Transatlantic turmoil

European leaders rally to Zelensky's defense

Deliver me, O Lord, from lying lips and a deceitful tongue (including mine). Psalm 120 “gets us out of an environment of deceit and hostility and sets us on our way to God,” writes Eugene Peterson.

So much of so-called Christian behavior is embedded in our legal system and social expectations as to be coercive. We don’t know how much murder, theft, perjury and falsification would happen apart from the law. “But worship is not forced,” writes Peterson. “Most Christian worship is voluntary.” It’s where we are free! It’s where we encounter the great foundational realities—that God created us, redeems us, and provides for us. It’s where we discover in ritual the truths that God forgives our sins and makes it possible to live without guilt and with purpose. (from Peterson’s A Long Obedience In the Same Direction)

These realities ground us to think about Ukraine, about famine in Sudan, about transition in Syria, about chaos, deceit, and challenges on the home front.

Leaders of Baltic and Nordic states gather around Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky on third anniversary of Russian invasion

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Winston Churchill gets credit for saying that America does the right thing after exhausting the alternatives. That’s how a lead editorial in London’s Financial Times begins. It continues:

Donald Trump has turned that aphorism on its head. In the past 10 days, he has all but incinerated 80 years of postwar American leadership. Those who thought America was a friend or ally, notably Ukraine and NATO, are dropping once safe assumptions to cope with a world in which America is an unabashed predator. Countries that were treated by Washington as adversaries, notably Vladimir Putin’s Russia, are suddenly America’s friend.

Trump’s assault on truth and the transatlantic alliance took off in a press conference Feb. 18 where he accused Ukraine of starting the war and criticized President Volodymyr Zelensky as “a dictator without elections.” Key cabinet members Hegseth, Waltz, and Rubio followed up, echoing Trump’s portrayal of Zelensky as the aggressor.

European leaders quickly rallied and gathered in Kyiv on the third anniversary of Russia’s invasion. Alexander Stubb, president of Finland, laid out a cogent plan (worth your 8 minutes) for pursuing peace in Ukraine, underscoring the threats from Russian President Vladimir Putin. “This war is about the existence of nationhood in Ukraine,” he said:

Now, my big point is that there seems to be some misunderstanding about what is going on here. Russia obviously started this war, but remember that it began its acquisition of territory and spheres of interest already in 2008 by attacking Georgia, and then in 2014 by annexing the Crimean Peninsula.

We are now here to commemorate the third anniversary of the beginning of the full-scale war. But the war has been going on for pretty much 11 years, ever since 2014. A lot of people don’t understand that this is not only about Ukraine, but this is also about Europe. This is also about the United States. This is also about international law, and at the end of the day, it’s about the world order.

So, if we now allow Russia to do what it wants to do, in other words, stop the existence of a Ukrainian state, then it’s not only Ukraine that has lost, it’s Europe that has lost, it’s the West that has lost, and also the United States that has lost.

As the European leaders met, the United States in an unprecedented move sided with Russia and rogue states like North Korea as the UN General Assembly voted on a resolution condemning Russia’s actions in Ukraine. The United States then drafted and voted for a resolution at the UN Security Council which called for an end to the conflict, but contained no criticism of Russia.

Church leaders in Ukraine also spoke out on the war’s anniversary. Sviatoslav Shevchuk, the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, said the war has been “a marathon all Ukrainians must run at full speed just to survive.”

In a speech last week at the Hudson Institute in Washington, Shevchuk said his church was outlawed in Ukrainian territory occupied by Russia, starting in 2022.

Putin, who often depicts himself as the defender of the faith, outlawed all churches in occupied areas except those aligned with the Russian-controlled Moscow Patriarchate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. In Mariupol Russian authorities banned “all Protestant and non-Orthodox churches.” In the occupied Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia, they banned all Greek Catholic churches as well as Catholic charity organizations Caritas and the Knights of Columbus.

As a result, Greek Catholics in Ukraine, said Shevchuk, face danger everywhere. “If Russia succeeds in Ukraine, our church will not survive.”

Ukrainians, Shevchuk said, seek a just peace, but one that does not discriminate among believers and “appease evil.”

Shevchuk said, “A peace that rewards aggression is not a peace, it is an invitation for future invasions.” He concluded: “God’s spirit is stronger than the forces of evil. May we have enough courage to stand for truth.”

More—

• How some Republicans are taking issue with President Trump on Ukraine

• Rubio’s pretzel

• Still, Trump and Zelensky plan to meet today to sign a minerals “agreement to agree,” and here’s a breakdown of what Ukraine is/is not giving away.

• How Russia wants to erase Ukraine’s future—and its past

• How fishing nets supplied by Denmark are helping Ukrainian soldiers survive Russian drone attacks

• In Turkey … Abdullah Ocalan, the imprisoned leader of the Kurdish militant group PKK that has fought a decades-long insurgency against Turkey, issued a call from prison on Thursday asking the movement he founded to lay down its arms and dissolve itself. It’s a move everyone seems to agree is good ;) and will impact transitions in Syria and Iraq.

I’m reading Challenger by Adam Higginbotham (whew, also stressful, also appropos U.S. government bungling) … and watching The Children of Windermere.

Next week I’ll be mentoring with these fellows in Virginia, and more likely being inspired by them.