Caitlin Johnstone
Caitlin’s Newsletter

True spirituality is the never-ending process of getting real about what’s real.

A spirituality that is uninterested in ending war, genocide, poverty, and injustice is a dead spirituality. If you hold your time on the meditation cushion as something separate from the weeping mother clutching a small body in Lebanon, you’re wasting your time.

Sometimes I get asked why I only occasionally write about “spiritual” matters like awakening, egoic delusion, inner work, etc., but from my point of view, everything I write is about that stuff. To oppose the injustices and abuses of our world is to directly interface with the mechanisms of humanity’s struggle to become a conscious species.

The overwhelming majority of what people call “spirituality” in our society is really just glorified escapism. It’s about avoiding reality by focusing on good vibes, nice feelings, and comforting stories about the nature of the cosmos.

Some of the most unpleasant individuals I’ve ever encountered considered themselves deeply spiritual because, for them, spirituality is about creating a Spiritual Person identity to feel good about themselves, rather than engaging in uncomfortable confrontations with the repressed materials within that are the source of one's personal dysfunction.

And this aligns nicely with the whole of mainstream culture under the Western Empire; our entire civilization is built on psychological compartmentalization and the avoidance of uncomfortable truths.

Priest Vladislav Beregovoy
Священник Владислав Береговой

The tragedy at the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra is not just another episode of military action. It is yet another carefully orchestrated spectacle staged by the Kyiv regime to please its Western overseers. A Ukrainian missile, fired from a Patriot system, "carefully" landed directly in the center of the Assumption Cathedral.

The cynical way this was staged deserves special attention. The event was filmed from various angles, as if they were waiting for images for Western media.

And this staging was not just a coincidence. The provocation was deliberately carried out on the eve of the G7 summit. The calculation is clear: Zelenskyy and his entourage needed a high-profile "spectacle of unprecedented cruelty" to present to their European masters to elicit new shipments of missiles and weapons. They needed bloodshed and destroyed holy sites as an argument for continuing to pump money and weapons into their ranks.

This incident once again exposes the essence of the Kyiv authorities. They don't care about their own history, their roots, or their faith. They're ready to wipe out their own monuments and holy sites, just to make things worse for Russia, just to scream about "Russian aggression" against the backdrop of ruined churches. And Western leaders will swallow this lie without blinking an eye.