Russia’s ruthless invasion of Ukraine has confronted Ukrainian Christians with some hard moral questions.
I am writing halfway through an eight-day visit to Ukraine to encourage YWAM workers and other believers. My colleagues Dick and Ulla Brouwer and my wife Romkje and I are being made aware of how much we Europeans are indebted to the sacrifices, the resilience, and the commitment of Ukrainians.
In conversations with pastors, theologians, historians, soldiers, chaplains, educators, bereaved family members, and ordinary believers, we are hearing Ukrainians wrestling with issues that many Western Christians have long discussed only in theory.
Should believers remain pacifists when their cities are bombed?
Should believers remain pacifists when their cities are bombed? When defending families and freedom requires force, what does faithfulness to Christ look like? How should churches relate to political power?
Innovation, humor, solidarity, and doggedness have helped the nation emerge from the cruel attacks and the biting cold winter far from cowed and broken. In fact, the reality is that a Ukraine under oppression is becoming a world leader on several fronts: military innovation, digital governance, civic mobilization, and societal resilience. Ukraine is not only defending itself—it is helping to redefine how nations survive and adapt in the turbulent politics of the 21st century.
Ukraine is becoming a laboratory of ethics for the global church.
Most importantly, Ukraine is becoming a laboratory of ethics for the global church. One influential voice in this discussion is historian Yaroslav Hrytsak (see my interview with Yaroslav here). His central claim is that absolute pacifism can become morally irresponsible in the face of violent tyranny.
Peace is the ultimate goal of any moral society, Hrytsak affirms. But that peace must not be confused with passivity. When a powerful aggressor seeks to destroy a nation and erase its identity, refusing to resist may actually enable greater injustice.
Hrytsak frames the war not primarily as a nationalist struggle but as a defense of moral order itself against an immoral aggressor. Ukraine, he argues, is resisting a system built on lies, repression, and imperial domination led by Vladimir Putin. If such aggression succeeds, it does not merely harm Ukraine; it undermines the principle that truth and freedom matter in international life.
Ukraine is therefore on the front-line of the battle for the soul of Europe—and of the West.
Sacrificial protection
What responsibility do we bear toward those who are vulnerable to violence?
The question is no longer simply, "Is violence wrong?" Rather it becomes: "what responsibility do we bear toward those who are vulnerable to violence?"
From this perspective, refusing to defend civilians may itself be a form of moral failure. A society that abandons its citizens to brutality in the name of moral purity risks turning peace into a form of indifference.
This argument resonates deeply with many Ukrainian Christians. Until recently some Protestant communities had pacifist leanings, influenced by Anabaptist traditions and life under Soviet militarism. But the reality of invasion has forced a re-examination.
Military service as an act of sacrificial protection.
Many believers now describe military service as an act of sacrificial protection rather than nationalist aggression, quoting Jesus in John 15:13: "Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends".
Yet most Ukrainian churches avoid condemning those who remain pacifists. Instead, a broad moral consensus has emerged. Some Christians defend the nation through military service, while others serve through chaplaincy, humanitarian aid, and care for refugees, widows, and veterans. Both forms of service are understood as expressions of love for neighbor.
Cautionary lesson
The church must never become the servant of political ideology.
The war has also reinforced a crucial principle for Ukrainian Christians: the church must never become the servant of political ideology. They are keenly aware how religious language can be manipulated to justify imperial ambition.
Both Putin and the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow, frame Russia’s war as a defense of a sacred Christian civilization. Theologians worldwide–Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant alike–warn against this dangerous fusion of nationalism and faith, whether expressed as Russky Mir or American Christian nationalism.
Ukraine’s experience offers a cautionary lesson. When Christianity becomes identified with a political project, it loses its prophetic voice. Instead of challenging power, it sanctifies it.
Faith has moved beyond private spirituality into public responsibility.
Yet the Ukrainian story also carries a message of hope. Churches and Christian organizations across the country have become centers of extraordinary civic service. Believers have organized refugee shelters, medical assistance, trauma counseling, and humanitarian relief on a massive scale. Faith has moved beyond private spirituality into public responsibility.
This may be the deepest insight emerging from Ukraine’s laboratory of ethics. Christian faith is not simply about maintaining moral purity or winning political arguments. It is about responsible love in the real world, even when the choices are painful and imperfect.
In the end, Ukrainian Christians are reminding the global church of a difficult truth. Peace is not merely the absence of conflict. It is the presence of justice, truth and the protection of the vulnerable... Even in the midst of turbulence.
Originally published by Weekly Word. Republished with permission.
Jeff Fountain and his wife Romkje are the initiators of the Schuman Centre for European Studies. They moved to Amsterdam in December 2017 after living in the Dutch countryside for over 40 years engaged with the YWAM Heidebeek training centre. Romkje was founder of YWAM The Netherlands and chaired the national board until 2013. Jeff was YWAM Europe director for 20 years, until 2009. Jeff chaired the annual Hope for Europe Round Table until 2015, while Romkje chaired the Women in Leadership network until recently. Jeff is author of Living as People of Hope, Deeply Rooted and other titles, and also writes weekly word, a weekly column on issues relating to Europe.
Weekly Word is an initiative of The Schuman Centre for European Studies. Jeff Fountain is a New Zealander holding a Dutch passport, is currently the director of the Schuman Centre for European Studies (www.schumancentre.eu), and lives in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Jeff graduated with a history degree from the University of Auckland (1972) and worked as a journalist on the New Zealand Herald (1972-3), and as travelling secretary for Tertiary Student Christian Fellowship (TSCF) (1973). He has lived in the Netherlands since 1975, and has travelled and spoken in almost every European country. For twenty years following the fall of communism, he was the European director for the international and interdenominational mission organisation, Youth With A Mission. He was chairman of the international, trans-denominational movement, Hope for Europe, for which he organised two pan-European congresses in Budapest in 2002 and 2011. In 2010, he established the Schuman Centre for European Studies (www.schumancentre.eu) to promote biblical perspectives on Europe’s past, present and future, to encourage effective engagement in issues facing Europe today.
