Current Events

How Are the Churches in Ukraine and Russia Responding to the War?

75% of Russians and 60% of Ukrainians profess to be Orthodox Christians. The war is driving a wedge into the Orthodox Church. The patriarch, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, has been silent about the war for a long time, but he has now justified the war. It has been condemned in the Ukrainian Orthodox churches and even by some priests in Russia. In his sermons the patriarch presents the war as a legitimate resistance to Western values. Two Orthodox churches exist in Ukraine. One is the independent Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OKU), the other is the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOK), which is an autonomous church within the Russian Orthodox Church. Both churches condemned the war emphatically. The UOK even called on the patriarch in Moscow to use his influence on Putin and work for peace.

—DW.com

Christians in and near Ukraine

Christians who escaped westward as Russia launched attacks on Ukraine expressed a mix of grief and survivor’s guilt as they viewed horrific images from the communities surrounding their besieged capital, Kyiv. Escape feels selfish because so many did not make it out. Ukrainian officials said that the bodies of at least four hundred ten civilians have been found in towns around Kyiv that were recaptured in recent days. As Russian forces withdraw from the capital and western Ukraine, officials are concerned attacks will intensify in the cities of the east, including Dnipro and Mariupol. In Mariupol thirty-three Christians who took refuge in a church are hopefully still alive. There has been no contact with them in over a month. Continued evacuations and relief missions are organized by Christian churches in Ukraine and near its borders.

—ChristianChronicle.org

Finnish Ruling: District Court Not to Interpret Biblical Concepts

A Finnish court has upheld the right to free speech by dismissing all charges against a Finnish Member of Parliament (MP) and a church bishop. In a unanimous ruling the court concluded that “it is not for the district court to interpret biblical concepts.” The MP had been charged with “hate speech” for sharing her faith-based views on marriage and sexual ethics. The bishop faced charges for publishing a pamphlet made by the MP to his congregation. The prosecution attacked core Christian teachings and cross-examined the bishop and the MP on their theology. The Court concluded there was no overriding social reason for interfering with and restricting freedom of expression.

—ADFInternational.org

Florida Parental Rights in Education Bill

The Florida Governor signed a Parental Rights in Education bill into law. The new law ensures parents are not kept in the dark about what is happening with their children in schools and protects kids in kindergarten through third grade from sexualized classroom instruction. In the words of the Florida Family Policy Council, “The Florida parents’ rights law is necessary because schools have become places more concerned with indoctrination than they are with education.” The Walt Disney Company pressured Governor DeSantis to veto the bill—and some LGBT activists both outside and within Disney pressured the huge company to go further. Still, polling indicates that the law is strongly supported by Floridians—including by Democrat primary voters— and by Americans generally. President Biden put out a tweet clearly targeting the new Florida law. Both sides of this issue have committed themselves to a continued activist agenda across the nation.

—FamilyPolicyAlliance.com

Churches in Some India Districts Have Been Shut

Pastor Kailash Dudwe from Madhya Pradesh state, India, is still recovering from injuries received when a mob beat him unconscious in January. He is now facing death threats, eviction, and false charges of forcible conversion. He was brutally assaulted, almost killed, paraded on the street with grievous injuries, hospitalized, and sent to jail. Since then, extremists have twice threatened to kill him and threatened his landlord to evict him. He remains in the house with his wife and their two small children but is searching for somewhere else to rent. Other property owners have refused him though, after also receiving threats. His wife filed a police complaint requesting police protection, but none has been provided. His services at church have stopped since the attack, and local officials have given orders for other churches in the area to stop meeting, too. Authorities said the atmosphere is not conducive; therefore, all churches nearby must be shut. The majority of churches in surrounding districts have been shut.

—ChurchInChains.ie

Massive Sweep Against Underground Christians in North Korea

Security guards broke into a place where several dozen Christians were gathered for a secret worship meeting. The guards arrested all of them and then executed every secret believer in the room. Information suggests that the time and place of the worship meeting was leaked to authorities. As is often the case, families of the North Korean believers will suffer as well. A contact says that their families—exceeding one hundred people—were also arrested and have been sent to political prison—where inmates are treated as animals, tortured, and forced to do harsh labor with little food. In North Korea it is illegal to worship Jesus or have a Bible. Anything that gives people an alternative allegiance to the ruling Kim dynasty is illegal. Christians must hide their faith, even from their own children. Yet, secret Christians are risking their lives to be part of a church or to own a Bible. A North Korean believer and ex-prisoner encourages us to pray with these families recently imprisoned as well as for all secret believers in North Korea. They are facing death to worship Jesus, knowing that their only hope is in Him.

—OpenDoorsUSA.org

COAH Update from Ukraine

Come Over & Help (COAH) has partnered with Pastor Sasha Pavljuk in Ukraine for many years. He is a great big bear of a man with an even bigger heart. Besides being a Presbyterian pastor in Western Ukraine, he is also a military chaplain. His son Mark is currently in the military and on the front lines. Pastor Pavljuk’s 22-year-old nephew was just killed in the fighting and left behind a new wife and a 10-month-old child. The Russian invasion has cost Ukraine thousands of lives. Through funds from the Ukraine Relief Fund, Pastor Pavljuk has been working with churches throughout Western Ukraine. He sends this update:

“We have arranged for refugees the possibility of both long-term and temporary residence. For long-term refugees, we find apartments, houses; there are also many families who are ready to accept these people. For the transit refugees, we constantly have hundreds of places located in church buildings. More than two hundred people pass through our community every day on the way to the borders of Romania, Moldova, Poland, and Hungary. Because of the martial law and curfew, people can travel only during the day. Therefore, in the evening, they settle with us for the night and then continue on their way. We coordinate the routes and the number of people with the pastors who remain in their cities. The people we host have the opportunity to shower, wash their clothes, eat, and sleep. Our volunteers work with children to somehow distract them from the horror that they have had to endure. For those who have lost everything, we provide clothes and money for the journey. For those who do not have their own transportation, transport is organized to the borders of neighboring states. Most often it is the Polish and Romanian borders. We do it for people for free.

In addition, there are territorial defense battalions in Dunaevtsy and Khmelnytsky. These are ordinary people who voluntarily agreed to defend their land. Their actions are coordinated by the military, but since they are volunteers, they also need support. Checkpoints and round-the-clock patrols are organized at the entrances and exits. Russian sabotage groups have already been detained. There are many brothers from different churches in these battalions. Yura Lukovoi, our presbyter, is one of them. We provide them with thermal underwear because we have snow, and it is quite cold; we give a lot of food and hygiene items as well.

The situation in our region is better than in other cities; only a small town near Khmelnytskyi is being bombed because there is a military airfield, but often rockets fly over our heads. Please continue to pray. It is highly likely that I, with the help of another chaplain, will go to Nikolaev (near Odesa). There is a friend of mine there who is a pastor with forty church members left. These are older people. They practically live in the basement. They need help. We are discouraged from doing this, but we are studying this issue and consulting with the military.”

—Taken from the NRC Waupun church bulletin, March 20, 2022

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