Religious life has become a working part of Russia’s war against Ukraine: a source of local trust, a channel for military information and a target of occupation policy. Ukrainian authorities say individual clergy have passed intelligence or spread Russian narratives, while Russian forces have pressured communities that refuse to submit to the Moscow Patriarchate.
The distinction matters. Criminal cases in Ukrainian-controlled territory concern specific acts attributed to specific people; they are not, in themselves, evidence of collective guilt by a denomination. In occupied areas, by contrast, religious communities are being treated as objects of control, with churches seized, organisations banned and clergy subjected to detention and violence.
Where religious freedom meets national security
Ukraine has more than 30,000 religious communities representing different confessions. Article 35 of its Constitution guarantees freedom of conscience and religion, separates religious organisations from the state and establishes no compulsory or privileged faith.
That framework now sits alongside a security policy aimed at institutional links with Russia. Law No. 3894-IX provides for court proceedings against religious organisations affiliated with religious centres in the Russian Federation, including the Russian Orthodox Church. The Ukrainian position is that the measure targets organisational dependence on structures in the aggressor state, rather than worship or private belief. Communities can continue holding services after severing those institutional ties.
The government also points to Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights. It protects freedom of religion but allows restrictions established by law when they are necessary for public safety, public order or the protection of other people’s rights. The difficult question is therefore not whether religious freedom exists in principle, but how narrowly security measures are applied in practice.
The Security Service of Ukraine says it has opened more than 200 criminal proceedings against clergy of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church since the full-scale invasion began. According to the same source, 78 people received formal notices of suspicion and 40 were convicted by Ukrainian courts and sentenced to prison. The cases cited involve the transfer of intelligence, assistance to Russian occupation forces and the distribution of propaganda.
Those figures are supplied by a Ukrainian security agency and do not establish collective responsibility for the church or its congregations. Nor do the cases all have the same legal status. Some ended in convictions; others concern investigations or allegations. Several convicted people were, with their consent, included on lists for prisoner exchanges with Russia.
How local trust can become a military channel
The cases described by Ukrainian investigators point to a clear mechanism. Clergy are embedded in local communities, know the surrounding area and may be trusted by residents. According to the authorities, individual priests used that access to gather or transmit information about military convoys, air-defence positions and critical infrastructure.
Messages and coordinates were allegedly sent through mobile phones and messaging applications. During searches, investigators said they found telephones containing relevant correspondence, photographs of damage caused by strikes and other technical equipment. Such objects are evidence within particular proceedings; their legal significance depends on the investigation and the court’s assessment.
In Odesa, the Security Service said an archpriest from a local diocese had acted in the interests of Russian military intelligence. Investigators accused him of helping to coordinate a double missile strike on the city in March 2024 and of passing information about Ukrainian air-defence positions. That remains an allegation within criminal proceedings, rather than a final conviction.
Other cases cited by Ukrainian authorities have ended with prison sentences. An archpriest of the Pokrovsk Diocese in Donetsk region was sentenced to 15 years for passing the Russian Federal Security Service the coordinates of Ukrainian firing positions and command posts on the Novopavlivka front. In Luhansk region, the head of a church in Lysychansk received a 12-year sentence for gathering and transmitting information about the deployment and firing positions of Ukrainian forces near Sievierodonetsk.
These judgments show why religious networks have drawn the attention of counter-intelligence services. A trusted local position can provide access to information that would otherwise be difficult to obtain. They do not show that such conduct is characteristic of all clergy or believers associated with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.
From church literature to international messaging
The Ukrainian authorities describe a second strand of activity: the circulation of the ideology of the “Russian world”. During searches of sites linked to the church structure, they said they found thousands of Russian-origin publications denying Ukraine’s right to self-determination, promoting the idea of a single “triune people” and justifying Russia’s aggression.
The former head of the Tultchyn Diocese in Vinnytsia region, Metropolitan Ionafan, whose civilian name is Anatolii Yeletskykh, was sentenced to five years in prison for justifying Russian aggression and distributing material calling for a violent change of power in Ukraine.
Other cases have a different legal status. Metropolitan Arsenii, head of the Holy Dormition Sviatohirsk Lavra, was placed in pre-trial detention. Prosecutors accuse him of revealing the location of Ukrainian checkpoints during a religious service. Metropolitan Feodosii, head of the Cherkasy Diocese, faces accusations of inciting hostility between religious communities. These allegations must be kept separate from final convictions.
Ukrainian law-enforcement bodies have also linked religiously connected media networks, including the Union of Orthodox Journalists, to Russia’s Federal Security Service. They accuse such networks of promoting the claim that believers are being persecuted in Ukraine, discrediting the Ukrainian state abroad and deepening social divisions. Where there is no final court ruling, that remains an assessment by Ukrainian authorities rather than an established judicial fact.
Russia’s messaging campaign has sought an international audience. At a public presentation of anti-Ukrainian material in Moscow, Serbia’s ambassador to Russia, Momcilo Babic, was among those present. His attendance could be used by the Kremlin to suggest foreign recognition of its narrative and to help circulate pro-Russian claims in political and media circles in south-eastern Europe.
Occupation authorities reshape religious life
In occupied territory, the pressure takes a broader form. The Institute for Religious Freedom says Russian troops and occupation administrations have persecuted communities that do not submit to the Moscow Patriarchate. The reported measures include restrictions on religious activity, the seizure of places of worship, unlawful detention, torture and the killing of religious representatives.
More than 630 religious buildings have been damaged or completely destroyed since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, according to the institute. Protestants account for more than 34% of documented cases involving the persecution of religious figures; in Zaporizhzhia region, their share is reported at 48%. Members of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine and the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church have also been affected.
At least 206 Protestant prayer houses were seized or destroyed, the institute says. Representatives of these communities were reportedly abducted, tortured or killed and accused of extremism or links to American organisations. Occupation administrations have also required religious communities to register under Russian law, creating practical and legal obstacles for groups outside the Moscow Patriarchate.
In the occupied part of Zaporizhzhia region, local authorities officially banned the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, the charity Caritas and other Christian organisations, followed by the seizure of their property, according to the information cited by the institute. In Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, places of worship belonging to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine and the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church have reportedly been closed, looted or transferred to the Russian Orthodox Church.
Some clergy in occupied and front-line areas have also been accused of directly assisting Russian forces by hiding soldiers in churches, passing target information or helping to organise sham referendums. A church rector from Luhansk region was sentenced to 12 years for passing occupation forces information about the movement of Ukrainian units.
The result is a conflict fought over more than doctrine. Ukraine is trying to separate the right to worship from organisational ties to Russian structures and to prosecute people accused of concrete crimes. Russia, in occupied territory, is seeking to replace independent religious networks with an order controlled through Moscow. The unresolved test for Kyiv is whether that response can remain focused on demonstrable conduct and institutional dependence, rather than allowing individual cases to define an entire religious community.
