B1 · Intermediate
17 min
religionhistorygeopoliticsculture
Faith and Nation: Georgia and One of the World's Oldest Churches
La Fe y la Nación: Georgia y la Iglesia Más Antigua del Mundo
The election of Shio III as Georgia's new Catholicos-Patriarch opens a conversation about one of the oldest Christian churches on earth and the extraordinary story of a people who used their faith to survive empires, invasions, and Soviet communism. Behind this election lie fourteen centuries of resistance, identity, and politics.
La elección de Shio III como nuevo Catholicos-Patriarca de Georgia abre una conversación sobre una de las iglesias más antiguas del mundo y la historia extraordinaria de un pueblo que usó su fe para sobrevivir imperios, invasiones y el comunismo soviético. Detrás de esta elección hay catorce siglos de resistencia, identidad y política.
6 essential B1-level terms from this episode, with translations and example sentences in Spanish.
| Spanish | English | Example |
|---|---|---|
| patriarca | patriarch | El nuevo patriarca de Georgia se llama Shio III. |
| sobrevivir | to survive | La iglesia georgiana sobrevivió muchos siglos de invasiones y guerras. |
| identidad | identity | La religión es una parte importante de la identidad nacional de Georgia. |
| sagrado | sacred / holy | Los monasterios son lugares sagrados para los georgianos. |
| llevar + gerundio | to have been doing something (duration) | Llevo dos años estudiando español pero todavía cometo muchos errores. |
| desconfianza | distrust / mistrust | Después de tantas invasiones, la desconfianza histórica de los georgianos es comprensible. |
I'll be honest with you, Octavio.
When I first saw this headline, I almost skipped it.
Georgia elects a new patriarch.
Fine.
But then I started reading, and I could not stop.
Sí, Fletcher.
Yes, Fletcher.
Shio III es el nuevo Catholicos-Patriarca de toda Georgia.
Shio III is the new Catholicos-Patriarch of all Georgia.
Es el líder de la Iglesia Ortodoxa Georgiana.
He is the leader of the Georgian Orthodox Church.
Pero tienes razón, esta historia es mucho más grande que una elección religiosa.
But you're right, this story is much bigger than a religious election.
So let's set the stage.
The previous patriarch, Ilia II, held that position for 44 years.
From 1977 until his death.
That is a tenure that spans the late Soviet period, the collapse of the USSR, Georgian independence, two wars with Russia, and a political revolution.
The man was an institution.
Exacto.
Exactly.
Y para entender por qué esto es tan importante, tenemos que hablar de historia.
And to understand why this matters so much, we have to talk about history.
La Iglesia Ortodoxa Georgiana es una de las más antiguas del mundo cristiano.
The Georgian Orthodox Church is one of the oldest in the Christian world.
Georgia adoptó el cristianismo como religión oficial en el año 337.
Georgia adopted Christianity as its official religion in 337 AD.
Eso es antes de que el Imperio Romano lo adoptara oficialmente.
That is before the Roman Empire officially adopted it.
337 AD.
Just to put that in perspective, the Edict of Milan, which made Christianity legal across the Roman Empire, that was only 24 years earlier, in 313.
Georgia was essentially moving at the same speed as Rome on this.
Sí, y la historia oficial dice que fue una mujer, Santa Nino, quien llevó el cristianismo a Georgia.
Yes, and the official story says it was a woman, Saint Nino, who brought Christianity to Georgia.
Era una esclava o una prisionera de guerra, no sabemos exactamente.
She was a slave or a prisoner of war, we don't know exactly.
Pero curó enfermos, habló de Jesús, y la reina y el rey se convirtieron.
But she healed the sick, spoke of Jesus, and the queen and king converted.
Así empezó todo.
That is how it all began.
A woman credited with converting an entire kingdom.
That's a founding story you don't hear often enough.
Para los georgianos, Santa Nino es la figura más importante de su historia religiosa.
For Georgians, Saint Nino is the most important figure in their religious history.
En las iglesias georgianas hay una cruz especial, la Cruz de Nino.
In Georgian churches there is a special cross, the Cross of Nino.
Es diferente, con los brazos inclinados hacia abajo.
It is different, with the arms tilted downward.
Dicen que ella hizo esa cruz con su pelo.
They say she made that cross from her own hair.
Now here's the thing that really grabbed me about Georgian Christianity.
It didn't just shape the religion, it shaped the language.
The Georgian alphabet, which is completely unique in the world, one of only a handful of truly independent scripts, it was developed specifically to translate the Bible and the liturgy into Georgian.
The church and the language grew up together.
Sí, esto es fundamental.
Yes, this is fundamental.
En muchos países, la iglesia ayudó a preservar la lengua.
In many countries, the church helped preserve the language.
Pero en Georgia, la iglesia creó la lengua escrita.
But in Georgia, the church created the written language.
Sin la Iglesia Ortodoxa, quizás no existía el georgiano como lengua literaria.
Without the Orthodox Church, perhaps Georgian would not exist as a literary language.
Es una conexión muy profunda.
It is a very deep connection.
And that connection becomes the key to understanding everything that came after.
Because Georgia is a small country in a neighborhood that is historically terrifying.
The Persians, the Arabs, the Mongols, the Ottomans, the Russians.
Every one of those powers rolled through Georgia at some point.
Exacto.
Exactly.
Y cada vez que un imperio nuevo llegaba, la iglesia sobrevivió.
And each time a new empire arrived, the church survived.
Cuando los persas llegaron en el siglo sexto, los georgianos murieron pero no cambiaron su religión.
When the Persians came in the sixth century, Georgians died but did not change their religion.
Cuando los árabes llegaron en el siglo séptimo, igual.
When the Arabs came in the seventh century, the same.
La iglesia era la identidad nacional.
The church was the national identity.
Sin ella, no había Georgia.
Without it, there was no Georgia.
I spent a few weeks in Tbilisi back in 2003, right after the Rose Revolution.
And what struck me, coming from two decades of reporting in places where religion and national identity had been weaponized, was how different it felt there.
The faith seemed genuinely woven into the daily texture of life, not used as a political instrument from the outside.
Eso es muy interesante.
That is very interesting.
Pero la política y la iglesia en Georgia siempre estuvieron juntas.
But politics and the church in Georgia were always together.
En la época medieval, el rey y el patriarca eran muy poderosos al mismo tiempo.
In the medieval period, the king and the patriarch were very powerful at the same time.
Había un período de oro en el siglo doce con la reina Tamar.
There was a golden age in the twelfth century with Queen Tamar.
Era cristiana, era guerrera, y construyó muchas iglesias.
She was Christian, she was a warrior, and she built many churches.
Queen Tamar.
She ruled in her own name, not as a regent for a son or a husband.
In the 12th century.
Georgia's greatest military and cultural expansion happened under a woman.
The Georgians are quietly proud of that fact in a way that doesn't require them to shout about it.
Sí.
Yes.
Pero después de Tamar, llegaron los mongoles.
But after Tamar, the Mongols came.
Y después, los persas de nuevo, y los otomanos.
And then the Persians again, and the Ottomans.
Georgia era un campo de batalla entre dos grandes imperios.
Georgia was a battlefield between two great empires.
La iglesia perdió muchos monasterios, muchos textos, muchos sacerdotes.
The church lost many monasteries, many texts, many priests.
Pero sobrevivió siempre.
But it always survived.
And then came Russia.
Which brings us to something that I think is underappreciated in the West.
When the Russian Empire absorbed Georgia in 1801, one of the first things they did was abolish the Georgian patriarchate.
They put the Georgian church under the Russian Orthodox Church.
They did it in 1811 and it stayed that way for over a century.
Sí, y eso fue muy traumático para los georgianos.
Yes, and that was very traumatic for Georgians.
La iglesia era su identidad.
The church was their identity.
Cuando los rusos la controlaron, los georgianos sentían que perdían algo fundamental, no solo religioso, sino también cultural y nacional.
When the Russians controlled it, Georgians felt they were losing something fundamental, not just religious but also cultural and national.
Recuperaron su independencia eclesiástica en 1917, cuando el Imperio Ruso colapsó.
They recovered their ecclesiastical independence in 1917, when the Russian Empire collapsed.
1917.
And then, almost immediately, the Soviets arrive.
And this is where the story takes a turn that still feels almost impossible to believe.
Stalin.
Stalin.
Sí, ya sé lo que vas a decir.
Yes, I know what you are going to say.
El hombre que destruyó más iglesias que nadie en la historia, el hombre que persiguió sacerdotes y religiosos, era georgiano.
The man who destroyed more churches than anyone in history, the man who persecuted priests and religious people, was Georgian.
Y cuando era joven, estudiaba para ser sacerdote en el seminario de Tiflis, que es Tbilisi.
And when he was young, he studied to become a priest in the seminary of Tiflis, which is Tbilisi.
Stalin studied at the Tiflis Spiritual Seminary from 1894 to 1899.
He was, by accounts from his fellow students, genuinely devout in those early years.
And then something happened.
Maybe the brutality of the seminary system, maybe his reading of Marx.
He left before graduating and became a revolutionary.
The seminary produced the man who would close hundreds of seminaries.
Es una ironía tremenda.
It is a tremendous irony.
Bajo Stalin, la iglesia en Georgia casi desapareció.
Under Stalin, the church in Georgia almost disappeared.
Muchos sacerdotes murieron en los gulags.
Many priests died in the gulags.
Los monasterios se convirtieron en almacenes o museos.
The monasteries became warehouses or museums.
Era peligroso ser cristiano, especialmente ser sacerdote.
It was dangerous to be Christian, especially to be a priest.
And yet it survived again.
Which brings us to 1977 and the man who would define the modern Georgian church: Ilia II.
He took over a church that, by most accounts, was in terrible shape.
Physically, spiritually, institutionally.
And over 44 years he rebuilt it into one of the most powerful forces in Georgian society.
Ilia II llegó al patriarcado cuando Georgia todavía era soviética.
Ilia II came to the patriarchate when Georgia was still Soviet.
Era un momento muy difícil.
It was a very difficult moment.
Pero él trabajó poco a poco.
But he worked step by step.
Construyó iglesias nuevas, formó sacerdotes nuevos, y cuando llegó la independencia en 1991, la iglesia ya era fuerte.
He built new churches, trained new priests, and when independence came in 1991, the church was already strong.
La gente buscaba identidad después del colapso soviético, y la iglesia la tenía.
People were searching for identity after the Soviet collapse, and the church had it.
There's a pattern here that I kept coming back to when I was reading about this.
Every time Georgia faced an existential crisis, an empire, a war, an occupation, the church absorbed the identity of the nation and carried it forward.
It's almost like the church was the hard drive that kept rebooting Georgia when the operating system crashed.
Sí, eso es una buena manera de explicarlo.
Yes, that is a good way to explain it.
Pero también hay una parte complicada de esta historia.
But there is also a complicated part of this story.
Cuando la iglesia es tan poderosa en un país, también puede ser conservadora en política.
When the church is so powerful in a country, it can also be conservative in politics.
En Georgia, la iglesia se opuso a los derechos de las personas LGBT.
In Georgia, the church opposed LGBT rights.
En 2013, grupos religiosos atacaron a manifestantes en Tbilisi.
In 2013, religious groups attacked protesters in Tbilisi.
Fue muy violento.
It was very violent.
That 2013 incident.
Priests leading mobs in the street.
It was a real rupture in Georgia's international image, particularly with the EU, which Georgia was trying to build a relationship with.
The church as a force for national survival and the church as a force for political conservatism, those two things coexist and they create real tension.
Y ahora Georgia quiere entrar en la Unión Europea.
And now Georgia wants to join the European Union.
La gente, especialmente los jóvenes, está a favor.
The people, especially the young, are in favor.
Hubo manifestaciones grandes en 2024 cuando el gobierno intentó bloquear el camino hacia la UE.
There were large protests in 2024 when the government tried to block the path toward the EU.
La iglesia, en general, tiene una posición más complicada sobre Europa.
The church, in general, has a more complicated position on Europe.
Esta tensión no terminó con la muerte de Ilia II.
This tension did not end with the death of Ilia II.
Which is precisely why the election of Shio III matters beyond the religious sphere.
Whoever leads that church is going to be a major political actor in a country that is pulled in genuinely opposite directions: west toward Europe, but also deeply connected to a conservative Orthodox world that includes Russia and Serbia and a kind of cultural traditionalism that is skeptical of EU values.
Exacto.
Exactly.
Y Shio III tiene que manejar esto con mucho cuidado.
And Shio III has to manage this very carefully.
No conocemos todavía cuáles son sus posiciones políticas exactas.
We do not yet know what his exact political positions are.
Pero la iglesia georgiana nunca fue completamente independiente de la política.
But the Georgian church was never completely independent from politics.
Es imposible en un país tan pequeño con una historia tan difícil.
It is impossible in such a small country with such a difficult history.
I want to go back to the Russia dimension for a second, because I think it's underplayed in most Western coverage.
Russia invaded Georgia in 2008.
Occupied South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
Both of those regions have Orthodox churches, their own bishops, their own religious structures that Moscow has been quietly cultivating.
The Georgian Orthodox Church and the Russian Orthodox Church are not friends.
No, no son amigas.
No, they are not friends.
Y esta es una diferencia importante con lo que mucha gente piensa.
And this is an important difference from what many people think.
El mundo ortodoxo no es un bloque unido.
The Orthodox world is not a unified bloc.
Hay tensiones entre Moscú, Constantinopla, Kiev, y también Tbilisi.
There are tensions between Moscow, Constantinople, Kyiv, and also Tbilisi.
Cada iglesia tiene su propia política, su propia historia.
Each church has its own politics, its own history.
Para Georgia, la independencia religiosa y la independencia política son la misma cosa.
For Georgia, religious independence and political independence are the same thing.
That point deserves to sit for a moment.
When Russia absorbed Georgia in 1801 and put the Georgian church under Moscow's control, it wasn't just an ecclesiastical administrative decision.
It was an act of cultural subjugation.
And the Georgians never forgot it.
So when people say the Georgian church and the Russian church share Orthodox values, that's technically true and politically meaningless at the same time.
Bien dicho.
Well said.
Y hay otro aspecto histórico muy importante.
And there is another very important historical aspect.
Georgia tiene monasterios en toda la región, en Turquía, en Israel, en Grecia, en Bulgaria.
Georgia has monasteries across the entire region, in Turkey, in Israel, in Greece, in Bulgaria.
Estos monasterios son parte de la identidad georgiana fuera de Georgia.
These monasteries are part of Georgian identity outside Georgia.
La iglesia era internacional mucho antes de que Georgia tuviera un pasaporte.
The church was international long before Georgia had a passport.
The monastery on Mount Athos in Greece.
The cave monastery of David Gareja on the border with Azerbaijan, which has been a genuine diplomatic flashpoint.
Georgian pilgrims and heritage sites scattered across a geography that no longer matches Georgia's borders.
That's a familiar story in this part of the world, but it's still striking.
David Gareja es un buen ejemplo.
David Gareja is a good example.
Ese monasterio tiene partes en territorio azerbaiyano.
That monastery has parts in Azerbaijani territory.
Los georgianos quieren acceso libre para visitar sus lugares sagrados.
Georgians want free access to visit their sacred sites.
Azerbaijan no siempre lo permite.
Azerbaijan does not always permit it.
Es un conflicto pequeño, pero dice mucho sobre cómo la religión y la geopolítica están siempre conectadas en esta región.
It is a small conflict, but it says a lot about how religion and geopolitics are always connected in this region.
Let me ask you something directly.
As someone who covers European politics and has watched a lot of these transitions in religious institutions, what are you watching for with Shio III?
What's the question you'd want answered in the first year of his patriarchate?
Mi pregunta es: ¿cómo va a hablar de Rusia?
My question is: how is he going to speak about Russia?
Si dice cosas positivas sobre Moscú, es una señal muy mala para el camino europeo de Georgia.
If he says positive things about Moscow, it is a very bad sign for Georgia's European path.
Si es más independiente, quizás la iglesia puede ayudar a construir un puente entre los georgianos que quieren Europa y los que tienen miedo del cambio cultural.
If he is more independent, perhaps the church can help build a bridge between Georgians who want Europe and those who fear cultural change.
That framing is useful.
Because the mistake outside observers make is treating this as a binary, either Georgia is heading toward Europe or it's being pulled back toward Russia.
But actually the church has often occupied a third position: deeply Georgian, skeptical of everyone else, sovereign in a way that doesn't map onto either geopolitical bloc.
Es verdad.
That is true.
Y eso no es una debilidad.
And that is not a weakness.
Es el resultado de catorce siglos de sobrevivir entre imperios.
It is the result of fourteen centuries of surviving between empires.
Los georgianos aprendieron a no confiar completamente en nadie.
Georgians learned not to trust anyone completely.
La iglesia refleja esa desconfianza histórica.
The church reflects that historical distrust.
Es profunda, no es solo política de hoy.
It runs deep, it is not just today's politics.
Fourteen centuries of learning not to trust anyone.
There's a foreign policy doctrine in that sentence.
Fletcher, cuando hablo de todo esto, quiero decir también algo sobre el idioma.
Fletcher, when I talk about all of this, I also want to say something about language.
Antes dijiste que la iglesia 'construyó' el idioma georgiano.
Earlier you said the church 'built' the Georgian language.
En español, a veces usamos el verbo 'llevar' para decir cuánto tiempo hace algo.
In Spanish, we sometimes use the verb 'llevar' to say how long someone has been doing something.
Yo dije antes que Ilia II 'llevaba más de cuarenta años' como patriarca cuando murió.
I said earlier that Ilia II 'llevaba más de cuarenta años' as patriarch when he died.
¿Notaste esa construcción?
Did you notice that construction?
I did catch that.
'Llevaba más de cuarenta años.' I understood it from context but I couldn't have produced it myself.
'Llevar' for me is about carrying things.
How does it get to mean 'has been doing something for a long time'?
Es que el verbo 'llevar' en español tiene muchos usos.
The verb 'llevar' in Spanish has many uses.
Pero con tiempo y un gerundio, significa la duración de una acción.
But with time and a gerund, it expresses the duration of an action.
'Llevo tres años viviendo en Madrid' significa que empecé hace tres años y todavía vivo allí.
'Llevo tres años viviendo en Madrid' means I started three years ago and still live there.
'Llevaba cuarenta años' con el imperfecto significa que la acción empezó en el pasado y continuó hasta un momento en el pasado.
'Llevaba cuarenta años' with the imperfect means the action started in the past and continued until a moment in the past.
So 'llevar' with a gerund is doing what English does with 'have been doing' or 'had been doing.' We use the present perfect or past perfect continuous.
Spanish uses 'llevar' plus the gerund and changes the tense of 'llevar' to show whether it's ongoing now or was ongoing then.
That's actually more elegant than what we do in English.
Más elegante, sí.
More elegant, yes.
Y también más difícil para los estudiantes de español.
And also harder for Spanish learners.
Pero es muy natural cuando lo escuchas mucho.
But it becomes very natural when you hear it a lot.
'Llevo una hora esperando.' 'Llevaba dos años viviendo en Londres.' Pruébalo, Fletcher.
'I have been waiting for an hour.' 'I had been living in London for two years.' Try it, Fletcher.
¿Cuánto tiempo llevas estudiando español?
How long have you been studying Spanish?
Llevo...
tres años estudiando español.
And I have very little to show for it.
The Georgian church lasted fourteen centuries against Mongols and Soviets and I can barely order coffee without causing a diplomatic incident.