Posted on 08/02/2016 12:13:06 PM PDT by Lera
How would you feel if tomorrow it became illegal to send an email to your friend, inviting them to church? This is the reality that Russian believers have suddenly woken up to, as a result of new anti-terror legislation which came into effect at the end of July, forbidding many forms of evangelism.
Ostensibly to combat terrorism, Russia has clamped down hard on evangelism, and made life extremely difficult for our brothers and sisters who want to share the Good News freely there. There has been a great window of opportunity for the gospel to spread since the fall of the Iron Curtain, and the number of believers has greatly increased as a result - a number that includes thousands of Jewish people, many of whom have arrived in Israel already believing in Yeshua, or very open to the gospel. The many Russian-speaking Messianic Jews, and Russian-speaking congregations here in Israel are testimony to the rapid spread of the gospel that has been permitted for some golden years. But now that door seems to be closing again. We seem to be lurching back to the old Soviet era in terms of religious freedoms.
(Excerpt) Read more at oneforisrael.org ...
Pinging the End Times ping list
The window for the Gospel being preached in Russia seems to be rapidly closing as they shut down congregations .
You must be mistaken. I keep reading about how Putin is a swell guy who loves his country and the dark days of the Soviet Union, KGB, etc are long, long gone.
I thought Russia was the savior of Christianity or something?
Putin controls the Russian Orthodox Church. He is playing at being the "Defender of the Faith" while attempting to destroy any competing Christian denomination.
The Russian Orthodox Church, also known as the Mother Church of Russia, was the official church of Russia during the days of the Soviet Union. Other religions were much more scrutinized and less tolerated.
Thanks for the explanation.
If FR had a like button.
IIRC...Ted Cruz's father operates his church out of his house. It's called....tax break.
This is a singular source, without confirmation.
It was widely reported that Putin fined a US-based pastor about a hundred bucks and kicked him out of the country, and only for intentions -- the good clergyman wanted to officiate a gay marriage. http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/american-pastor-expelled-russia-lgbt-case-40883111
There might have been another case like this.
The law is still very vague, and could be interpreted differently by police which lends itself to bribery and corruption. It is as yet unclear what it will mean for believers
They are a small scale outfit that preaches Jewish conversion to strong Evangelical Christianity in Israel, and their position generates considerable resistance from Jews there, so they consider any limit on pro active solicitation of religious conversion to be censorship or suppression.
Radical terrorist Islam solicits converts in exactly the same manner as One For Israel solicits theirs.
This is a singular source, without confirmation.
Russia's Newest Law: No Evangelizing Outside of Church (Christianity Today)
Christians in Russia Under Attack From Putin's Law Banning Evangelism Outside of Churches (Christian Post)
Churches in the USA do not have to be registered.
I didn’t post this when I heard it a few years ago, because people make up all sorts of stories to get refugee status here in the U.S., but I met a guy from Russia at that time who said he was a religious refugee. He was from a Protestant denomination.
I do know Putin and the Orthodox Church are very tight. Remember that Pussy Galore group or whatever it was called who tried protesting in a Russian Orthodox church? Socked away. I had arguments with people who thought they should have been allowed to protest there, people who were extremely anti-Putin, and that was the reason they thought it was okay to protest.
That's wrong. The Soviet Union was officially atheistic. Communism is, in fact, a quasi-religion itself. Anyone who was climbing the social ladder had to join the party at some point. The Russian Orthodox Church was never official, while it was more loyal to the authorities than to other Christian denominations. The reason was that the ROC's faith has always had some nationalistic element, it's called a "Russian" church, you see. The ROC was merely tolerated "we must have some tolerance to those uneducated rural old ladies, who can't grasp the scientific discovery of atheism".
Because of its nationalism the ROC was useful when the Soviet authorities needed to deal with nationalistic movements of Russian-related peoples (like Western Ukrainians).
Many Christian denominations were (and still are) perceived as either foreign or destructive cults. And some of them really were destructive.
The decade after the USSR's demise brought any possible US, and not only US, denomination or cult to the former USSR countries. The local people grew an antipathy to them either because of nationalism or having learnt its destructive nature or because of the cultural differencies of the American worship ("wowbuddyjesuslovesyou!"). Add to all these that Russia has had its own evangelicals (who are way more conservative than their US counterparts) since the XIX century. The current Russian authorities do have public support on the recent legislation.
Still, its churches publicly speak against it, and the ROC does it too. The Russian law-enforcing style means that noone will be punished for a private email inviting to church.
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