On the morning of March 6, 2022, ten days into the invasion of Ukraine, Patriarch Kirill stood beneath the gold dome of the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow. It was Forgiveness Sunday, the threshold of Lent. He wore white and gold. The choir sang and incense filled the air. He told the faithful the war was a metaphysical struggle, light against the dark, and he ended by praying for the men at the front.

In Kyiv, priests of the same church knelt before the same God with the opposite plea. They asked heaven to stop the tanks. One of their bishops called the invasion the sin of Cain, the brother who killed his brother out of envy. These priests belonged to Moscow's own faith. They shared its liturgy, its saints, the thousand-year-old baptism both nations trace to the river at Kyiv. They prayed to the same Christ Kirill prayed to, and they prayed for his country's defeat.