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Q: Tell us about how the 2016 Yaravaya law was implemented in Russia?

It seems that there are some deniers of the suppression of evangelical faith on FR, likely by anti-evangelicals, and some atheists. However, suppression - which is not as intense in scope and degree as usually realized under the USSR and varies in degrees (and likely with large gatherings some allowed for show) extends to criminalizing all evangelism by any apart from the RO. But since becoming saved/born again/regenerated results in lay evangelism, thus they, while a minority, would mostly be affected.

For

the Yarovaya law forbids outside approved churches and other religious sites "the activity of a religious association aimed at disseminating information about its beliefs among people who are not participants (members, followers) in that religious association, with the purpose of involving these people as participants and its results"

and thus requires

"telecom providers to store the content of voice calls, data, images and text messages for 6 months, and their metadata (e.g. time, location and message sender and recipients) for 3 years,"

Under Putin, the Russian Orthodox Church and other approved religions became tools of state policy. According to Putin, there are four traditional and “exclusively Patriotic” religions, Russian Orthodoxy, Islam, Buddhism, and Judaism. Since 2012, when the Kremlin started incorporating religious and conservative messages into the government’s rhetoric, these institutions were showered with financial and political benefits due to their close ties with the regime.

Those who fell outside these four patriotic religions’ freedoms were subject to anti-missionary laws and state surveillance, which eroded their ability to practice their religion openly. This tactical choice targets independent religious activity outside of the Kremlin’s control and allows the regime to prosecute religious groups through incredibly vague laws. Notable groups target under these laws include Jehovah’s Witnesses, Muslims, and Evangelicals. Indeed, according to a 2019 report, Evangelicals were the group most penalized under the anti-missionary laws. For example, the Kremlin forced a Russian Christian radio station to relocate from Moscow, Russia to Odesa, Ukraine. In 2022, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) recommended labeling Russia as a country of particular concern “for engaging in systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations of religious freedom”. - https://www.christianpost.com/voices/putin-is-not-the-defender-of-the-faithful.html

https://motabredsquare.wordpress.com/2016/07/12/missionary-work-after-the-yarovaya-laws-part-ii-legal-analysis/: The bulk of the effect of this legislation on missionary work concerns the addition of a large section dedicated specifically to missionary work to the federal code concerning the freedom of conscience.

Missionary work is defined in as broad a way as possible: “Missionary activity … is defined as activity of a religious association intended to spread information about its doctrines among people who are not participants (members, followers) of the particular religious association, with the goal of drawing those people into the group of participants (members, followers) of the religious association, carried out directly by the religious association or by citizens by the association or by legal entities, publicly, by means of the media, the information-telecommunication network “Internet”, or by other legal methods.”

Missionary activity thus defined is allowed “without restriction” in buildings owned by the religious organization, and various other specially-designated places such as cemeteries, but (reasonably so) not in other religious associations’ property.

Missionary work is not allowed in residences. If there is one takeaway from the law, it should be this.

In other public situations, only the leader of the local religious association (or a designated alternate) is allowed to engage in missionary activities without a special permit – essentially, a legal declaration by the religious association that the carrier is authorized to perform missionary work. This requirement is notably targeted at Russian citizens, but a similar requirement is also required of foreign citizens. (It is my understanding that it is already the Church’s practice is to issue such declarations for missionaries.) Of particular note is the prohibition against missionary work intended to assist in the performance of “extremist activity.” This has been defined by recent legislation extremely broadly,...

One final provision clarifies that only religious services and rites, not missionary work, is allowed to be performed in people’s homes (by reference to the law governing religious meetings held outside of religious buildings). On the face of it, this suggests that anointing for the sick and afflicted is allowed in homes, and perhaps even holding Sacrament Meeting, but no missionary work. As a preventative measure, the provision also prevents the legal conversion of a residence into a religious space, meaning that you can’t just have someone in the branch register their apartment as a church and hold member lessons there. - https://motabredsquare.wordpress.com/2016/07/12/missionary-work-after-the-yarovaya-laws-part-ii-legal-analysis/

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Moscow church destroyed in sign of new Russian repression

If the issue was simply about stopping Western culture, then Russia should favor traditional evangelicals, but instead, its ant-evangelicals in the interest of the RO and political support thereby have served to placed a wedge btwn such, which see-no-evil Putin supporter as yourself attack them, thus showing RO fruit.

https://publicorthodoxy.org/2016/10/25/yarovaya-conservatives-traditional-values/...2013..Over the last several years, European and US religious conservatives have often rallied to the new Moscow-centered “traditionalist international.”...American evangelical heavyweight Franklin Graham began to warm to the Russian president as well. Viewing this remarkable rapprochement between American and Russian conservative Christians united by a culture wars agenda as potentially very harmful to the cause of human ri

ghts,...

the World Congress of Families—perhaps the single most important forum for collaborative efforts between West European, American, and Russian hardline religious conservatives... A rebranded WCF VIII went ahead with Russian financing, much of it linked to the ostentatiously Orthodox oligarchs Konstantin Malofeev and Vladimir Yakunin. Now billed as a forum called “Large Families: The Future of Humanity,” the event featured American WCF leaders as planned....A year later, WCF IX was hosted in Salt Lake City, and Russian Orthodox Christians played a prominent role there...

The first sign of fraying relations came when the preparing for a World Summit in Defense of Persecuted Christians that Graham planned to host in Moscow, in collaboration with the ROC, was quietly put on hold by the Russian side last spring. In August 2016, however, Graham announced that the summit would be moved from Moscow to Washington, D.C. and take place May 10-13, 2017. Acting as if the initiative to break with Russia was his own, Graham cited Russia’s recent passage of an “anti-terrorism” package known as the Yarovaya Laws (for the key role of United Russia Duma deputy Irina Yarovaya in their passage) as his reason for moving the summit. These laws place severe restrictions on Protestants and other minority religious groups in Russia, essentially banning proselytizing. In effect from July 20 of this year, the Yarovaya Laws are already being enforced. Protestants are being detained and fined for conducting ordinary religious activities.

I reached out to William Yoder, a Belarus-based writer on church affairs who has decades of on the ground experience working with Protestant communities in Eastern Europe and Russia, to get his opinion on the current state of affairs. In his view, “the Yarovaya Laws are putting a damper on the budding relationship between the Christian right in the US and the Orthodox in Russia ... by persecuting Protestants, the Russian state is making it considerably more difficult for American Christian conservatives to count themselves among Putin’s right-wing fellow travelers. - https://publicorthodoxy.org/2016/10/25/yarovaya-conservatives-traditional-values/

LIVING AS A PERSECUTED CHRISTIAN IN RUSSIA
November 21, 2019

Andrei was a youth pastor and contractor in Russia. An oppressive law that passed in 2016 banned the public sharing of one’s Christian faith. After receiving threats from Russian officials on the lives of his two children, Andrei, his wife Galina and their children fled from Russia as refugees, and arrived in Minnesota in 2019. We interviewed Andrei about life in Russia and the persecution he left behind:....

(The Yarovaya law increases regulation of evangelism, including a ban on the performance of “missionary activities” in non-religious settings.) Based on this law, which is active right now, if you declare that you belief this or that or if you publically invite someone to church, of if you share an invitation to a Christian conference or service on facebook, sometimes even if you just attend church you will receive a huge fine or you can be jailed for up to 3 years. If you represent a church as a pastor or leader, then the fine is $1M rubles ($15,700) and up to 5 years in jail, if they can prove that you were promoting your faith....

The (Russian security service) investigators would just show up at a church service and would ask around for more information on specific people. Then they would subtly threaten people by reminding them that kids often use drugs in Russia, and you never know what could happen to your kids. Investigators wanted me to cooperate and inform on other people.
I was refused jobs because I am a Protestant. I was working as a contractor on the house of a Russian parliament member (part of the Russia Unite party); when he found out I was a pastor at a church, he took all of my tools, kicked me out, and refused to pay me for any of the work I did on his house. I hired a lawyer to receive payment, but since the justice system is very much in submission to the government, I was found guilty.

Religious Repression in Putin’s Russia By Antonio Graceffo on January 11, 2023
Under the Russian Constitution, though citizens are guaranteed religious freedom, authorities may suspend religious activity in the name of national security. Although the constitution specifically cites extremism as a cause for the suspension of religious freedom, it does not provide a robust definition of which activities could be considered “extremism.” .

Additionally, Russia has strict laws on the registration of clergy and places of worship in addition to staunch prohibitions against missionary work. The term “missionary work” is broadly applied to “preaching, praying, disseminating religious materials, and answering questions about religion outside of officially designated sites.”...

Russian law technically recognizes Christianity, Islam, Judaism, and Buddhism as the four “traditional” religions. But, only the Russian Orthodox Church is elevated to the role of representing the ideals and faith of Russia... About 63% of Russia’s population are Orthodox Christian, 7% are Muslim, and 26% identify as agnostic. Buddhists, Jews, other Christians, and animists each comprise about 1% or less of the population. - https://providencemag.com/2023/01/religious-repression-in-putins-russia/

Russian persecution of evangelicals exceeding that of Soviet era, Mission Eurasia president says
By Scott Barkley, posted August 23, 2023 in International News, Persecution

MOSCOW (BP) — The raid by secret police of Russian evangelical leader Yuri Sipko’s home will not silence the former Baptist Union president’s “uncompromised” stance. Sergey Rakhuba, president of Mission Eurasia, promised as much in comments he shared with Baptist Press. (See related story.) “I have personally known Yuri Sipko for a long time,” Rakhuba said. “He is an uncompromised, powerful leader and preacher of the Gospel for whom truth is the most important thing.” Sipko’s home was one of many among prominent evangelical leaders that was raided by the FSB, Russia’s secret police, Mission Eurasia reported on Aug. 8...

Sipko’s opposition to Vladimir Putin extends back to the Russian president’s early days in power, particularly Putin’s past as a KGB officer. Those stances continued with Russia’s 2014 invasion of Ukraine and annexation of Crimea. The next year Sipko spoke at a consultation hosted by Mission Eurasia at the Bishop of Canterbury’s headquarters in London to raise awareness over the invasion...

“Most deny that this is the beginning of a new wave of repression by the Russian regime. [But] we are monitoring churches in the occupied territories in Ukraine through our Religious Freedom Initiative and have discovered that more than 500 churches have been seized, many pastors have been deported, some have disappeared and many have been killed by the Russian regime.” A common thread is emerging in those areas, he noted. Only the Russian Orthodox Church is allowed to remain. Religions and “any foreign religious influences” are being removed from the nation.

At Expense of All Others, Putin Picks a Church

By CLIFFORD J. LEVY Published: April 24, 2008

STARY OSKOL, Russia —

It was not long after a Methodist church put down roots here that the troubles began.

First came visits from agents of the F.S.B., a successor to the K.G.B., who evidently saw a threat in a few dozen searching souls who liked to huddle in cramped apartments to read the Bible and, perhaps, drink a little tea. Local officials then labeled the church a “sect.” Finally, last month, they shut it down.

There was a time after the fall of Communism when small Protestant congregations blossomed here in southwestern Russia, when a church was almost as easy to set up as a general store. Today, this industrial region has become emblematic of the suppression of religious freedom under President Vladimir V. Putin.

Just as the government has tightened control over political life, so, too, has it intruded in matters of faith. The Kremlin’s surrogates in many areas have turned the Russian Orthodox Church into a de facto official religion, warding off other Christian denominations that seem to offer the most significant competition for worshipers. They have all but banned proselytizing by Protestants and discouraged Protestant worship through a variety of harassing measures, according to dozens of interviews with government officials and religious leaders across Russia.

Russia's De-Facto State Religion : Persecution : http://www ... www.persecution.org/?p=9350&upm...‎ International Christian Co... Putin frequently appears with the Orthodox head, Patriarch Aleksei II, ... Baptists, evangelicals, Pentecostals and many others who cut Christ's robes like bandits, ...

Government Returning Land to Religious Organizations to Favor Orthodox Tuesday, March 3rd, 2009: An ambitious draft law on the transfer of property of religious significance to religious organisations may reignite a process begun in 1993.

Pentecostal Seminary Targeted for Liquidation

Pentecostal Church Forced to Meet Outside in Moscow Winter

Russia: Governor Orders Church Land Grab

Council of Religious Experts threatens religious freedom

A new Inquisition ?

Russia “You have the law, we have orders ”

In addition,

"63% of Russians consider themselves Orthodox believers" and 66% of Russians – the population as a whole, without reference to one’s faith – trust the Russian Orthodox Church." - https://www.pravmir.com/over-65-of-russians-trust-the-russian-orthodox-church-poll/

More findings from that same source are that,

For many people, however, “Orthodox” is basically a cultural identification label and does not necessarily imply adherence to specific religious doctrines—a Levada poll found that 30 percent of those who saw themselves as “Orthodox” did not even believe in the existence of God. To single out the believers from the “culturally Orthodox,” we started by asking whether respondents considered themselves as belonging to any religion at all. Slightly more than half, 55 percent, answered in the affirmative. Of these, 81 percent indicated Russian Orthodoxy. This means that altogether 45 percent of our respondents considered themselves Orthodox believers.

Moreover...we found that Orthodox Christians, despite the ROC’s strong stance on abortions, were only marginally more opposed (48 percent) than the non-Orthodox/nonbelievers (46 percent) (see Table 2).

On whether certain other behavior could be justified, 55% of self-declared Orthodox believers affirmed fornication could be, which is actually just slightly less than non-Orthodox/nonbelievers (57%)

Pew research finds that in Russia,

just 6% of Orthodox Christian adults say they attend church at least weekly, 15% say religion is “very important” in their lives, and 18% say they pray daily. Other former Soviet republics display similarly low levels of religious observance. Together, these countries are home to a majority of the world’s Orthodox Christians.

https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2017/11/08/orthodox-take-socially-conservative-views-on-gender-issues-homosexuality/
Across all three waves of ISSP data, no more than about one-in-ten Russians said they attend religious services at least once a month.

Meanwhile,

America has incurred the wrath of God, being more blessed and accountable than others. To which applies:

Israel hath cast off the thing that is good: the enemy shall pursue him. They have set up kings, but not by me: they have made princes, and I knew it not: of their silver and their gold have they made them idols, that they may be cut off. (Hosea 8:3-4) I have written to him the great things of my law, but they were counted as a strange thing. (Hosea 8:12) For Israel hath forgotten his Maker, and buildeth temples; and Judah hath multiplied fenced cities: but I will send a fire upon his cities, and it shall devour the palaces thereof. (Hosea 8:14)

Yet,

For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God? And if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear? (1 Peter 4:17-18)