Warrior Virgin, Warrior Queen, Champion General Mary, and Mother of Power

How can Virgin Mary be used as a symbol of war, military, imperialism, and violence? Virgin Mary was as far from war and violence as a human can possibly be. But Christian nationalists have used Mary as a militaristic icon since ancient times. 

Dorian Llywelyn, a Jesuit priest, scholar of Catholicism, and President, the Institute for Advanced Catholic Studies, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences has written a fascinating article about how Mary has become a warrior queen and a military general, who has won many battles, for many nations. 

In his article, The patriotic Virgin: How Mary’s been marshaled for religious nationalism and military campaigns, Mr. Llywelyn traces the history of the Warrior Virgin from ancient times. He gives the example of a prayer from 4th century Christians in Egypt to Christian's victory over Persians after Constantinople was besieged by the Persian navy in 626 AD. Christians believed that their prayers to Mary destroyed the Persian fleet. Mary was given the military title 'Champion General' in the Akathist hymn that has been prayed in both the Orthodox and Eastern Catholic churches. Since then, Mary has been used as a symbol of the military and nation. In the Argentinian and Chilian militaries, she is still considered a national patroness and a general.

 Mr. Llywelyn mentions interesting and intriguing episodes of history when both sides of the conflict invoked Warrior Mary. During the War of Mexican Independence (1810-21), local forces invoked "Our Lady of Guadalupe," a title of Mary used in Mexico while the Spanish imperialist army invoked another title for Mary, “Virgin of Los Remedios,” as their protector and supporter. 

Another such episode is the reign of English Queen Elizabeth I, called the "Virgin Queen" because she was never married. However, many of her English supporters also considered her the second Virgin Mary under whom the golden age of purity and justice was restored. She was the head of the Anglican Church and Catholic Christians suffered harsh persecution during her reign. In her book, "The Virgin Mary in The Perceptions of Women: Mother, Protector, and Queen," Joelle Mellon wrote that during those difficult times, when death or imprisonment was a real threat, the English Catholics asked Mary for protection and gave her a new title: Mother of Power.

A mural in Kyiv, Ukraine depicting the Virgin Mary cradling a U.S.-made anti-tank weapon

Source: The patriotic Virgin: How Mary’s been marshaled for religious nationalism and military campaigns

Mary as a national symbol

Mary has been used as the national symbol of many countries. Catholic countries are particularly susceptible to Mary's devotion as Mr. Llywelyn explains:

Off the battlefield, many Catholic cultures have historically felt they had a special relationship with Mary. In 1638, King Louis XIII formally dedicated France to the Virgin Mary. Popular belief interpreted the subsequent birth of the future Louis XIV as Mary’s miraculous reward, after 23 years of waiting for a male heir.

About two decades later, Polish King Jan II Kazimierz consecrated his country to Mary amid a war. Both acts reflected church and political leaders’ beliefs that their countries had a sacred mission and divine approval for their political ambitions.

This religious symbolism allows rulers to justify their actions, whether it's war, peace, theft, or imperialism, based on religion. 

Mary as a warrior

Ancient symbols and personalities are often reimagined and reinterpreted by powerful rulers or groups so that current political positions and actions can be justified. Traditions are invented and people think of them as ancient and long-standing while in reality these traditions of are relatively recent origin.

The following excerpt from a Novena/prayer to Mary shows that the "gentle maid" is also a powerful warrior. 

How strange it seems to think of Mary as a warrior.

The gentle maid of Nazareth, the Virginal Mother, the Mother of the Prince of Peace, is still called -and properly called- "More terrible than army in battle array."

And so she is....

Mary, conqueror of heresies

Mary, triumphant always in the battle with sin.

When then we put on the scapular, which is Mary's uniform, we join in a special way the regiment of which Mary is the queen and honorary colonel.

We pledge ourselves to do battle against the enemy of the human race.

We will be victorious as Mary is victorious, and conquering as Christ is conquering.

Although the battles and triumphs are spiritual, once you make someone honorary colonel of a regiment, it's easy to use it to also battle corporeal enemies that threaten us in the real world. The following image of Mary, with a club in her hand, is particularly interesting.

Source: Virgin most powerful: Catholic Belief in Mary's Strength 

Putin, wars, and Russian Orthodox Church

Mark Woods, the contributing editor of Christian Today, calls Russian Orthodox Church a tool in the hand of President Putin. In his article, How the Russian Orthodox Church is backing Vladimir Putin's new world order, focuses on growing Russian religious nationalism.

Thousands of miles away (in Russia), however, there's an ideological synergy between Church and State which is just as unhealthy. Under its leader Patriarch Kirill, the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) has backed the aggressive expansionism of President Vladimir Putin, which has seen him extend Russian power into Crimea and eastern Ukraine. Kirill described Putin at a religious leaders' meeting in 2012 as "a miracle of God". It supported a government crackdown on "gay propaganda" in 2013. The ROC has made billions from trading concessions granted to it  by the government. It is increasingly asserting its position as the largest of the 14 self-governing Orthodox Churches and is using its political muscle in support of Putin's aims. It's no friend to evangelicals, especially in the Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine, seeing them as puppets of the West.

Wood is particularly critical of the role played by the current head of ROC, Patriarch Kirill. He mentions that Kirill has been accussed of being a KGB agent and his usage of ROC's special previliges in the 1990s to earns billions for the Church and himself. Kirill, however, denies any personal benefits from the past financial dealings.

Wood quotes Ukrainian academics, mainly from Ukrainian Catholic University, to details the closeness of the ROC and Russian state or the subordination of the  ROC to Putin agenda. The choice of experts is problematic and raises doubts about Wood's thesis.

Wood quotes Mykhailo Cherenkov, a Ukrainian Baptist and a Professor in Philosophy at Ukrainian Catholic University, as arguing that fall of communism left an ideological vacuum, which has been filled with Orthodoxy. t was the "new ideological binding agent" that Russia needed to survive:

It was Orthodoxy that served as the main ferment in the formation of a new Russian identity from the beginning of Putin's presidency. If, in Soviet times, the mark of the majority was political atheism, then now it is political Orthodoxy.

Being partiotic and Orthodox became synonyms and wars of the Russian state became holy wars. Cherenkov argued:

The goal of the 'Holy War' is not seizure of territory, or change of power, or defeat of opponents, but the victory of faith over all lack of faith and false teaching, of the only right picture of the world over all wrong ones, of truth over all untruths. If Rus is Holy, then her faith and truth are the only Orthodox ones.

Wood then quotes a more extreme view by Joshua Searle, a lecturer at Spurgeon's College and Visiting Professor at Ukrainian Catholic University. Searle contends that the ROC is not real Christian Church:

It needs to be made clear that the ROC hierarchy is essentially a political construct. The church structure is based not on gospel values of freedom, truth and enlightenment, but on fear, authoritarianism and the promotion of nationalism under the guise of religious zeal. This kind of fake patriotic religion deifies the State and gives divine sanction to a nation's imperialism.
The ROC can even invoke the name of "God" as an idol who has bestowed a special blessing and favour on Russia, which then allegedly gives 'Holy Russia' the right to invade and conquer neighbouring territories and subdue their peoples. Such a sham Christianity, which is a denial of Christ and the gospel, will always refuse to accept any higher power and will ruthlessly destroy any forms of genuine Christian faith that go beyond cultural or national identity.

George Soroka does not agrees with Wood as he sees not only harmony but also tension in the ROC-state relations in Russia. He has written a very insightful article on ROC's relations with the Russian state in Foreign Affairs. In his article, Putin's Patriarch: Does the Kremlin Control the Church?, Soroka explains that the ROC and the state in Russia do not have a dominant-submissive relationship. The widely-held perception that the Church is the handmaiden of the Russian state is not true. President Putin and Patriarch Kirill support each other most of the time and Putin is usually the more assertive partner but there are differences. 

Source: Foreign Affairs

The Church has prospered since the break-up of Soviet Union and more so under Putin as Soroka illustrates:

Meanwhile, the church has benefited from the close ties between its leadership and the government. In 2011, then President Dmitri Medvedev granted the patriarch a residence in the Kremlin. In late 2010, Russian legislators passed a long-awaited bill allowing the return of Church property seized by the Soviet Union, codifying and expediting a process that had been proceeding piecemeal since the 1990s. The Russian Orthodox Church and affiliated organizations have also been the country’s biggest recipients of presidential grants in recent years, receiving more than 256 million rubles in funding between 2013 and 2015.

And Putin has used the ROC despite the separation of church and state in the 1993 Constitution. Putin has used the Church's symbolic power to not only defeat his enemies both inside and outside Russia (Chechens, liberals, democrats, terrorists, etc.) but also to unify the new Russian state under a defensive, inward-looking nationalism.

Soroka concludes the article contending that the Kremlin and the ROC still have many differences so the real partnership is not between them but between the civil religion “Orthodoxy without Christ” and Putin’s rhetoric and defensive nationalism.

Symphonia, or harmonious, mutually respectful coexistence, represents the ideal of Church-State relations in Orthodox thought. Unfortunately, it has seldom been achieved, and post-communist Russia is no exception. Russia today is still in the process of exiting the ideological vacuum that resulted from the Soviet Union’s collapse. What is emerging in its stead remains inchoate, a selective culling of the past that mixes Orthodox imagery with Soviet triumphalism, interspersed with an increasingly inward-looking nationalism.
Yet this is not ultimately a coherent narrative; it will eventually crumble under the weight of its own historical contradictions. Putin’s conundrum is that he wants the Russian Orthodox Church to help legitimate the restored Russian state while eliding the abject persecution the church suffered under the Soviet regime, just like he wants to emphasize the Red Army’s victory over Nazi Germany in WWII without coming to terms with the horrific crimes of Stalin.

Where does this leave the church? It is not as an institution subordinate to the Kremlin, but neither does it stand on equal footing with the regime in Putin’s Russia. Moreover, despite recent internal efforts to quell dissent, the church still embodies diverse opinions and viewpoints. As a result, the real synergies are not between the church and the Kremlin but between a burgeoning civil religion that Chapnin terms “Orthodoxy without Christ” and Putin’s muscular brand of statist rhetoric. In a society where over 70 percent of citizens identify as Orthodox even though the percentage of active churchgoers is in the single digits, the cultural resonance of the church is as obvious as its doctrinal relevance is moot, making it ripe for political exploitation. In contemporary Russia, it is not the Orthodox Church but the jingoistic Orthodox atheist that is the regime’s greatest ally.