How Not to Speak of God...

 

How Not to Speak of God...

by R.E. Slater

Setting: Russia's attack on its brother state, Ukraine, on February 24, 2022.

Here is a post I had read on Facebook which I will leave anonymous from a fellow Christian friend I admire but whose theology of God is austere and ungenerous.

An evangelical Christian whose faith is built on Reformed Neo-Calvinism which sees God as an unloving God disinterested in caring or helping those in need (such as the unfortunate Ukrainians in the loss of their freedom and democracy to Russia's bombs and forced subservience).

On the post was the recital of Romans 9:14-24 NLT without further commentary. Thereto were a number of "likes" and several comments agreeing with its posting. Knowing the person, their faith, and their followers, I then understood why it had been posted. Simply, it was to show a blind trust and faith in God regardless of world's events (such as the Covid pandemic we all have experienced).

Which is all well or good as blind faith goes but has become a misleading source to God's character impugned by Christians believing all sin and evil in the world is from His hand and by His direction.

Who further believe that God controls and determines all events in this world, whether good or evil, and that God may use both the wicked and the good to set His purposes aright in the outcome of His divine rule (as depicted in their minds by the book of Revelation).

At one time I was of the same mind and belief. But no longer. I do not consider God to be aloof from this world like the Greek Olympiad's Zeus, who came-and-went at his "good" pleasure leaving mankind to its fortunes or fates.

Nor do I attribute to God a determinative control over a freewilled creation birthed out of his love and not by divine fiat. A God who gave to creation the multiplying gifts of valuative wellbeing to bless one another with boundless opportunities of love, kindness, and recreation.

Nor do I attribute to God any-and-all wickedness which a loving, holy God cannot do. It would be out-of-character with whom God is. No, all sin and wickedness can only be attributed to a freewill creation which has abandoned its holy charters of love to enact unloving words and deeds upon itself. These things are not from God but from a creation choosing sin over love.

This kind of fundamental, or evangelical, or "biblical" faith is the kind of dogma I now reject and can not longer approve, defend, or wish to fix. Instead, I have chosen to abandon this kind of faith which believes in a God such as this and move to a Reformed process version of my faith

I should explain that since I am not Lutheran, Catholic, or Orthodox, the Lord took what I knew and helped me express my post-fundamental and post-evangelical Reformed faith using process philosophy as its base, and process theology as its outcome. In doing this, my rejection of Calvinism for Arminianism, and its subsequent uplift towards Open & Relational Arminian Theology can now include Open & Relational Process-based Arminian Theology. One which I now call Process Christianity so that it might include Lutherans, Catholics, and Orthodox believers.

Moreover, by quoting and interpreting Romans by Calvinistic standards I have found such theological outlooks to be implicitly harmful to Spirit living. Evangelical Calvinism has become over the years a very dark, misleading theology about God, God's promises and hope, and Christian living. But from personal experience it can also be a place where the Spirit of God might lead a follower of Jesus away from even as the Spirit had done with my own evangelical outlooks and beliefs many years earlier.

Which is why I write. In hopes that what spiritual light is spoken here at Relevancy22 may lead other Jesus-followers away from similar Christian systems of spiritual bondage and oppression to see the light-and-life which lies in Jesus our Lord and Savior when beheld in the love of God, our Father and Redeemer.

Peace,

R.E. Slater

February 25, 2022

* * * * * * * *

The God who is Not There for You

Posted by Anon

February 25, 2022

ROMANS 9.14-24 NLT

14 Are we saying, then, that God was unfair? Of course not! 15 For God said to Moses,

“I will show mercy to anyone I choose,

and I will show compassion to anyone I choose.”

16 So it is God who decides to show mercy. We can neither choose it nor work for it.

17 For the Scriptures say that God told Pharaoh,

“I have appointed you for the very purpose of displaying my power in you and to spread my fame throughout the earth.”

18 So you see, God chooses to show mercy to some, and he chooses to harden the hearts of others so they refuse to listen.

19 Well then, you might say, “Why does God blame people for not responding? Haven’t they simply done what he makes them do?”

20 No, don’t say that. Who are you, a mere human being, to argue with God? Should the thing that was created say to the one who created it, “Why have you made me like this?”

21 When a potter makes jars out of clay, doesn’t he have a right to use the same lump of clay to make one jar for decoration and another to throw garbage into?

22 In the same way, even though God has the right to show his anger and his power, he is very patient with those on whom his anger falls, who are destined for destruction.

23 He does this to make the riches of his glory shine even brighter on those to whom he shows mercy, who were prepared in advance for glory.

24 And we are among those whom he selected, both from the Jews and from the Gentiles.

        END

* * * * * * * *

HOW to Speak of God aright...

A Suggested, But Brief, Interpretation

of Romans 9.14-24

by R.E. Slater

Here Paul speaks to an audience of Jewish and Gentile Christians who have questions about Israel's rejection of Jesus. From personal experience the Apostle Paul (once the Jewish Rabbi, Saul) understood the pride and hard-heartedness of his fellow tribal congregants and templed Jewish theocracy.

Firstly, Judaism was a monotheistic faith - but at Jesus' Incarnate Advent, the Jews believed Christians were holding to an apostatizing faith of two Gods, not One. For centuries later, both Jews - and later Muslims - misunderstood the doctrine of the Trinity and the Incarnation of Christ. It kept both faiths to their own monotheistic faiths rather than convert to the trinitarian monotheism of Christianity.

However, here, in this passage, time, and setting, Paul gets a bit rough in his speech to his fellow brethren saying that if willful pride and the blasphemy of Jesus' redemptive atonement kept Israel from Christ, so too can pride and short-sighted theology keep the Christian church in its error and apostasy from Christ.

Paul makes full usage of the Judaized teachings of the Mosaic Law to show how far apart their idea of God is from whom the true God is. In affect, Paul's speech here of the OT God was purposely using the genre of sarcasm to compare Israel's hard-hearted, pagan perception of God to that of the Christian idea of a loving God who is always present with His people.

When Christians read these passages in a literalizing way they will find what they are looking for... a doctrine of a God of fear and judgment. But for the child of God who knows the Father and Son and Holy Spirit, there is no spirit of fear but of trust and affinity for the "Lover of Our Souls."

Romans 9 is the assurance to the converted Jew or Gentile that the God they had once pictured as doing "this or that thing" is but a fiction to the real story of God's steadfastness of love not only to the believer, but to all men and women living in a world of disruption, harm, and suffering.

God is a God to all people of all faiths even as God can never be a God to those who misunderstand Him and purposely refuse to change their beliefs teaching of an austere God who does what He wants, forgives whom He wants. A God not of love - but of bounded edges and withholding grace. Who is so far removed from creation as to become a God one fears instead of a God one loves. A God who is worshipped as a pagan would do, mistrusting the very God they sacrifice to rather than worshipped as a God who is good and kind and selflessly sacrificing to His creation in all His ways, actions, and deeds.

Romans 9 is a declaration to austere religions that the very God they worship is justified in treating their faiths exactly as they believe. But in Paul's rant, this same God is spoken of untruly and is not the graven image He is made out to be:

22 In the same way, even though God has the right to show his anger and his power, he is very patient with those on whom his anger falls, who are destined for destruction.

23 He does this to make the riches of his glory shine even brighter on those to whom he shows mercy, who were prepared in advance for glory.

24 And we are among those whom he selected, both from the Jews and from the Gentiles.

R.E. Slater

February 25, 2022

*After writing this post I came across an interpretation of Romans 9 which may or may not help show how Calvinists and Arminianists think on the same passage. Perhaps this will enlighten a bit further. Here is the link.

Thomas Jay Oord - God's Timeful, Experiential Pluriform Love (Panentheism v Classic Theism)

amazon link

Big God Questions: Love, Divine Revelation, and the Value of Theology

Mar 1, 2022

Thomas Jay Oord joins Tripp Fuller to

tackle HBC Community Member questions

Why Go Wesleyan? 13 Reasons from Tom Oord

Jan 13, 2017

Thomas Jay Oord joins Tripp Fuller's Theology Nerd podcast

to drop 13 reasons to go Wesleyan... theologically speaking.

* * * * * * * *

A strong case can be made that love is the core of Christian faith. And yet Christians often fail to give love center stage in biblical studies and theology. And most fail to explain what they mean by love.

Thomas Jay Oord explores this question and offers ground-breaking answers. Oord addresses leading Christian thinkers today and of yesteryear. He explains biblical forms of love, such as agape, philia, hesed, and ahavah. We should understand love’s meaning as uniform, he says, but its expressions are pluriform.

Widely regarded as the world's foremost theologian of love, Thomas Jay Oord tackles our biggest puzzles about the nature and meaning of love, divine and creaturely. His proposals are novel. They align with love described in scripture and expressed in everyday experience. Oord also provides radical and yet persuasive answers to questions about evil, hell, the Big Bang, divine violence, divine abandonment, and more.

Pluriform Love changes the landscape of Christian love studies.

Here, Tom Oord tells of an Everlasting God whose presence and love fills all the days of the cosmos, earth, beasts, and mankind. A God who is here, now, with us and not a God who remains substantially apart and separate from His creation as classic theologies of the church would have us believe. This is the story of processual theology and its meaning to the church and the fellowship of humanity in the person, work, and love of the Incarnational God who has forever been, and forever will be, with us from all our days before to all our days beyond. it is not only God's promise but God's binding love which anchors His presence with His creation giving to it life and light, nobility and purpose. - re slater

* * * * * * *

By R.E. Slater

As Intro, please refer to my more recent posts on God and Time:

How Process Philosophy & Theology Connects Scientific Evolution & Cosmology to God

COSMOLOGY - What is Processual Primordial Time before the Big Bang?

Thank you Tom for your helpful insights in your commentary below.

* * * * * * *

Love and the Timeless God

article link

by Thomas Jay Oord

January 28th, 2022

Philosophy always plays a role in Christian theology. This isn’t a bad thing; philosophy isn’t inherently evil. We’re all philosophers, in the general sense of thinking about things, and all theologies have philosophical assumptions. In fact, every statement about love – scholarly or not – incorporates philosophy, at least in the broad sense.

Some philosophies do better than others at elucidating love. Some better fit the way biblical writers portray God’s love and creation. Some better fit our experience of the world, aligning better with contemporary science, personal experiences, art, and culture. Some philosophies are more plausible, in the sense of cohering with what we know about life. And some are more internally consistent.

We should avoid philosophies that cannot help us talk coherently about love.

Augustine and Classical Theism

The influential medieval theologian Augustine read widely in philosophy, including the works of Aristotle, the Neoplatonists (e.g., Plotinus, Porphyry), the Stoics, and others. Many scholars note the influence these philosophies had on his theology.

Adolf Harnack (1851-1930) is often cited as the first to decry Greek philosophy’s influence upon Augustine and Christian theology. Harnack called it “the Hellenic spirit” and many today call this the “Hellenization” of Christian thought.[1] These philosophical traditions still influence Christian theologians and philosophers today.

Many today use the label “classical theism” to describe ideas endorsed by Augustine and theologians he influenced, such as Anselm, Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin, and Martin Luther. “Classical” doesn’t necessarily mean old. Nor do only theologians who lived long ago embrace these ideas; some scholars embrace them today.[2] And not every theologian of yesteryear embraced so-called classical theism. Theological diversity existed then as it does now.

Augustine and classical theism affirm at least four unique ideas about God, ideas intricately connected to Platonic and Neo-Platonic views about the superiority of what is changeless. They say God is

1) timeless,

2) immutable,

3) impassible, and

4) simple.[3]

To a great extent, these four ideas are mutually reinforcing, and each has implications for a theology of love.

In this essay, I explore problems which come when believing God is timeless. In my book Pluriform Love, I explore the other three aspects of classical theism’s particular view of God. And in the book, I offer alternative philosophical ideas meant to replace the ones in classical theism I find inadequate.

God and Time

Just about every Christian believes God had no beginning and will have no end. But classical theism understands this belief in a particular way. It says God experiences no succession of moments. God is timeless. There is no “before” or “after” in God because God is nontemporal. Deity does not experience moment by moment.

Augustine affirms this divine timelessness view.[4] “In the sublimity of an eternity which is always in the present,” he says, God is “before all things past and transcends all things future.”[5] In fact, God created time, according to Augustine. “What time could there be that you had not created?” he asks rhetorically of God. “You are the Maker of all times… No time is co-eternal with you.”[6]

Because time had a beginning, Augustine says, we should not ask what God was doing before creating.[7] That question is nonsensical, because there was no time before God created it. In fact, Augustine admits he can’t really talk about time at all. “If I wish to explain it to one who asks,” Augustine says, “I know not [how].”[8]

1 - Scholars propose various ways God might relate to time. Two proposals dominate. The divine timelessness view we find in Augustine says God experiences no succession of moments. God has no experience. Many use the word “eternal” to identify this view, although in popular vernacular, some say God is “outside time.”

2 - The other dominant way to think about God and time is often called the “everlasting” view.[9] It says God experiences a succession of moments, and this succession had no beginning and will have no end. But God experiences the ongoing flow of time. Past moments preceded each moment of God’s everlasting life, and God will experience moment by moment everlastingly into the future. The everlasting God is the “living God,” to use a common biblical phrase, in the sense of experiencing time’s ongoing succession.

In short, to say God is “eternal” means God is timeless or nontemporal. To say God is “everlasting” means God continually experiences and is pantemporal.

My Response to a Timeless God

It is difficult to align the dominant portrait of God in scripture with Augustine’s and classical theism’s portrait. The God described in the Old and New Testaments interacts with creatures, moment by moment. This involves time sequences. The living God of interactive love has “befores” and “afters,” making promises about what God will do and responding to what creatures have done. In the Bible, God plans for the future, talks about past events, and acts alongside creatures in the present. Biblical writers typically describe God as one who experiences time’s flow.

Old Testament writers use the word olam to describe God’s relation to time. This Hebrew word connotes long duration, antiquity, and futurity rather than timelessness. Olam describes the remote past or future, but also the notion of perpetuity.[10] When used with reference to God, olam better describes God as everlastingly experiencing rather than as timelessly not experiencing. Many scholars also say the timeless view of God is absent in the New Testament.[11]

According to this reasoning, passages that appear to support divine timelessness are better interpreted as identifying God’s faithfulness. God is lovingly faithful through time, not outside it (sic, "faithfulness"). C. R. Schoonhoven states the case bluntly: “In the understanding of the writers of the Old Testament and New Testament, eternity is not timelessness but endless time.”[12] The God of the Bible “lives in time,” says John Goldingay.[13] “Neither timelessness nor the simultaneity of past, present, and future,” says Terence Fretheim, “would represent the view of any biblical tradition.”[14]

An everlastingly time-full God interacts with time-full creatures in a time-full universe.

Divine Timelessness and Love

The timeless view presents problems for a theology of love. From everything we know, love requires time-full giving and receiving. Love is interactive and experiential, which implies influencing and being influenced moment by moment. The love of a timeless God would be nondurational, which makes no sense with love as we know it.

If the divine timelessness view is true, many biblical passages would be meaningless. John’s claim that we love because God first loved us (1 Jn. 4:19), for instance, would be incomprehensible. A timeless God doesn’t act prior to our actions. If God is nontemporal, John should have said we and God love simultaneously. Creatures would not need a timeless God to act first on their behalf.

Or take the biblical view that God redeems.[15] To say God, in love, redemptively responds to sin makes no sense if God is timeless. A timeless God has no time to redeem, because an eternal God does not respond to what occurs in time’s flow. Nicholas Wolterstorff puts it nicely: “God the Redeemer cannot be a God eternal.”[16] A redeeming God must be everlasting, which means responding moment-by-moment to creation.

One of the most profound expressions of divine love is forgiveness. God responds to sin by forgiving the offender. “If we confess our sins,” writes John, “he who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins” (1 Jn. 1:9). But forgiving love makes no sense if God is timeless, because a nontemporal God cannot respond. Forgiveness is a time-oriented form of love.

Index

[1] Adolf Harnack, History of Dogma, Neil Buchanan, trans. (London: Williams and Norgate, 1897). Many others have made this argument. See Hubertus R. Drobner, “Christian Philosophy,” in The Oxford Handbook of Early Christian Studies (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008). 672–90; Helmut Koester, History, Culture, and Religion of the Hellenistic Age in Introduction to the New Testament, 2nd ed. (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1995). Sometimes the Hellenism thesis is taken too broadly, as Paul Gavrilyuk has argued (The Suffering of the Impassible God: The Dialectics of Patristic Thought [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004]).

[2] For examples, see James E. Dolezal, God without Parts: Divine Simplicity and the Metaphysics of God’s Absoluteness (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2011);H. J. McCann, Creation and the Sovereignty of God (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 20212).

[3] On this designation for classical theism, see Ryan T. Mullins, “Classical Theism,” in T & T Clark Handbook of Analytic Theology, James M. Arcadi and James T. Turner, Jr., eds. (London: Bloomsbury, 2021), 85-100; T. Williams, “Introduction to Classical Theism,” in J. Dillerand A. Kasher, eds., Models of God and Alternative Ultimate Realities (New York: Springer, 2013), 95–7.

[4] Augustine, On the Trinity, 5, 17; Confessions, 13, 38, 53; City of God, 11, 8; 22, 30.

[5] Augustine, Confessions, XI. xiii (16).

[6] Ibid.

[7] Ibid.

[8] Ibid.

[9] Translations of scripture rarely indicate what view of time the writer holds. Biblical translators sometimes use the word “eternal” to describe what is likely the “everlasting” view and vice versa. Note, for instance, various translations of the conclusion to John 3:16. Some say God gives “eternal” life and other say “everlasting” life.

[10] F. Brown, S. R. Driver, and C. A. Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon (London: Oxford University Press, 1906), 761.

[11] Oscar Cullmann, Christ and Time, F. V. Filson, trans. (London:SCM, 1951[rev. ed. 1962]), 69-80. This is the conclusion of many New Testament scholars, including Eldon G. Ladd (A Theology of the New Testament [Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1974], 47).

[12] C.R. Schoonhoven, “Eternity” International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, vol. 2, ed. G. W. Bromiley (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1982), 162-164.

[13] John Goldingay, Israel’s Gospel, Vol. 1 of Old Testament Theology (Downers Grove, Ill.: Intervarsity, 2003), 64.

[14] Terence E. Fretheim, God and the World in the Old Testament: A Relational Theology of Creation (Nashville: Abingdon, 2005), 303.

[15] Richard Holland Jr. offers a strong argument for why a timeless God cannot be incarnate. See God, Time, and the Incarnation (Eugene, Or.: Wipf and Stock, 2012).

[16] Nicholas Wolterstorff, “God Everlasting,” in God and the Good, ed. Clifton J. Orlebeke and Lewis B. Smedes (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1975), 182.

History of Eastern Russia: Prayer for Ukraine and its People

The Old Soviet line of Annexed Territories

A Brief History Of Ukraine

Mar 4, 2022

PRAYER FOR THE PEOPLES OF EASTERN RUSSIA

Thursday, February 24, 2022, has become a day of mourning for the peoples of Ukraine and their brothers and sisters found throughout Crimea, Georgia, Belarus and Eastern Russia as the Communist dictator, Putin, continues his campaigns against the free sovereign states of the former Union of Soviet Russia (USSR) serving as proxy territories to Russia's own imperialist safety and security concerns.

We pray for the free peoples of the Russian empire. For their courage, wisdom, caution, and resistance to the propagandist campaigns of Russian autocracy even as we pray for the unity and community support of the peoples of Russia during another era of manic harm and suffering imposed by the cruel and evil forces found in this unjust world.

Together with the peoples of both the free world as well as all those held under imperialist dictatorships we pray for the peace and protection of loved ones, community and countries unfairly harmed or broken by the wicked of this age. An age which has continued in its agony since man's beginning when in search of power, rule, and wealth - but not for God, love, or the solidarity of one's countrymen.

Lastly, we pray to the God who is everywhere present to use the resources He has to save the innocents of this world - the families of men, women, and children - who cry out for a Savior to help them from their dilemma wrought at the hands of evil men. That God comfort and protect all who seek His help and favour who might bring God's own peace and presence into these horrific times of fear and need.

For our loved Ones,

R.E. Slater

February 24, 2022

Western Russia

A brief history of modern Ukraine - BBC News

Feb 25, 2022

When the Soviet Union collapsed in the 1990s Ukraine was one of the largest new nations to emerge. It held its first elections in 1991. 

Bordered by Russia on the east and by Hungary, Poland and Slovakia on the west, politics in Ukraine have always been divided along those looking east towards Russia and those looking to the West. 

Putin has said that Ukraine is “ancient Russian soil” but  the majority of Ukrainians don’t feel this way, with 68% of Ukrainians in favour of joining the EU.

Slavic Nations

Ethnicities of Eastern Russian Territories

The origins of Russia - Summary on a Map

Jun 24, 2021

Geo History

Let's retrace on maps the first origins of Russia, from the creation of Novgorod during the IXth century, until the end of the Time of Troubles and the beginning of the Romanov dynasty.

English translation & voiceover: - https://www.epicvoiceover.com/
Original French version: https://youtu.be/og8yLsgvbYM
Russian version: https://youtu.be/eqVXKsnQuMY
Arabic version: https://youtu.be/DeDEVmmM6XE
Spanish version: https://youtu.be/Mmb6a_wTUi8
Portuguese version (Brazil):
Coming soon Japanese version: Coming soon

Music: Created for Geo History
Software: Adobe After Effects

Chapters 00:00 The Varangians 01:15 Kievan Rus’ 02:52 Russian principalities 04:56 Catholic and Mongol threats 06:24 Mongol invasion 08:00 Grand Duchy of Moscow and Lithuania 09:59 Ivan the Terrible 11:43 End of the Rurik Dynasty 12:56 Time of Troubles

BELARUS

Wikipedia - Belarus

Belarusian Coat of Arms

Belarusian Flag

A History of Eastern Europe: Ukraine-Russia Crisis

Dec 15, 2016

Wondrium

Taught by Professor Vejas Gabriel Liulevicius, an award-winning professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, these 24 insightful lectures offer a sweeping 1,000-year history of Eastern Europe with a particular focus on the region’s modern history. You’ll observe waves of migration and invasion, watch empires rise and fall, witness wars and their deadly consequences—and come away with a comprehensive knowledge of one of the world’s most fascinating places.

This video is episode 23 from the series A History of Eastern Europe, Presented by Vejas Gabriel Liulevicius

Learn more about Eastern European History at https://www.wondrium.com

This course goes far beyond issues of military and political history. Professor Liulevicius delves deeply into the cultures of this region—the 20 nations that stretch from the Baltic to the Black Seas. You’ll meet the everyday citizens—including artists and writers—who shaped the politics of Eastern Europe, from poets-turned-politicians to proletarian workers who led dissident uprisings. Breathtaking in scope and crucially relevant to today’s world, A History of Eastern Europe is a powerful survey of a diverse region and its people.

00:00 Ukraine Erupts Into Crisis in 2014

02:10 Background to Ukraine-Russia Crisis

07:26 West Vs. East Conflict in Ukrainian History

11:03 A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian

13:52 Ukraine Gains Independence

15:59 Ukraine Becomes Dependent on Russia 

18:37 Gains for Ukrainian Reform Lead to Disappointment

22:31 Russian Media Denounces Protesters as Nazis

25:54 Ukraine-Russia Conflict Becomes "New Normal"

27:44 Russian Power Abuse Echoes Late 1700s

UKRAINE

Wikipedia - Ukraine

Ukrainian Coat of Arms

Ukrainian Flag

  

Phil Snyder says it best...

"As if our world could take one more thing.

"War is ruined time. It is forged for the sake of ego and empire, and it leaves those who put their faith in it forever hungry for more, with an insatiable thirst that is never satisfied, all while those who so desperately want to avoid war instead find themselves weeping for irretrievable pasts and lost futures, wondering how they will endure it all, or if they can endure it all. 

"War doesn’t fill the void, it exploits it, exposes it, enlarges it. Violence begets violence, and the world loses count. There is no glory in warfare, only loss, only sorrow. Loss of life for the victims, loss of soul for the perpetrators, and loss of promise and possibility beyond anything we will ever know. War is an incalculable evil that breeds irreparable loss. That nations try to find meaning and purpose in it is a sickness unto death. 

"In Dante’s Inferno, there’s a place in hell where despots and warmongers have to acknowledge the traumatic truth of who they are, to come face to face with how much suffering they caused. Only then can they change. But the problem with that is not just that it’s fiction. Even if it were real, by then it is still too late for this world, where the warmongers have already created too many hells on earth. And it does nothing for those in Ukraine, who just want to sleep and just want to live, who just want to be able to step outside and walk down their street. Which shouldn’t be asking too much.

"Justice is always too late for this world, it seems, and I guess sometimes that just grieves me beyond words.

"My heart and prayers are with the people of Ukraine." 

- Phil Synder, Feb 24, 2022 

GEORGIA

Wikipedia - Georgia

Georgian Coat of Arms

Georgian Flag

  

CRIMEA

Wikipedia - Crimea

Crimean Flag

RUSSIA

Wikipedia - Russia

Russian Flag

Russian Coat of Arms

Ethnicities of Russia

Post-Colonialism never really leaves, it just morphs into something else. To be trully committed to freedom one must be willing to give up biases and hatreds and learn a new language of love, respect, and understanding. - re slater

REPORT

What has set the stage for the conflict?

Ukraine was a cornerstone of the Soviet Union until it voted overwhelmingly for independence in a democratic referendum in 1991, a milestone that turned out to be a death knell for the failing superpower.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, NATO pushed eastward, bringing into the fold most of the Eastern European nations that had been in the Communist orbit. In 2004, NATO added the former Soviet Baltic republics Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Four years later, it declared its intention to offer membership to Ukraine some day in the distant future -- crossing a red line for Russia.

Putin sees NATO's expansion as an existential threat, and the prospect of Ukraine joining the Western military alliance a "hostile act" -- a view he invoked in a televised speech on Thursday, saying that Ukraine's aspiration to join the military alliance was a dire threat to Russia. 

In interviews and speeches, Putin has previously emphasized his view that Ukraine is part of Russia, culturally, linguistically and politically. While some of the mostly Russian-speaking population in Ukraine's east feel the same, a more nationalist, Ukrainian-speaking population in the west has historically supported greater integration with Europe. 

In early 2014, mass protests in the capital Kyiv known as Euromaidan forced out a Russia-friendly president after he refused to sign an EU association agreement. Russia responded by annexing the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea and fomenting a separatist rebellion in Ukraine's east, which seized control of part of the Donbas region. Despite a ceasefire agreement in 2015, the two sides have not seen a stable peace, and the front line has barely moved since. Nearly 14,000 people have died in the conflict, and there are 1.5 million people internally displaced in Ukraine, according to the Ukrainian government.

In the eight years since, Moscow has been accused of engaging in hybrid warfare against Ukraine, using cyberattacks, economic pressure and propaganda to whip up discord. Those tactics have escalated in recent months, and in early February the State Department claimed Putin was preparing a false-flag operation to create "a pretext for an invasion." 

What does Putin want?

In a lengthy essay penned in July 2021, Putin referred to Russians and Ukrainians as "one people," and suggested the West had corrupted Ukraine and yanked it out of Russia's orbit through a "forced change of identity." 

That type of historical revisionism was on full display in Putin's emotional and grievance-packed address to the nation on Monday announcing his decision to recognize the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics, while casting doubt on Ukraine's own sovereignty.    

But Ukrainians, who in the last three decades have sought to align more closely with Western institutions like the European Union and NATO, have pushed back against the notion that they are little more than the West's "puppet." 

In fact, Putin's efforts to bring Ukraine back into Russia's sphere have been met with a backlash, with several recent polls showing that a majority of Ukrainians now favor membership of the US-led transatlantic military alliance.  

In December, Putin presented the US and NATO with a list of security demands. Chief among them was a guarantee that Ukraine will never enter NATO and that the alliance rolls back its military footprint in Eastern and Central Europe -- proposals that the US and its allies have repeatedly said are non-starters.

Putin indicated he was not interested in lengthy negotiations on the topic. "It is you who must give us guarantees, and you must do it immediately, right now," he said at his annual news conference late last year. "Are we deploying missiles near the US border? No, we are not. It is the United States that has come to our home with its missiles and is already standing at our doorstep."

High-level talks between the West and Russia wrapped in January without any breakthroughs. The standoff left Europe's leaders to engage in a frenzy of shuttle diplomacy, exploring whether a negotiating channel established between France, Germany, Russia and Ukraine to resolve the conflict in Ukraine's east -- known as the Normandy Format talks -- could provide an avenue for calming the current crisis.

In a news conference with the new German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on February 16, Putin repeated unsubstantiated claims that Ukraine is carrying out a "genocide" against Russian speakers in the Donbas region and called for the conflict to be resolved through the Minsk peace progress -- echoing similar rhetoric that was used as a pretext for annexing Crimea.

But less than a week later, after Russia's upper house of parliament approved the deployment of military forces outside the country on February 22, Putin told reporters that the Minsk agreements "no longer exist," adding: "What is there to implement if we have recognized these two entities?"   

The agreements, known as Minsk 1 and Minsk 2 -- which were hammered out in the Belarusian capital in a bid to end a bloody in eastern Ukraine -- have never been fully implemented, with key issues remaining unresolved. 

Moscow and Kyiv have long been at odds over key elements of the peace deal, the second of which was inked in 2015 and lays out a plan for reintegrating the two breakaway republics into Ukraine. 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky recently stated that he did not like a single point of the Minsk accords, which require dialogue on local elections in the Russian-backed separatist regions and -- although unclear in what sequence -- would also restore the Ukrainian government's control over its eastern borders. Critics say the agreement could give Moscow undue sway over Ukrainian politics.

Putin previously responded in blunt terms by saying that regardless of whether Zelensky likes the plan, it must be implemented. "Like it or don't like it, it's your duty, my beauty," Putin said in a news conference alongside French President Emmanuel Macron. Zelensky, a former comedian and TV star, won a 2019 election in a landslide on promises to end the war in Donbas, but little has changed. Responding to a question about Putin's stark, undiplomatic language, Zelensky responded in Russian, saying bluntly: "We are not his."

- CNN

What does Putin want in Ukraine? The conflict explained

https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/24/europe/ukraine-russia-conflict-explainer-2-cmd-intl/index.html