Ukraine’s “Revolution of Dignity,” spanning both the 2013–2014 protests in Kyiv’s city center and the mass mobilization of grass-roots resistance against Russian aggression in 2014–2015 and thereafter, manifest new interpretations of ideas and philosophical concepts. In the first part of the article we unravel the meaning of the Ukrainian word hidnist – a moniker of the revolution whose significance remains underestimated. In the second part we situate Ukraine’s revolution within a broader context of “modernity” and suggest its individualist foundation may (...) be replaced by a form of “personalism” – an ethic that echoes that of Ukraine’s revolutionaries. In the third part of the article, we delve into the substance of the revolution’s agenda: its protagonists’ promise to build a non-hierarchical community of “fairness”. In the fourth and final section, the main argument of the article is summarized, namely: that the shift from individualism to personalism in social interaction and the transition from hierarchy to heterarchy in power relations, particularly with respect to institutionalizing “fairness,” embodied in the various structures and organizations formed during Ukraine’s Revolution of Dignity, may have been reflective of more comprehensive trends in ideational change affecting European civilization. (shrink)

Preview: /Aaron J. Wendland interviewed by Przemysław Bursztyka/ “What Good Is Philosophy?” took place on 17-19 March 2023, and it aimed to raise the funds required to establish a Centre for Civic Engagement at Kyiv Mohyla Academy. This Centre will provide support for academic and civic institutions in Ukraine to counteract the destabilizing impact that Russia’s invasion has had on Ukrainian higher education and civilian life. Keynotes at the conference were delivered by world-renowned author, Margaret Atwood, one of the most (...) celebrated scholars of Ukrainian history, Timothy Snyder, and two of Ukraine’s preeminent public intellectuals, Mychailo Wynnyckyj and Volodymyr Yermolenko. Lectures were also given by some of the most influential philosophers writing today, including Peter Adamson, Elizabeth Anderson, Seyla Benhabib, Agnes Callard, Quassim Cassam, Tim Crane, Simon Critchley, David Enoch, Peter Godfrey-Smith, Sally Haslanger, Angie Hobbs, Barry Lam, Melissa Lane, Dominic Lopes, Kate Manne, Jeff McMahan, Jennifer Nagel, Philip Pettit, Kieran Setiya, Jason Stanley, Timothy Williamson, and Jonathan Wolff. The closing remarks were delivered by Ukraine’s Ambassador to Canada, Yulia Kovaliv. This benefit event was designed to provide members of the public, individual academics, colleges and universities, professional associations, charitable foundations, and private companies with a way to support students, scholars, and civic institutions in Ukraine. The entire conference is now available to be viewed online via on the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy’s YouTube channel. Here is the relevant link. I encourage everyone who watches the conference to make a donation to support students, scholars, and publicly engaged academics in Ukraine. All donations can be made here. And as the conference organizer, I am extremely grateful for any and every contribution to this cause. (shrink)

The European vector of development of modern Ukraine requires a new reconstruction of national history, which in turn makes it possible to make sure: this choice is not a conjuncture, but a completely natural, historically justified, nationally conscious one. Of course, in such a thematization, the question of the European fate of Ukraine coincides not only with political, but also with social, cultural, historical, religious and other aspects of research. It was in such a broad context that Mikhail Drahomanov, the (...) first “Ukrainian European”, thought. However, unlike modern reform theorists of the Soviet school, he considered spiritual and moral-ethical factors to be the most significant. (shrink)

Ukrainian evangelical Protestantism is a significant factor in the religious life of the country, not only because of its quantitative characteristics, but also because of its differentness, the identity of dominant national traditions and the situation of political situations. Representing the Eastern image of Western Christianity, the openness to the spiritual experience of the world church community, the evangelical communities are the most dynamic in their development, in new attempts at topical theological synthesis, and in establishing inter-denominational bridges. Evangelical Protestantism (...) means, above all, evangelical Baptist Christians and Evangelical Christians, separating them, on the one hand, from the historical churches and, on the other, from the latest Protestant movements. (shrink)

Evangelical Protestantism is a landmark phenomenon in the history and modern religious life of the Ukrainian society, affirming the fact of its peaceful presence with the historical churches the possibility of practical implementation of an inter-denominational, pluralistic model of religion conversion. The eighteen centuries of the existence of the evangelical church in the unfavorable conditions of persecution by the tsarist regime and the Soviet authorities have proved its viability and great social potential, based on widespread popular support, kinship of the (...) evangelical faith and spiritual demands of society. (shrink)

I cordially congratulate the book of Roman Solovy, a colleague of religious scholars and like-minded people on theological workshop. The author comprehends the mutual influence of culture and the Church on the break of modern-postmodern-post-postmodern. Unfortunately, the last move fell out of the attention of the author, leaving a sense of incompleteness, not-really-topicality. If the researcher is only going to analyze what the theologians of the "emerging Church" are thinking about "the transition from the modern to the postmodern era," he (...) is going to look for yesterday. After-Postmodernism does not appear in the text, nor as a constant concept, nor as a premonition. However, from the subsequent text, it becomes clear why and in what sense the author regards postmodern as a stage of modernism, that is, the continuation of the past, rather than a bridge to the future. (shrink)

Ukrainian Protestantism characterized by an eastern and western traditions that allows to recover cultural and theological relationship with European Protestantism and Catholicism in the context of interfaith dialogue. Dialogue has an ecumenical potential which was found by Ukrainian Maidan of dignity.

"Memorial" of Metropolitan Joseph Slipyj is an important document of the confessional history of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. It is also a valuable source for anyone interested in the history of religion, the spiritual culture of Ukraine, the course of Orthodox-Catholic and church-state relations in the Soviet era. The author himself calls himself "a silent witness of the Silent Church". In this confession, there is an indescribable tragedy of the personal destiny of the Metropolitan, as well as the fate (...) of his Church. When I wanted to scream the world over the crimes of the Soviet regime against the Church, I had to remain silent, only to pray. The persecuted Church could not tell the world what was happening, her voice did not break through the "Iron Curtain". But she survived and lived - in catacombs and prisons, in the hearts of simple believers and confession museums. (shrink)