Belonging without Identity: Hospital Chaplaincy in Wartime Ukraine as a Practice of Moral Presence
Publication information:
Abstract
This paper examines hospital chaplaincy in wartime Ukraine as a site for rethinking belonging beyond religious identity, institutional membership, and confessional affiliation. Among the military, hospital, and civilian forms of chaplaincy that have developed in Ukraine, the hospital setting most clearly reveals the breakdown of identity-based models of belonging under conditions of extreme trauma. Drawing on five in-depth interviews with practicing chaplains and the author’s engagement in public discussions in which new ritual practices have emerged, the paper argues that wartime suffering generates forms of belonging grounded in moral presence -embodied practices of accompaniment, care, and the affirmation of human dignity rather than shared belief.
Presenter Biography
VALENTYNA KURYLIAK (BA, Ukrainian Institute of Arts and Sciences; MA, Andrews University; PhD, University of Münster; Doctor habilitatus candidate, Dragomanov Ukrainian State University, Ukraine) is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Theology at the Ukrainian Institute of Arts and Sciences. Her most recent publications include “The Church in Times of Crisis: The Impact of the Russia–Ukraine War on Seventh-day Adventist Relations,” Journal of Church and State (2026); “The Problem with the Performance of Alternative or Military Service of Ukrainian Adventists in War Conditions,” Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe 44, no. 4 (2025); and “Religious Communities of Ukraine as Agents of Resilience During the Russian Invasion,” Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe 44, no. 7 (2024). She has published seventeen articles in Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe and forty-one articles in other peer-reviewed scholarly journals, including East European Historical Bulletin, Pages of History: Collection of Scientific Works. Her research interests include church history, the history of Protestantism in Ukraine and Eastern Europe, and religious studies.