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In post-soviet Russia, sobornost’ has been a historic ideal and cultural resource that diverse actors have used in order to construct anew the nation’s dignity and status. This study analyses the promotion of the (imperial) culture of sobornost’ by Patriarch Kirill and Patriarch Alexy based on 36 speeches they delivered from 1993 to 2022 at the World Russian People’s Council, in a forum purposefully established to enhance the culture of sobornost’/solidarity in Russian society. The findings of a qualitative thematic analysis of the speeches identified common themes (such as ‘true historical path’), thematic changes (such as the adoption of geopolitical discourse on family), thematic emphases uniquely present at particular ‘times’ (such as at the EU enlargement of 2004), themes related to the promotion of sobornost’ at the level of the trans-national church, and its correlates—Russian state-civilization, globalization, and confrontation with the West. The findings demonstrate agreement in the messages of Patriarch Alexy and Patriarch Kirill as well as specific content and style that were articulated only by the latter. In the conclusion, we compare Kirill’s culture of sobornost’ with Roman Catholic synodality and with Russian 19th century applications of the same concept, and Kirill’s entrepreneurial construction of national identity from the perspective of glocalization.

Using a religious studies methodology, this paper offers a detailed contextual mapping and a structural configuration of how collective violence is justified in Orthodox Christianity. The research design is explanatory, whereby the functional perspectives of doctrine, ethics and worship are all investigated and probed as phenomena of lived religion and orthopraxy. While predominantly initiatory and pedagogical, the paper also proposes a systematic platform for advanced research on this subject, by flagging contexts, themes and areas of inquiry that a researcher might examine in order to untangle the inner workings of the justification of violence in the mind of the Orthodox. Given the ongoing Russian War on Ukraine, relevant samples are drawn from this case.ContributionThis paper outlines the Orthodox Christian justification of violence from the perspectives of doctrine, ethics and ritual and identifies pivotal areas of ambiguity between orthodoxy and orthopraxy.