In 1917 at Fatima, Our Lady called Russia a scourge but also foretold its immense potential for a spiritual turnaround. Fast-forward to today, and Vladimir Putin’s attempt to demoralize Ukraine has ironically become the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church’s greatest cause for conversion in a century.
Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk of Kyiv notes that church affiliation has risen 150 percent since the invasion. It seems that when you launch rockets at innocent civilians to crush their hope, they don’t capitulate—they pack the pews.
“Our churches are filled with people who had never come before,” according to the Major Archbishop of Kyiv–Galicia and Primate of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. The nation’s resilience is so stubbornly robust that it even surprises the clergy.
When the Diplomats Fled, the Clergy Dug In
The invasion in February 2022 changed everything. Parishes became bunkers, priests became chaplains, and charity became a matter of daily survival. When Russian forces threatened to encircle Kyiv within 24 hours, most diplomats quickly packed their bags and left.
Yet, Catholic Archbishop Visvaldas Kulbokas, the Vatican’s apostolic nuncio to Ukraine, chose to stay. Along with only the ambassadors of Poland and Turkmenistan, Archbishop Kulbokas watched the chaos unfold. As he put it with masterful understatement, “It was clear the city could soon be fully surrounded. But we stayed.”
The One-Man Army
Archbishop Kulbokas recounts the story of a single Ukrainian soldier armed with portable Javelin missiles. He stepped out of cover, destroyed a Russian tank, then hid. He did it again when a second tank appeared, and then a third time. The Russian convoy, utterly convinced they had stumbled into a massive defensive trap, halted their advance and retreated.
“It’s good I didn’t know there were a dozen tanks there,” the soldier later said. In the grand theater of war, sometimes a little ignorance, paired with a shoulder-fired missile, is the ultimate strategic advantage.
This episode convinced Archbishop Kulbokas that, in moments of crisis, even one person’s heroism could change the course of history.
Trench Therapists and Therapy Dogs
The psychological toll of war is unimaginable, yet clinical psychology seems to be losing out to spirituality—and golden retrievers. Archbishop Kulbokas describes a training program designed to prepare 25 psychologists to treat wounded soldiers. After one session, 23 walked out, deciding the grim reality simply wasn’t for them. After the second session, the last two departed. The organizer’s remaining hope? Priests, monks and dogs.
One military chaplain brings dogs to the front lines. He doesn’t preach fire and brimstone; he simply prepares the young men for the sheer, terrifying reality of combat. He hands out rosaries, hears confessions and validates their fear. Faith doesn’t magically erase fear, but it makes the nightmare endurable. As for the chaplain’s four-legged companion, it turns out that a puppy requires no words or probing questions. The dog arrives, leans in, and the therapy begins.
The Final Medicine
With chaplains meeting only about 60 percent of the desperate demand, the frontline reality remains starkly devastating. The nuncio shared a heartbreaking account of a military doctor treating soldiers pinned down by drone surveillance. Knowing evacuation was impossible, the critically wounded soldiers declined further medical treatment. “Don’t stitch me up; it won’t help anymore,” they told the doctor. “Better give me absolution.”
When the horizon presents eternity, stitches lose their appeal and the Faith becomes the paramount concern.
A Surprising Harvest
Perhaps the sharpest irony of the conflict is its effect on religious belief. In Kherson, where the civilian population has plummeted to a fifth of its former size, Catholic parish attendance has somehow surged by 500 percent. “In Kherson, there are no unbelievers left,” Archbishop Kulbokas notes. Farther from the front lines, bishops quietly distribute the sacraments, canned meat and bread, feeding both bodies and souls amid a tragedy that has radically united the populace around the one true faith.
The war has even sparked amazing conversions. Archbishop Kulbokas noted that an Orthodox bishop and two Protestant pastors recently converted to Catholicism. One Protestant pastor was warned by a friend not to listen to a particular rosary-praying Catholic bishop for fear of converting. He attended a single homily and is now converting to the Catholic Faith.
The Smile of Our Lady
Russia’s diabolical struggle to subjugate Ukraine has failed, especially in its attempt to stamp out the Catholic faithful. If anything, the invasion might well become a modern-day Damascus Road story. Saul persecuted the early Church and was knocked off his horse and struck blind. Our Lord’s words converted him, transforming him into the great Apostle Saint Paul. Similarly, will Russia’s aggressive overreach have set the stage for its own spiritual conversion at the hands of Ukraine, its victim?
Our Lady foretold Russia’s conversion at Fatima. TFP founder, Prof. Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira thought this historic conversion would come through through a smile of Our Lady. Might Ukraine’s sufferings and growing Catholic population turn it into an instrument for Our Lady to bring Russia back to the Catholic Faith? Transforming the very scourge of the West into a new Saint Paul, a new champion of the Church?
Photo Credit: © diy13 – stock.adobe.com