BEING HUMAN

#BeingHuman. Ukraine as a moral issue… Ukraine has become our generation’s moral Golgotha – a place where suffering is not theoretical but embodied, where evil is not philosophical but concrete, where our response reveals not our political but moral essence… as in other contexts of the “armed conflicts”… we cry about them too, in and from Ukraine…

“What does it profit a man to gain the whole world yet forfeit his soul?” This haunting question from Mark 8:36 now confronts Western politicians and the Global Church alike, even if they do not think or realize it…

While they debate Russian gas prices and Ukrainian minerals, our loved ones are killed by Russians… our children sleep in subway stations as bombs fall overhead… this is a revelation of our spiritual condition in the “fight for traditional Christian values.”…

I think of the Psalmist’s cry: “How long, O Lord?” It echoes from our lips day and night, not as a rhetorical exercise but as a visceral plea… When mothers bury children in makeshift graves, when elderly couples cling to one another in bombed-out apartments, and when pastors hold services in basements while sirens wail, these moments become moral imperatives that demand response… not silence.. or muting the victims…

The Global Church now stands at a crossroads, resembling Peter in the high priest’s courtyard… and it is not about Ukraine only but also many other locations with euphemistic “armed conflicts” where the oppressed people and communities of Hope suffer…

Will we recognize the crucified Christ in Ukraine and many other places, or will we, like Peter trembling in the courtyard, choose the warmth of distant indifference over the cold truth of complicity?

In this moment of terrible freedom, our response – “I know Him” or “I do not know the man” – reveals not merely what we believe about geopolitics and traditional Christian values but whether our faith in the crucified and resurrected God and theological leadership (through theological education toward the flourishing church) have substance beyond words…

The anguished eyes of Ukrainian and other children suffering in the “armed conflicts” now become the mirror through which we glimpse our authentic selves… stripped of pretense… confronting the abyss between who we claim to be in our mission statements and international gatherings… and who we truly are when suffering (which never is and looks romantic, beautiful or pleasant) demands witness.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​..

Our response is not primarily political; it is moral and existential. It reveals whether we truly believe that humans in the “armed conflicts” (not the aggressors but the victims) bear God’s image or whether this remains merely a theoretical doctrine from systematic theology (which has rested in peace in Ukraine since 24 February 2022).

For Western politicians, Ukraine represents what Kierkegaard might call the “teleological suspension of the political”: a moment when standard political calculations must yield higher moral truth… When Pilate washed his hands, he made a reasonable political decision… History judges him not on his political acumen but on his moral abdication…

I am haunted by Ezekiel’s vision of those who “sigh and cry over all the abominations” versus those who remain silent. Our sighing and crying – or our silence – reveals not our geopolitical sophistication but the content of our faith and hearts.

As another cherry night falls over Ukraine, let us remember that darkness is never just darkness. As John’s Gospel reminds us, it is either the darkness that has not overcome the light or the darkness we choose when we turn away from the light. Which it becomes depends not on our policies but on our mission of presence with those suffering.

In this shadow of moral ambiguity, we must remember that both Abel and Cain emerged from Eden’s exile, sharing the exact fallen nature. Neither stood holy before God, but both were called to bring sacrifice for and from their broken humanity.

Yet when God accepted Abel’s offering and rejected Cain’s, it was Cain alone who made the fateful choice to murder his brother, despite God’s direct warning: “Sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it” (Genesis 4:7).

God’s response was not to suggest a balanced hearing of “both perspectives” or to create a moral equivalence between killer and killed… Instead, He rendered clear judgment: “What have you done? Listen! Your brother’s blood cries out to me from the ground” (Genesis 4:10)…

This blood still cries today, as Hebrews 11:4 tells us: “Though he is dead, he still speaks.” Why does Abel’s blood continue its ancient testimony? Because even among God’s people there and now, this cry often goes unheard, drowned out by comfortable peacetime theologies that consistently avoid the scandal of “taking sides” in the presence of evil.

This is not a call to specific political action but to moral awakening… While theological institutions debate comfortable academic questions, God lies crucified again in Ukrainian rubble like in Kryviy Rig yesterday…

The Divine presence dwells not in our careful neutrality but in the shattered bodies of the victims, calling us to see the theological significance of this moment… As Abel’s blood still cries from the ground after millennia, so too will Ukraine’s testimony echo long after our convenient explanations have turned to dust…

We cannot compel anyone to make moral choices. Each witness to the crucifixion of God makes their decision in the terrible freedom of human conscience… either to hide at a safe distance like Peter, warming ourselves with sophisticated justifications… or to follow John to the very foot of the Cross, where comfortable theology dies and authentic faith begins…

As you read these words, what voice speaks louder in your heart… the voice of caution or the voice of the Crucified? When the history of this moment is written, where will you be found standing? And when your grandchildren ask what the church did when Ukrainians were being slaughtered, will your answer reveal a faith that remained theoretical, or one that became flesh and dwelt among the suffering through the mission of presence? Peace be with you and keep your children away from war…
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Taras Dyatlik, Germany
6 March 2025, Thursday
8 months when Andriy was deadly injured by the Russians..