THOUSANDS of Russian Orthodox Christians have urged Patriarch Kirill of Moscow to reinstate a popular priest in the capital, the Revd Alexei Uminsky, who refused to recite an official prayer for their country’s victory over Ukraine.

In an open letter, they write: “In our difficult times, it is important to maintain the opportunity for people to receive spiritual support from a beloved and important priest.

“The decree banning this priest from serving will deprive thousands of people of spiritual support — a great tragedy for many believers, for children’s hospice patients, for hundreds of prisoner and thousands of homeless people.”

The appeal, signed this week by more than 11,000 people, including heads of local charities, says that Fr Uminsky, parish priest of Holy Trinity, Moscow, since 1993, had led many people to faith, providing “strength, support, and reconciliation” through sermons, books, and speeches.

It says that the priest, who has repeatedly warned that he cannot endorse Moscow’s February 2022 invasion, worked to help sick children and those on Russia’s social margins, and also “answered questions that really bother people”.

Russia’s online news agency Gazeta.ru said that the priest had long been considered “a thorn in the Kremlin’s side” for his anti-militarism and concern for political prisoners, and had been branded a “criminal in a cassock” by the Russian Orthodox Church’s TV channel Spas, after urging mercy for the opposition leader Alexei Navalny, during an August 2021 prison hunger-strike (Comment, 29 January 2021).

The news agency said that Fr Uminsky had been banned from ministering under a decree, issued on 3 January by the Moscow Patriarchate, for suggesting in a YouTube interview that Christians should “pray for peace rather than victory”. He had been replaced by a Ukrainian-born priest who supported President Putin’s “special military operation”, the agency said.

More than 300 Russian Orthodox priests signed an appeal against the Ukraine invasion of 2022, most of whom have since been silenced or forced to emigrate — and some of whom have joined a new clergy association, Christians for Peace, whose website (christians4peace.com) was blocked in Russia last September.

At least ten priests have faced direct sanctions for refusing to recite the prayer ordered at the liturgy by Patriarch Kirill in September 2022, which denounces those who have “taken up arms against Holy Rus, eager to divide and destroy her one people”, and asks “forgiveness of sins and blissful repose” for servicemen killed in the war.

The prayer also asks God to “grant victory” and “deliverance from troubles” to “faithful children zealous for the unity of the Russian Church”, and to “overthrow the plans” of enemies who are seeking to “darken minds and harden hearts”.

In a statement at the weekend, the Russian Church’s diocesan court said that Fr Uminsky faced unfrocking for “violating his priestly oath” if the relevant court order was approved by Patriarch Kirill.

The ruling has been challenged, however, by the Union of Orthodox Journalists (UOJ), which questioned Patriarch Kirill’s right to impose a prayer “about Russia’s victory over Ukraine”.

“Father Uminsky, like any other priest, had every right not to read this ‘special’ prayer’: it is not in the service book, does not have conciliar origin, and it is not approved by the Holy Synod, but is the desire of one person,” the UOJ said last week.

“To ban a priest from ministry simply for refusing to read a prayer that contradicts his ethical or political views clearly has nothing to do with the Kingdom of Heaven and brings enormous harm to the Church.”

In a further sign of toughening attitudes, the Pope condemned Russia’s actions in Ukraine, in a letter published last week. He said that he was “close to the pastors trying to give hope to people in a situation that seems increasingly hopeless”.

He told the Primate of the Greek Catholic Church in Ukraine, Major Archbishop Svetoslav Shevchuk: “I share with you the same contempt and pain that you feel before these military operations, which, having struck the civilian population and the civil infrastructure of the entire country, are dishonourable and unacceptable and cannot be justified by any manner.”