Religious nationalism’s role in Russia’s war with Ukraine

It is well known that the Russian dictator’s mother and ex-wife were highly religious devotees within Russian Orthodoxy. Putin wears a cross and is often photographed with Russian Orthodox hierarchs in Moscow. His cross, a gift from his mother, has taken on an almost mystical significance. Putin has told the story over and over of how a fire destroyed many family possessions in the 1990s, but a fireman found the cross in the rubble and returned it to Putin.