Statement made during the panel discussion at the Round Table “Contemporary Ukrainian Orthodoxy: Debunking Myths for the Sake of Reconciliation Among Orthodox Christians in Ukraine,” held on April 29, 2025, in Kyiv. The event was part of the educational–analytical project organized by the Sophia Brotherhood with support from Renovabis.
Archpriest Georgiy Kovalenko: “Here’s a vital question we’ve long discussed: is Christian nationalism even possible? We imagine a universal, cosmopolitan Christianity—but if we speak of nations that bring glory and honor (Rev 21:24), nations don’t vanish at Jerusalem’s gates. Yet nationalist projects often divide and breed hatred. Could there be ‘nationalisms of love’? Is Christian nationalism possible in a globalizing world and a Church that aspires to be universal?
Vyacheslav Horshkov: Many assume nationalism necessarily involves hatred, that it’s always “against something or someone.” But that’s not accurate. Working with century-old sources, we noted that while some claimed Ukrainian nationalism was a negative form, Ukrainians themselves rejected that—they negated the “minus”.
It’s important to remember that the word “nationalism” itself originated from theological thought. It was coined by Johann Gottfried Herder, a Prussian philosopher, theologian, pastor, and the father of Western Slavistics and ethnography. Herder introduced the term in a positive sense—“Herderian nationalism” was explicitly constructive: it held that nations must develop subjective identity in order to see themselves as part of the universal human family, fostering fraternal relations .
Herder’s ideas profoundly influenced Ukraine—without his thought, we might not have had Mykhailo Hrushevsky or Taras Shevchenko. In his 1769 travel diary, Herder foretold a great cultural future for Ukraine, saying it would rise as a new Greece, with its boundaries stretching to the Black Sea—and from there influencing the world.
However, over time, nationalism degenerated in many contexts. The Ukrainian sociologist Oleherd-Ipolit Bochkovsky differentiated between Herderian-type nationalism (true nationalism) and aggressive, hateful “pan-nationalism”, which fueled totalitarian and fascist ideologies . Thus, the root of nationalism is Christian theology, not chauvinism—it began with a positive “plus” sign, completely compatible with biblical values.