppet show continues, complete with dialogue written by Langley.
I don’t think he’s remorseful at all.
He’s getting ready to have the entire Kiev Lavra under him. He knows perfectly well what he’s doing. Remorse implies a change of action, not only has he not changed his actions, he has doubled down on Ukraine and all of his other heresies.
Bartholomew will forever be knows as an arch-heresiearch and schismatic for the rest of Church history. That I can almost be sure is his legacy.
When he does take the Lavra, what will the other patriarchs say? What will the other bishops say? Will we keep hearing crickets or will we finally hear righteous indignation from the entire Church?
You know I don’t think he’s remorseful either. I think he knows he has to appear remorseful to be able to move on. But the things that plague him today are the same things he initially said we’d get over. He still believe we’re going to get over if he poses for the camera.
Soon, he will be onto his next move.
We sometimes forget the canons are there for a reason. There is a reason bishops cannot go into another bishop’s territory. There is a reason we have a spiritual court and we have bishops who can take people to spiritual court. There is a reason we can’t pray with schismatics. There is a reason schismatics must be removed from the Church There is a reason we have councils. There is a reason we expect our bishops to be above reproach.
At this point, Bartholomew is not the problem.
Now the ball is in the hands of the bishops. If they fumble the ball, we all go down. God will hold them accountable. They know what Bartholomew ignited in Ukraine is a travesty. All of them. They put it in writing. But none of them is using their power to stop him.
The canonical Church is being snuffed out by Bartholomew’s people and he couldn’t care less. He probably thinks the Russians deserve it. If he can’t get NATO into Ukraine to blow them up, he’ll settle for undermining them by taking in their rejects as if depositions from Russia don’t matter any more. Even when it comes to people who are habitual offenders when it comes to their proclivities.
The foundation of the Church is eroding and it is because the bishops are failing to address the problem with Ecumenical Patriarchate. Bartholomew needs to be removed. If he passes to the next life before he is dealt with here, the Church will have live with his legacy forever. Every canon he violated might as well be removed, because he has set new precedents and no one has officially challenged him. Writing a letter saying, “tsk, tsk,” doesn’t even begin to cover it. The bishops are abdicating their power. Every one of them is letting us down.
And our Church is poorer for it. We have less to believe in. If it’s true that the bishop is the Church, then the Church is failing us.
Someone said you get the bishop you deserve! That’s about deep as a mother’s day card on sale and it’s ridiculous on it’s face. (One of those pithy things people like to say when the opportunity comes up to let everyone know how special they are for being clever by half.)
I’m sorry, but Christ demands better than this. It is His Church and these are His bishops. The canonical Church is being snuff out of Ukraine where it has been since 988AD. This a HUGE deal. No one “deserves” a bishop who could be a partly to this. No one.
One day it will be down to one bishop, one priest, one deacon and one layman. Just like Noah there will be few people in the ark when the end comes. Very sad. I look around me and I see madness as this country marches on towards nuclear war blissfully unawares as our educators teach children that there are more than two genders, as our educators teach children perversity and those who follow God’s commandments are labeled bigots. Our government tramples on religious freedoms here and supports a government that persecutes the canonical UOC under Met Onuphry who has since been locked out of his residence. I heard that Biden is now sending cluster bombs to the Ukraine and silly me I thought those who used cluster bombs were considered war criminals. Madness,insanity! People are hurting under this inflation but our elites are more concerned about what pronouns we are using. To keep up with this insane inflation which is fueled by greed, I have to start working sundays after Church. Insanity! Asian Americans and Muslims are declared White Supremacists merely because Asian Americans believe they should be allowed to attend college based on their test scores and the Muslims want to opt their children out of these Woke indoctrinations.
Now I would like to say a little something about Bart and Elpi and that is SHAME ON YOU. Bart thru his greed and lust for power has brought persecutions upon his fellow Christians and Bishops. SHAME! Elpi has done everything he can to promote things that are antithetical to Orthodoxy and by his lust and greed is willing to trade his own salvation just to be accepted by a culture that wants to be more like Sodom and Gomorrah than to be like the Kingdom of Heaven.
Bart and Elpi have betrayed the faith of Isaac and much like Esau both have traded their inheritance for an earthly bowl of soup!
BTW after my little rant I have decided that I am not working after Church. I have a few other words to say but I don’t think they would be appropriate to say amongst polite company.
We are encouraged by what you said. Thank you.
Rev Dn, I second Gail’s response.
Lest we forget Bart’s big painted icon inside the entrance of St. Nicholas. I am in shock.
Gail, I agree “the ball is in the hands of the bishops”. The current crisis at the Kiev Caves needs the support of Orthodox bishops everywhere. Nobody needs to be evicted from the Kiev Caves Lavra. All the monks there should most definitely stay. All that’s necessary now is for the bishops to act and follow the good example of the churches of Alexandria, Cyprus, and Greece. The inaction of the bishops to do so is only magnifying this crisis.
Everything that Patriarch Bartholomew has done in Ukraine so far has been above board and transparent. Sufficient explanations have been provided. No canons have been violated. It is time for churches to enter in communion with the OCU and take a stand for Orthodoxy.
Joseph, those monks are part of the UOC. They don’t want to be under the EP. He is cruel. He will evict people from their homes if they don’t bow to him.
Joseph Lipper: “All that’s necessary now is for the bishops
to act and follow the good example of the churches
of Alexandria, Cyprus, and Greece…”
…and agree to the displacement of a canonical sister Church
and its replacement by a collection of unordained schismatics.
As Gríma says: “Saruman has ever been our friend and ally.”
Joseph, surely you can’t be serious. To say that what Bartholomew did was “above board” is like saying everything Tammany Hall did running NYC 140 years go was “above board”.
Bartholomew not only trampled on the canons of the Church but he did so while his strings were being pulled by Langley.
As for the homosexualization of the Church which he and Elpidophoros are engineering, this too, is “above board” in that the clandestine nature of said program was pioneered by the mainstream Protestant denominations fifty years ago. Then it was via subterfuge, now it’s in the open.
George, even though some people were caught off guard by the EP granting autocephaly to Ukraine, it was nonetheless a forthright and transparent development. Perhaps it began with Polish autocephaly, granted by the EP in 1924. That tomos of autocephaly proclaimed as uncanonical the patriarchal act of 1686 that also gave Moscow the conditional right to ordain the Metropolitan of Kiev going forward.
So the Ukrainian congress in June 2016 would later request Patriarch Bartholomew to rescind this act of 1686, and he clearly responded that the EP would consider this proposal. Two years later, he met with Patriarch Kirill at the Phanar on August 31, 2018, and announced that the EP would indeed rescind the 1686 act in view of granting autocephaly to Ukraine. Shortly afterwards, the Holy Synod of the EP did just that.
There was a clear development, and everything was announced beforehand and then followed through. The fact that the EP’s actions aligned with the geopolitical concerns of some, and didn’t align with the geopolitical concerns of others, is only to be expected. It was also only to be expected that the Russian propaganda machine would go into overdrive the moment of any whiff of the EP granting autocephaly to Ukraine. This is because the Moscow Patriarchate was fully expecting this and was ready for action. They weren’t caught off guard in the least.
Joseph Lipper: “Patriarch Bartholomew…announced
that the EP would indeed rescind the 1686 act
in view of granting autocephaly to Ukraine.”
The Act of 1686 is completely irrelevant to modern Ukraine.
Canon XVII of the Council of Chalcedon explicitly states:
Outlying or rural parishes shall in every province remain subject to the bishops who now have jurisdiction over them, particularly if the bishops have peaceably and continuously governed them for the space of thirty years. But if within thirty years there has been, or is, any dispute concerning them, it is lawful for those who hold themselves aggrieved to bring their cause…
Ecclesiastical order, having collapsed in Ukraine due to war,
was restored during the reign of the Empress Catherine II;
after which Kiev commemorated the Patriarchs of Moscow
(not those of Constantinople) for over two centuries,
during which time no EP raised any challenge whatsoever.
Chalcedon’s thirty-year statute of limitation is clear.
Constantinople’s claim to Ukraine lapsed long ago.
The EP quite clearly does not care what Chalcedon or any other council or canon says, why would it care about this particular one?
They see themselves as above the canons of the Church.
It is precisely because of the existence of this canon
that the Ecumenical Patriarch will not call a Council
to decide which Ukrainian Church is Canonical.
The EP can’t rescind the act. It’s in the original tomos.
I will however speak about this in a podcast, I’ve done the research and can prove it.
I look forward to it, George.
Alex Christophorou has a great video on his channel from this morning about Zelensky’s visit to Turkey, he also touches on the meeting with Black Bart.
If you view Z’s meeting with Black Bart, the moving of the Lavra under the EP and Erdogan letting the Nazis go and saying Ukraine should be let into NATO, all makes sense through the lens of the upcoming NATO summit.
Very interesting news today that Erdogan is now bargaining with NATO for EU membership:
“Erdogan says Turkey could approve Sweden’s NATO membership if Europeans ‘open way’ to Turkey EU bid”
https://apnews.com/article/nato-membership-sweden-turkey-347ef8ba4ff2e31d522f4df7049cf1ba
Less here than meets the eye. Erdogan knows that Sweden is going to be part of NATO. He also knows that the EU will never allow Turkey to join.
So he’s going all Eddie Haskell, then when they reject Turkey’s bid, he’s going to act all wounded and go back to his people and “Hey, I tried to be nice and look how much they hate us.”
The pull to the East is now inexorable.
Yes, they’re not going to admit a Muslim country with borders to other Muslim countries. But even the slight of releasing the Azov monsters is empty. After all, they were safe in Turkey. Now they will be within reach of Russian weapons.
Turkey would most likely be admitted to the EU under a two-speed model consisting of Eastern European members. A second speed Eastern EU might group together Turkey with Greece and Cyprus, and also Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, and Ukraine. The Eastern group likely would not have access to the Schengen zone, but perhaps would have free access (in theory) to the other second speed states. Such a plan might be proposed to solve the Schengen zone’s current immigrant crisis. The French government seems desperate for any solution right now.
Of course Turkey would be the dominant military and economic member of a second speed Europe, and then it’s basically the Ottoman Empire all over again. That may sound far fetched, but not really. The main idea is to get Turkey on board to fight against Russian expansion, especially in Ukraine. If Turkey views Ukraine as it’s own territory, then everything else just falls in place.
Joseph, the problem for the West is that if Turkey is allowed to enter the EU, then Greece, Cyprus and others (Bulgaria, Romania) would leave.
My gut tells me that Erdogan is playing a masterful game. What did he ask for in return for releasing the Ukronazis? F-16s? That’ll make the Greeks happy.
We are seeing not only the slow-motion breakup of NATO but the intrinsic instability of the entire EU project ripen before our very eyes. Some Russian cynics want the Ukraine to become part of NATO, they’d be an even bigger albatross around the neck of Germany than the Greeks.
George, what I’m suggesting is that the EU may sacrifice Eastern Europe to a new Ottoman Empire with Turkey as hegemon. The “Second Speed Europe” is just a euphemism for this.
Greece and Cyprus (and the others) could pack their bags, leave and go where?
Meanwhile, Sweden joining NATO is still contingent on approval by Turkey’s congress. Something tells me this pending approval could drag on for a while longer.
Guarandangtee ya they won’t go quietly into that good neo-Ottoman night.
First of course, the Greeks will drag their globalist leaders through the streets then, when they do that, all bets are off.
OK, now that I’ve calmed down, I will say that the EU project is a dead man walking. What we saw in France is the future: the importation of hundreds of thousands of non-Europeans into their midst will not end well –for any Western European country. I don’t need to tell you that there are rumblings among the natives… [Others can fill in the blanks].
I’m going to make a bold and pessimistic prediction (of which I hope I am proved entirely wrong), but, there will be no uproar from the bishops. They can’t even manage to get together in regards in Elpi, there’s no way they will speak out against Bart, except for the small platitudes they have already done.
I could be wrong, but, why would Bart taking the Lavra spur them to speak out now? Especially the other atrocities that are currently being waged against the UOC. It’s the same logic as to why the Ephraim monasteries continue to remain under the GOA/EP, but union with Rome is their breaking point? It makes no sense.
If there are indeed bishops who read this blog DO YOUR JOB.
Article 18: Pillage and Purposeless Destruction (Laws of War Clause, see: MCTP 11-10A).
Article 93, Section (C): Mental Cruelty
Article 99, Section 5: “is guilty of cowardly conduct”.
Article 109: “Destruction of” Property other than military property of United States—waste, spoilage, or destruction
Article 134: “The unlawful and wanton destruction or illegal taking (confiscation or stealing) of property (e.g., medical, RELIGIOUS, educational, scientific, and cultural property) that is protected by the Geneva and Hague Conventions.
Bartholomew the Great Heretic and Master Divider and Betrayer of Orthodoxy); May God grant him FEW years!
Their handlers will move onto the next puppets. Stay tuned.
Epitaph for Patriarch Bartholomew
☠️☠️☠️
A servant of Satan
So what “gift” did Volodo have for Bart? A framed poster of Baphomet?
I think it was khaki t-shirt with one of those Nazi emblems on it. 😉
The iconography of Zelensky[yyyy…etc] is such that
I would not be surprised to see him burst out of the shirt
like some pocket version of Lou Ferrigno in The Hulk!
Pardon my ignorance, I’m only a catechumen and don’t know much, but what exactly can the laity do about such things, beyond complaining on the internet?
Write them, and encourage everyone to do the same.
https://www.voiceoforthodoxlaity.com/compose-your-letter
FWIW, Erdogan released those five Nazi commanders from the Azovstal steel plant. On the face of it, this was a betrayal of Putin and a big PR win for Zelensky. However, it looks like now the Russians are going to pull out of the grain deal and blockade Odessa inspect any ships leaving Odessa to make sure there is no grain on them.
I imagine they will commandeer the grain, onboard to Russian merchant ships and then sell them to BRICS+ nations.
Perhaps Erdogan was responding to Russian support
of the Syrian Arab Army’s recent advances?
It’s all tangled up like a Gordian knot.
So: Where is Alexander?
Quite possibly.
Russian govt and media are blaming the West for exerting tremendous pressure on Erdogan so as to absolve him effectively from the decision. But that does not mean that they cannot retaliate against the West and Ukraine.
Considering the diplomatic points Zelensky just racked up with Erdoğan and Duda, plus the US opening up DPICM deliveries, the typical Kremlin mouthpieces are going to be even more red-faced and screechy than usual for a while.
They always aren’t they? Seriously, I was wondering if you were going to comment 15 days ago when the rest of the Western media was having a wall-to-wall orgasm during Prigo’s “March for Justice”. Unless I am wrong, you decided not to.
In the meantime, while the neocons pat themselves on the back, the Russians keep on gobbling up more Ukrainian land.
Long story short: there’s always another foot that is going to drop.
Let’s put our cards on the table, unless NATO decides to put major boots on the ground in the Ukraine –and that’s a big IF–then all the West will have to show for it are PR stunts. Russia is ready for a major war with NATO. They’ve already geared their economy for that.
I wasn’t expecting this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D24qh-y2IfA
Richard Haass, the outgoing president of the CFR is recommending that the Ukraine not be admitted into NATO. Worse, he states that the US is the most “destabilizing factor” in the world today.
These are two shoes that I wasn’t expecting to see drop.
You are correct, I didn’t comment on Prigozhin’s mutiny at the time. Hard facts on the situation were difficult to come by and the most interesting aspects are going to be the long term consequences and fallout in the Russian elite. I think the only thing that is reasonably clear is Prigozhin’s motivations were born from losing a political battle with the MoD and the impending subordination of Wagner to Shoigu and Gerasimov.
There were some rumblings, impossible to verify, that Prigozhin’s original Plan A was more or less kidnapping those two and when that fell through, well, Plan B wasn’t well thought out. Not that the Plan A, if that’s what it was, was much better. I don’t think you’ll ever see the Kremlin give a PMC Pantsirs again! It’ll be interesting to see how many tanks and heavy weapons go to the Rosgvardia as a consequence instead of the war effort.
Anyway, I could ruminate about the current state of things, what each side is doing well, what the other is struggling with, how things are likely to evolve, but it’s still early in the summer. Ukraine is having to attempt a prolonged attrition campaign out of necessity and I don’t expect to make a meaningful assessment of the counteroffensive before the end of September at the earliest.
Again, NATO is not going to intervene directly in Ukraine unless Russia attacks NATO (highly unlikely) or starts lighting off tactical nukes in Ukraine (also highly unlikely). Russia would get absolutely annihilated in a purely conventional fight with NATO, especially in its current shambolic state. Establishing air supremacy over Ukraine would require extensive strikes of Russian GBAD and air bases inside Russia. Russia wouldn’t be able to stop it, and would respond on attacks on Russian soil with tactical nukes. And then we’re off to the races on the escalation ladder. Hard truth, but it really is that simple.
Ideological conformity has driven many in the West effectively insane. That is the only way to explain the deranged military rhetoric in the face of obvious Russian superiority to NATO tactics and weaponry and their overwhelming edge in weapons manufacturing.
But some still say Russia is about to run out of everything. This is psychological denial. But it means nothing in the material world. It is purely rhetorical self delusion and Western face saving. Western elites have to hold their heads up, after all. And the press’s job as the fourth branch is to help them do it. But they have all lost their souls to the lying.
“Russia would get absolutely annihilated
in a purely conventional fight with NATO,
especially in its current shambolic state.”
Russia’s got guns, bullets too…
NATO has way too few.
Nate, you’re way more responsible than the Western media, who have lost all aspects of sobriety.
Yes, I think Russia and China are moving on:
https://www.rt.com/russia/579484-beijing-moscow-global-reform/
They know they’ve won and all that remains is for the details to be worked out. Short of a nuclear war that destroys everyone, there’s nothing the West can do but pound sand.
It is a bit dizzying. First, in my twenties, the Soviet Union collapsed. We had been raised in the Cold War and that superpower struggle had shaped our worldview practically from the crib. Suddenly, on Christmas Day (Western) 1991, down came the Soviet flag and up went the flag of the Russian Republic.
Now, again, in 2022-2023, a major shift in world power is unfolding, this time in the opposite direction. Having shaken off communism and re-embraced mixed-market economics and Russian Orthodoxy, Russia, the largest country on earth, amazingly rich in resources and with the largest nuclear arsenal; and China, tied for most populous country with India, a nuclear power and having a manufacturing base larger than the US and Europe combined, have allied to take over world hegemony from the US.
Now, there are some who will say, “Oh, no, no, we are just headed for multipolarity, like the Russians and Chinese say.”
Don’t be naive. Power doesn’t work that way. It may be a relatively soft hegemony (compared to that of the US), but hegemony it will be. Witness all the countries lined up to join BRICS due to the emerging gold based trading currency to be announced in August. Witness the gradual erosion of consensus within EU states regarding the viability of independence from Russian energy. Witness the US Secretary of Treasury obsequiously bowing before her Chinese counterpart like a vassal before her lord. And who can forget Emmanuel, king of the gun droppers, seeking in vain to be admitted to BRICS.
On some level, they know the jig is up. That is why they are waging a full on war, to the extent that they dare, against Russia. The sanctions are unprecedented and the seizure of central bank reserves was not even used in WWII. The propaganda is full on war propaganda reminiscent of that used against the Japanese during WWII. The only steps they haven’t taken are the use of nukes (due to MAD) and an American direct intervention in the Ukraine War (aka, the War for European Hegemony). This is due to the realization that NATO weapons, training and tactics have already lost badly and an aversion to losing the ability to deny their inferiority to the Russian military if American troops were trounced in a similar fashion to their Ukrainian counterparts. The appeal of some of their weapons systems has already been degraded by poor performance in the conflict. There is a limit to how much money the MIC is willing to lose.
But the US would have to stage a monumental buildup someplace in order to intervene. The 101st Airborne is not going to cut it. Were the US to demonstrate a manifest intention to build up forces for an invasion, Russia would attack the buildup as it unfolded. It certainly would not simply wait there for a massive army to materialize in countries bordering the Ukraine.
America/NATO has no chance in this conflict – none whatsoever. It’s too close to Russia. They could blow up the world, but other than that, they’re done. And they won’t do that because it would destroy the power and wealth of the elite rulers.
“America/NATO has no chance in this conflict –
none whatsoever. It’s too close to Russia.”
Even Obama noticed that in Ukraine
Russia has escalatory dominance.
Pity he never told Joe…
Something’s been bugging me about Erdogan’s about-face. Something just didn’t seem “right”.
it started with the five Nazis that were released. So what? I think Erdogan –wily horse-trader that he is–is softening up the EU for Turkey’s admission.
He ain’t gonna get it. So, like a wounded lover, he will run back to Moscow.
I saw this over at Helleniscope:
https://www.helleniscope.com/2023/07/10/erdogan-on-a-tightrope-did-he-actually-turn-against-the-russians/
What I didn’t know was the Putin is flying to Ankara next week just ahead of the BRICS summit.
And then there’s the fact that Saudi Arabia is going to formally join BRICS.
The game’s afoot.
This escaped my attention (Zelensky loses his cool while meeting with the Bulgarian govt):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3O3mr-o9KG4
Very interesting video. It ought to be a very interesting meeting in Vilnius.
It is so interesting, and disturbing, that it is now somehow off limits to ask obvious questions: why does Zelenskyy wear a tee shirt while all his counterparts wear suits? Why is it Ok for Fetterman to dress the same and look like a big mental patient while all his colleagues dress appropriately? Why is it “incredibly irresponsible” to ask if the presidents family left something behind in the WH when they flew to Camp David? Why is it OK for the Press Secretary to say the first family was not in the WH on the day before the powder was found, when they certainly were?
Zelenskyy going around as if he is always ready to rush in and start driving a tank, even when he is 5,000 miles away in Washington DC is laughable – but if we so much as crack a smile we expose ourselves as Putin-istas.
Personally, I think that the vial of cocaine was planted there. By who, I don’t know.
Two options:
1. Kamala’s people did it in order to add more fuel to the fire against Biden, or
2. Biden’s people did it in order to somehow tie it to Kamala.
Option #1 is to grease the skids so the Cabinet can invoke the 25th, option #2 is to do the same to get rid of Kamala and replace her with Big Mike Obama or Gavin Newsom.
Some researchers have been digging into official Russian records to attempt a more comprehensive estimate of Russian war deaths. Midpoint of the range through to late May is 47,000.
https://meduza.io/en/feature/2023/07/10/bring-out-your-dead
As I’ve mentioned before, you can suppress these figures to a limited degree for a limited time, but they ultimately come out in the end.
Possibly true. However we were told back in April of 2022, that the Russians had already lost 50,000 KIA. That was over a year ago. Clearly somebody in the
West is peddling propaganda.
I would ask however, does your source have any information on the Ukrainian KIAs?
It is true that Wagner lost quite a lot of men in Bakhmut. Hard to say.
As I understand it, much of Russia’s casualty list
likely stems from the Wagner Group’s attempts
to justify its continued independent existence
through the full-scale assault on Bakhmut;
despite the Russian MOD’s clear preference
for the slow destruction of Ukraine’s army
by a prolonged campaign of steady attrition.
If so, the fault must lie more with Prigozhin
than with Putin, Gerasimov and Shoigu…
I don’t recall seeing KIA figures that high in that timeframe from any remotely credible sources. Do you remember where you saw that citation? I do recall seeing estimates of 50,000 casualties (KIA/WIA combined) for Russia emerging until around July of last year.
Doing similar analysis in Ukraine is probably not possible at this time. For what it’s worth, I suspect even the low confidence estimates that have come out are in the ballpark. Extrapolating to late May, that would put Ukraine at around 160,000 casualties, of which 40-50,000 might be KIA.
Both sides will be taking significant losses over the next few months. Russia has multiple brigades doing a pretty good Ship of Theseus impression this past month.
That’s the point: those figures last year were bandied about by “credible” sources in the West. As for Ukrainian KIA, it’s credibly put in the 200,000 range.
And that is totally believable. Why? Because the Russians have built impregnable defenses which the Ukrainians are constantly impaling themselves on. Some sane commentators who are veterans (e.g. Col MacGregor, Lt Col Shaeffer, Col Davis, Brig Gen Kimmit, et al) and who understand the differences btw the Russian way of maneuver warfare compared to the Ukrainians, who are throwing everything against the wall and seeing what sticks, say that the number may be up to 350,000 KIA.
What sources? I am truly curious who on earth was saying that.
MacGregor and that ilk have a spectacularly bad track record in this conflict, but I guarantee he’ll keep telling you what you want to hear, regardless of the actual reality of the war.
Speaking of pictures, here’s 50 videos of the destruction being rained upon the Kievan regime’s army, courtesy of Jacob Dreizin:
https://thedreizinreport.com/2023/07/07/dreizin-new-material-since-june-16th-big-video-dump-1-the-dump-awakens/
https://www.helleniscope.com/2023/07/08/desecration-electronic-music-party-in-a-historic-church-in-smyrna/
Lest we forget Smyrna and its venerable Orthodox history…. nearly destroyed during the Asia Minor catastrophe in 1922.
https://www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2021/02/the-cathedral-church-of-saint-photini.html?m=1
May St Photini, St Chrysostomos and the new martyrs of Smyrna pray for us that we maintain our Orthodox Christian faith during these demonic times.
https://orthodoxwiki.org/Chrysostomos_(Kalafatis)_of_Smyrna
The church where this dance party was held is dedicated to St. Boukolos, who was the first Bishop of Smyrna (the immediate predecessor of St. Polycarp) and the earthly “angel” to whom Christ addressed a letter that is included in Scripture (Revelation 2:8-11):
Saint Boukolos, intercede for the wayward children of your land!
So as the Ecumenical Patriarch was emphatically stating to Zelensky that he was “Mother Church of all Ukraine,” this was happening on his watch.
https://orthochristian.com/154750.html
Exactly who does he think the Orthodox are in Ukraine? What about the people being evicted from their homes? These are people who have probably been Ukrainian Orthodox their entire lives.
AND WHAT IS THEIR “MOTHER CHURCH” DOING FOR THEM, EXACTLY? Nothing. Absolutely nothing to help them.
Good luck getting them to unite under Bartholomew’ now. The whole Orthodox world is gasping at what we’re seeing. These people even broke down the door to Met. Onufry’s residence and sealed it. https://orthochristian.com/154750.html
The “Mother Church” has failed. It has failed to hold onto the respect of the Orthodox world. It has has failed the people it says it represents. Why would the GOA want continue to hitch their wagon to an abject failure who is associated with evil hat’s being perpetrated on the Ukrainian people who just wat to live in their homes.
Bartholomew has aligned himself and his patriarchate, which includes the GOA, with pure evil.
Some people say spiritual energies are innocuous. They don’t believe that if they’re a party in supporting evil, there will be consequences. In the next life to for sure, but also in this life there are consequences when one ignores evil. People call it karma. But the reality is, evil likes to hang out with people who are comfortable with evil being done within their lives on their behalf. If they don’t sweep their houses clean, evil will take up residence there. It will mess with your own life. If you have various things befall your families, think about who you support. Think of the evil he unleashed.
At this point, to call Cpole a “Mother Church” is ironic indeed. Perhaps “Mommie Dearest” isntead?
I’m just going to stick to the dichotomy handed down from my Lemko Rusyn forebears, as related to me by my grandmother and mother:
To be Russian is to be Orthodox.
“Ukrainian” is a name invented for Russians who became Catholic—the ones who embraced Papism and Latinization hook, line, and sinker.
Dr John Campbell’s video opens with a slide
showing Western Australia vaccine data…
Bad Australian vaccine data
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1l6Q2r5VWLo
[Video – 15:36]
Truly: “One Picture Is Worth a Thousand Words”
https://www.insider.com/greek-priest-arrested-anointed-tourist-genitals-report-2023-7
More info from the National Herald; it looks like the (Chicago) natives are getting restless:
https://www.thenationalherald.com/clergy-and-laity-of-chicago-oppose-archbishops-charter-proposals/
A unanimous act of defiance on behalf of the clergy?
“It is emphasized that all the priests appeared at the meeting wearing a ‘rason and kalimavki’ – the traditional Orthodox black robe and stovepipe hat. Elpidophoros, as is well known, has imposed on New York priests and workers within the Archdiocese a rule not to wear a ‘rason’, nor a cassock – the so-called inner rason, nor a kalimavki, but they are to walk around in a suit and collar.”
Jim Jatras made an appearance on World War Now, definitely worth a listen.
Though not dealing directly with Elpi’s Tour of Disaster, they do touch on the potential (inevitable) 2025 union of Rome & the EP. It’s very interesting. I do agree with Jim that any potential “union” will be in a more cunning, less overt way, than it was at Fererra-Florence.
It did get me wondering, why is God allowing this to happen? The Church has already been in a situation where it has denounced a false union with Rome. Have we not learned our lesson? This should be a no-brainer for the Church to condemn.
But, we do have wise words from this Bulgarian hierarch, no doubt aimed at Met. Emmanuel of Chalcedon, who was in attendance:
“…why is God allowing this to happen?”
God gave us free will.
It is we who allow it.
“Have we not learned our lesson?”
Err… No, not yet…
But God will prevail.
https://orthochristian.com/154873.html
On the sin of regicide, by St John Maximovitch