American Evangelicals Divide over Ukraine
Republican candidates make competing arguments to potential voters.
Ministers detained by police. A secret service that searches sanctuaries, questions clergy with polygraphs, and puts church leaders under house arrest. A president who threatens to ban any religious organizations with ties to a neighboring country.
For American evangelicals concerned about international religious freedom, these reports would be enough to raise alarms about any country. But they’re even more alarming when they’re coming from a nation their government is backing in a war.
These were likely the kind of stories former Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson had in mind in July when he asked former vice president Mike Pence whether Christian voters could, in good conscience, continue to back US support for Ukraine and Volodymyr Zelensky in the war with Russia.
“The Zelensky government has raided convents, arrested priests—has effectively banned a Christian denomination,” Carlson claimed, referring to the Ukrainian branch of the Russian Orthodox Church.
The exchange, at a gathering of conservative Christians in Iowa, quickly got testy. And Carlson was roundly criticized by supporters of Ukraine. The Orthodox Public Affairs Committee, a US-based group, accused Carlson of spouting “Russian propaganda.”
But a growing number of American evangelical voters appear to be asking the same questions Carlson is asking. Many are expressing growing doubts about US support for the war.
American evangelicals backed Ukraine pretty vigorously at the outset. In fact, when Russia invaded Ukraine last February, they were more likely than other Americans to support Ukraine. According to an Economist/YouGov poll in March 2022, 77 percent of American evangelicals said they were sympathetic to Ukraine, ...
from Christianity Today Magazine https://ift.tt/U6Bz5c8
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