At a recent workshop in Athens on “Orthodoxy, War, and Human Rights”, organized by the International Orthodox Theological Association colloquium and co-hosted by the Francis Rich School of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences of The American College of Greece (20–21 March 2026), I reflected on a demanding question:
What is the responsibility of Orthodoxy in times of war? My response was simple, yet not easy. I prefer speaking about peace rather than war. Yet peace today cannot be addressed without confronting what war does to the human person.
War is not only a geopolitical event.
It is an ontological rupture.
It fractures relationships. It distorts perception. And perhaps most dangerously, it normalises the dehumanisation of the other. When theology reinforces division rather than protects the human person, it ceases to be prophetic. It becomes functional.
From my perspective, the starting point is not the state, nor the conflict. It is the human person, created in the image and likeness of God, bearing an inherent and non-negotiable dignity. This is where an important convergence exists with the international human rights framework. Yet Orthodoxy contributes something further: it understands dignity not only as a legal principle,
but as a relational and spiritual reality. This depth matters.
In this context, interreligious engagement is not optional. It is an ethical necessity. It affirms that suffering is not confined within religious or national boundaries. It resists fragmentation. And it preserves the presence of the other as a human person. This leads to a final point.
Orthodoxy cannot remain at the level of right belief alone.
It must move toward responsible action:
• to name violence clearly
• to accompany without instrumentalising
• to refuse dehumanising narratives
Orthodoxy cannot stop wars.
But it can preserve something essential:
the capacity to see the other as human.
And today, this may be its most important contribution.
