From church to streets: How Garabagh clique hijacked Armenia’s church

By Elnur Enveroglu

By any measure, the recent spat between Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and the Armenian Apostolic Church has revealed more than just personal animosities or institutional tensions. It has unmasked the deep moral, political, and ideological fractures at the heart of Armenian society—a nation still reeling from its defeat in the Second Garabagh War, and now struggling to reconcile with reality. Pashinyan’s caustic Facebook comments against high-ranking clergy expose a country where the old elite refuses to relinquish control, even as the new order tries, however clumsily, to move forward.

In a stunning social media post, Pashinyan lashed out at Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, who is currently leading protests against the government's decision to return four border villages to Azerbaijan, a step long demanded by international law and supported by the 1990s-era maps. The Prime Minister wrote an insulting comment to Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, a phrase so crude it barely warrants translation. He then openly questioned how many of the Church’s bishops are actually celibate, before sarcastically responding to criticism of his own marital status.

Such vulgarity from a head of government is disturbing. Yet it also reflects the depth of frustration that the Armenian leadership feels toward an institution that has transformed itself into the last stronghold of the so-called “Garabagh clique”—the entrenched elite that ruled Armenia for over two decades and lost not only the 2020 war, but also the moral legitimacy to dictate national policy.

Indeed, Archbishop Galstanyan is not merely a spiritual leader. He is now the de facto head of a revanchist movement seeking to undo Armenia’s peace process with Azerbaijan, undermine the rule of law, and drag the country back into the militarist, isolationist era of the Serzh Sargsyan and Robert Kocharyan administrations—both figures closely tied to the Armenian lobby. For years, this clique manipulated the Church, the media, and the security services to maintain a frozen conflict that only served their narrow interests. In the end, their arrogance led Armenia into a catastrophic war it could not win.

By contrast, Azerbaijan has shown a firm and consistent commitment to restoring its territorial integrity without falling into internal chaos. After the 2020 victory, Baku could have pushed further, but it chose diplomacy. Even now, with the latest agreements on delimiting the border and the peaceful return of four Armenian villages, Azerbaijan remains focused on future regional integration, economic development, and peaceful coexistence. This is a maturity Armenia’s fractured political class would do well to emulate.

Pashinyan, for all his faults, is at least trying to turn Armenia toward a more realistic and less confrontational foreign policy. His willingness to concede what international law already recognises as Azerbaijani territory is not weakness—it is a necessity. Yet he faces a revolt not from parliament, but from the pulpit. When clerics mobilise mobs in the streets and issue thinly veiled threats against a sitting prime minister, one wonders whether Armenia is truly ready to function as a modern state.

The tragedy here is not Pashinyan’s language, however inappropriate. It is the fact that in 2024, the Armenian Apostolic Church is being used as a political battering ram by those who have nothing constructive to offer. And in doing so, they are sabotaging what could be the beginning of a long-overdue reconciliation with Azerbaijan—a country that has already moved on.

It is time for Armenia to do the same. Let the Church return to spiritual matters. Let the Karabakh clique fade into history. And let diplomacy—not dogma—guide the South Caucasus to a more stable and prosperous future.