[Diocese in Europe, Church of England] Dignitaries from 37 embassies around the world attended a Remembrance Sunday service at St. Andrew’s in Moscow on Nov. 13. The congregation, including a number of ambassadors, deputy ambassadors and deputy heads of mission, heard the chaplain, the Rev. Malcolm Rogers, preach on the horrors of war and the glimpses of light in the darkness. The service took place as the war in Ukraine – the biggest conflict on European soil since the Second World War – rages on into its ninth month.

Rogers noted that conflicts not only cause suffering and death but also devastate communities and create paralyzing rumors, uncertainty and the fear of separation. And they have an impact on everyone.

“We come to accept the unacceptable as normal,” he said. “There is the growing hatred fueled by and fueling the lies and exaggerations. Incidents of atrocity are universalized. The deep fires of the volcano of revenge are ignited.”