President Putin has compared himself to Jesus Christ as he quoted the Bible to explain his divine mission schooling Russia’s youth in “traditional” values.
The Russian president has frequently portrayed himself as a stalwart defender of the Christian faith against the “Satanic” West.
But in a revealing insight into how Putin sees his role, the Russian leader spoke in overtly religious terms about the need to shape the worldview of young Russians.
Appearing via video link to celebrate the opening of children’s centres near Moscow, Putin began quoting from the Bible.
Putin has ordered the establishment of youth centres across the country in a move redolent of the Soviet-era camps where children were indoctrinated in Communist party values from a young age. From the age of six, primary schoolchildren in the Soviet Union could join the Little Octobrists, before advancing to the Young Pioneers aged nine and progressing to the Komsomol at 14.
Advertisement
Under Putin, the strict atheism of the Soviet Union has been replaced by a muscular form of Orthodox Christianity that is often used to spread state-approved messages.
• God’s on Russia’s side in Ukraine, says Putin — but church is split
Putin compared his mission of protecting the Russian youth from the creeping influence of the West to the efforts of Jesus Christ recruiting Peter and Andrew, two fishermen, to spread the word of God.
“Do you remember how Jesus came to Galilee and saw the fishermen beside the Sea of Galilee?” he asked a meeting of Russian officials.
“One was catching fish, another was fixing his net. And He said to them: ‘Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men, fishers of human souls.’ They became his evangelists, his students.
Advertisement
“This was very important at a time when world religions were developing … but it is no less current now, when we must defend our traditional values, our culture, our traditions and our history. This is very important for the future of the country.”
• Michael Bird: Alexei Navalny was inspired by the Sermon on the Mount
The return of religion to Russian politics and Putin’s apparently sacred role in upholding the country’s traditions mirrors the deification of the tsar before the February Revolution of 1917.
At the meeting last week, Putin insisted he did not want to share a solely Christian message and referenced the four “traditional religions” of Russia — Christianity, Islam, Buddhism and Judaism.
But in a country where 70 per cent of Russians identify themselves as Orthodox, Christianity has enjoyed a privileged role and has been co-opted into justifying the war in Ukraine.
Advertisement
Patriarch Kirill, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, has said that Russian troops who die in Ukraine are absolved of sin, effectively anointing the war as a holy crusade.
In the run-up to Orthodox Easter on May 5, the Moscow patriarchate, which is closely aligned to Putin, has heaped further blessings on what it describes as a struggle for “national liberation in …southwestern Russia”. At a meeting in Moscow at the end of last month, the patriarchate officially called the special military operation a “svyashchyennaya voyna” or “Holy War”.
The patriarchate also identified the continuing decline of the Russian population as one of the gravest dangers facing the nation.
Putin has declared 2024 the Year of the Family, encouraging Russians to have more children by offering subsidised mortgages and improved maternity leave, and telling women they must have at least two babies to “preserve our ethnic group”. At the same time, LGBT+ groups have been banned as extremist organisations.
Putin’s attempts to shape the values and worldviews of Russia’s youth appears to be working, polling suggests.
Advertisement
Although independent polling in Russia is difficult, a survey by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and the Levada Center, a Russian independent polling organisation, of those aged 18 to 34 found that young Russians were overwhelmingly patriotic. They were also found to be apathetic about engaging in democracy, with just 30 per cent voting in an election in the past two years. In total, 82 per cent said they were very proud or somewhat proud of being Russian.
