Cyril Hovorun

Welcome to In Conversation. In this conversation I have the pleasure of talking with Professor Cyril Hovorun a research fellow at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles and at the Stockholm School of Theology. He is author of a number of substantial books on public and political theology including the recently published Political Orthodoxies: The Unorthodoxies of the Church Coerced.

I welcome you to our conversation on church and state and the challenges to the Orthodox churches posed by nationalism, fundamentalism and anti-

Semitism in the post-Soviet period. I welcome your thoughts on our

conversation and may be reached at davidgoa@telusplanet.net.

In February 2014 in the central square in Kiev, the Maidan, we witnessed the Ukrainian Revolution. It was a rare occasion in the history of an Orthodox country. Priests and monks came out to support the people as they challenged political authorities. Professor Cyril Hovorun, a political insider, spoke out eloquently on this occasion. His analysis of the relationship between ecclesiastical leaders and political leaders, between church, state and society drew on his scholarship from Constantine through the Patristic period to the contemporary world. Fr. Cyril is a Patristic scholar and keen observer of how the culture wars in Eastern and Southern Europe turn into bloody conflicts. He focuses on the theological underpinnings of these wars that emerged with the fall of communism and the spiritual renewal of Orthodoxy. In Russia, Ukraine and other countries of Eastern Europe the Orthodox Church became an influential political protagonist. All to often religion is being politicized and weaponized, used in service to narrow nationalism and anti-Semitism. His work calls for a rethinking of the Orthodox doctrine of the Symphonia, the harmony between Emperor and Hierarch, State and Church. His analysis is singular in helping us understand the troubling movements unfolding in many Orthodox countries. His guidance is sorely needed for the church to find its better angels.

Professor Hovorun is a research fellow at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles and at the Stockholm School of Theology. He is author of a number of substantial books on public and political theology including the recently published Political Orthodoxies: The Unorthodoxies of the Church Coerced. I welcome you to our conversation on church and state. I welcome your thoughts on our conversation and may be reached at www.davidgoa.ca/contact.