Russia's War Against Evangelicals

A TIME article?

Russia Is Persecuting Christian Churches in Occupied Ukraine

Anyone who believes Russia is ‘protecting Christianity’ is ignoring the record of Russia’s treatment of Ukrainian churches.

The issue of religious persecution has emerged as an objection to House Speaker Mike Johnson’s plans for military funding for Ukraine. Many congressional Republicans evidently believe that Russia is “protecting Christianity,” as Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R., Ga.) said on Monday. These Republican members are being duped by Russian propaganda, including the claim that Russia’s war against Ukraine is against Satanism. “The overthrow of faith and traditional values and the suppression of freedom are resembling a ‘religion in reverse’ — pure Satanism,” Putin said two years ago, in a speech on Russia’s intent to annex occupied Ukraine.

Moscow’s invasion and devastation of Ukraine have contributed to the assessment, by the U.S. State Department and the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), that Russia ranks among the world’s religious persecutors of greatest concern. Russia, they find, “egregiously” and “systematically” persecutes a wide array of Christian churches, except the Ukrainian Orthodox Church–Moscow Patriarchate, which Putin co-opts. A Ukrainian delegation of diverse religious leaders told a Hudson Institute gathering last year that they fear that a victorious Russia would crush their religious institutions. Credible reports on Russia-occupied Ukraine validate this.

Last December, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church posted on its site that in 2022 the Russian authorities in occupied Zaporizhzhia banned all Greek Catholic churches there as well as Caritas and the Knights of Columbus, Catholic aid organizations. According to the post, the bans were based on “groundless” accusations that church buildings were storing explosives and firearms, that its members were participating in anti-Russian protests, and that the charities were spying for the Vatican and Washington. All real property of the Greek Catholic Church in Zaporizhzhia was transferred to the Russian administrative authorities, church leases were terminated, and its leaders were barred from registering to legally carry out their ministries. The office of Archbishop Borys Gudziak of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Archeparchy of Philadelphia confirmed for me that the post represents the official position of the Ukrainian Catholic Church.

Mission Eurasia, an American Christian charity, finds that in spring 2023 “almost all non-Orthodox churches in occupied territories were stripped of their right to hold church services.” Forum 18, a Norwegian news service dedicated to religious freedom, reports that, in the occupied Luhansk region, Protestants, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and the Orthodox Church of Ukraine have not been allowed to register their places of worship and only two Pentecostal churches were allowed to register, last January. Moreover, in 2022 in Lysychansk, Russian administrators reportedly seized the city’s largest Protestant church and informed another that Baptists, Pentecostals, and Seventh-day Adventists were banned as “extremists.” USCIRF also reported that Russian authorities in Mariupol had banned “all Protestant and non-Orthodox churches.”

Mission Eurasia found that the “scale of the destruction of evangelical prayer houses is vast.” It has mapped more than 600 religious buildings damaged or destroyed by targeted Russian missiles, suicide drones, artillery strikes, and other violence. Affected were the Ukrainian Pentecostal Church, Evangelical and Baptist churches, and the Seventh-day Adventists. The Jehovah’s Witnesses have seen 110 of its Kingdom Halls damaged.

The Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church now has “no clergy left” in Ukraine’s Russian-occupied regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, and Kherson, in addition to Zaporizhzhia, according to Mission Eurasia. It cites Forum 18’s Felix Corley, adding that Ukrainian Greek Catholic churches have been closed and their priests expelled from the occupied regions.The Kyiv-based Institute for Religious Freedom reports that Russian militants calling themselves “Cossacks” have shut down Catholic churches in Donetsk and and closed them to worshipers. Storing weapons, promoting “neo-Nazi goals” — such claims are “the kind of classic accusations they’re making against the [Ukrainian] Greek Catholic Church,” said Corley.

In November 2022, Fathers Ivan Levitsky and Bohdan Geleta, Ukrainian Catholic Redemptorist priests, were arrested by Russian authorities at their church in occupied Zaporizhzhia. They were then “tortured without mercy” before being sent to prison, according to Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. According to Mission Eurasia, Russia’s “widespread” torture of detained Christian leaders in occupied Ukraine, includes “mock executions, threats of rape, electrical torture, and hours-long group beatings.” It finds a “practice of arbitrary arrests and kidnappings of religious figures, holding them in basements in horrific conditions and inflicting violent torture on them.”

USCIRF reports that Russian soldiers in Kherson abducted Orthodox priest Sergey Chudinovich after he refused to allow the military to distribute aid at his church. Russian forces detained him in a cold basement and “beat, strangled, and attempted to rape him with a baton” until he agreed to cooperate.

USCIRF reports also that Evangelical deacon Anatoliy Prokopchuk and his son Oleksandr were found dead, with signs of severe torture, in a forest two days after Russian forces abducted them in Kherson in 2022. Father Stepan Podolchak, a Ukrainian Orthodox priest, died in Kherson, the Ukrainian military administration (in exile) stated on February 15, 2024, two days after Russian forces abducted him from his home. Bruises were found on the priest’s body. Bishop Nykodym (Kulygin) in the neighboring diocese of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine told Forum 18 “that Russian occupation forces ‘tortured Father Stepan to death.” Podolchak held religious services in Ukrainian and refused to affiliate with the Moscow Patriarchate.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2024/04/russia-is-persecuting-christian-churches-in-occupied-ukraine/?twclid=24taitiurkv11eropq0ou95exq

Russia delenda est!

The Russian Orthodox Church and the Russian state have a symbiotic mutual protection relationship - the state protects the institutional Orthodox Church and the Church runs a social protection racket backing up the state.

🤣🤣🤣. Repreobate globalits are concerned about Evanglicals.

_________________________________________________

Exactly! Is this article supposed to make us think that Western nations (especially the US) are super-sensitive to the wants and needs of Evangelicals?

Russia is at war with the homo-gelicals. The USA and the EU are at war with Christianity and Judaism.

An American who defected all the way to the Russian side (probably had an FR handle) from Texas was recently raped and decapitated by Russian troops, despite holding valid military ID and citizenship.

The Kremlin appears to be censoring demands for an investigation into the reported murder of a former Donetsk People Republic (DNR) serviceman amid a wider trend of the Kremlin coopting or otherwise censoring DNR-affiliated voices within the Russian information space. Russian sources recently claimed that Russian propagandist, former DNR serviceman, and US national Russell Bonner Bentley III disappeared in Donetsk City on April 8.[33] Russian sources alleged that elements of the Russian 5th Tank Brigade (36th Combined Arms Army [CAA], Eastern Military District [EMD]) detained and interrogated Bentley under the impression that Bentley was a Ukrainian spy due to his foreign accent and later killed Bentley.[34] Veteran Russian propagandist and RT editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan announced Bentley‘s death on April 19.[35]

Deputy Head of the DNR Main Directorate of Rosgvardia, Commander of the DNR’s special rapid response and riot police (OMON and SOBR), and former DNR Security Minister Alexander Khodakovsky called for an investigation into Bentley's reported kidnapping and murder and “exemplary punishment” for the perpetrators in a post on April 19, which Khodakovsky later removed reportedly due to pressure from Russian officials.[36] The DNR “Vostok“ Battalion, which Khodakovsky previously commanded, claimed that Russian officials likely forced Khodakovsky to remove the post and that Khodakovsky complied with the demand in accordance with the unspecified “rules” of having a government position despite his personal relationship with Bentley.[37] Khodakovsky claimed on April 20 that being a government official and “a person” often creates competing priorities between his personal and professional loyalties, and insinuated that he agreed to remove his social media post to keep his government position.[38] Khodakovsky insinuated that censorship was necessary during the war and claimed that unspecified actors could pursue justice for Bentley after Russia won in Ukraine. Another DNR-affiliated Russian milblogger claimed on April 19 that unspecified actors are threatening to file charges against the milblogger for discrediting the Russian Armed Forces (a charge that could result in a fine of up to five million rubles ($65,530), up to five years of correctional or forced labor, or up to seven years in prison) after the milblogger demanded an official investigation into Bentley's kidnapping and murder.[39]

Russian efforts to cover up Bentley's death are the latest in what appears to be a concerted Kremlin effort to censor or coopt DNR officials and DNR/Luhansk People's Republic (LNR)-affiliated voices within the Russian information space. The Russian Investigative Committee arrested former Russian officer and argent ultranationalist Igor Girkin (Strelkov), a prominent DNR commander in 2014, on charges of discrediting the Russian Armed Forces on July 21, 2023.[40] Russian authorities also arrested milblogger and former DNR serviceman Andrei Kurshin who reportedly ran the “Moscow Calling” Telegram channel in August 2023, and Russian milblogger and sergeant in the 4th Motorized Rifle Brigade (2nd LNR Army Corps) Andrei Morozov reportedly committed suicide after refusing the Russian military command's orders to censor his reporting about high Russian casualty rates around Avdiivka in February 2024.[41] The Kremlin may be targeting DNR and LNR-affiliated voices within the Russian information space due to concerns that groups within the DNR and LNR, which have been fighting Ukrainian forces since 2014, are becoming disillusioned as the war drags on. Girkin, Kurshin, and Morozov were all vocal critics of the Russian military command, and Khodakovsky had previously disagreed with the Russian military command and ongoing Kremlin censorship efforts. All four, however, are and were firm supporters of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.[42] It is unclear how or if Kremlin officials will respond to Bentley's death or how the targeting of DNR officials and affiliated voices will impact the Kremlin's relationships with its proxies in occupied Ukraine.

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-april-20-2024

and a Russian source:

The murder of “Texas” in the DPR reached the Kremlin level. He will probably be buried in Russia

The story of the murder of American Russell Bentley (call sign “Texas”) in the DPR has reached a new level. According to our information, US authorities are preparing to submit a request for the release of the body of the deceased. At the same time, the Kremlin knows that before his death, “Texas” in Donetsk was raped by one of the servicemen.

“The body cannot be handed over. Now they are deciding how to bury it in Russia,” said a source in the AP [Presidential Administration]. The option that Russell Bentley will be declared an enemy spy and buried in the DPR is being preliminarily discussed. Another option is more obvious - since “Texas” had a Russian passport, he must be buried in Russia with all honors. After all, he generally led the life of a simple Russian person, was an Orthodox Christian.

At the same time, the Kremlin reacts extremely nervously to statements by military officers and other participants in the war regarding the murder of “Texas”. For example, Alexander Khodakovsky was forced to urgently delete a post calling for an investigation into the incident. This only confirms that the authorities, neither in the DPR nor at the federal level, do not need unnecessary fuss. But this is important! Prove that justice exists! That we are not some kind of fascists to kill a person just because of his American origin. The right thing to do is to investigate the murder of Russell Bentley as quickly as possible.

https://t.me/kremlin_secrets/3965

Prior to his activities in the Donbas, he was a marijuana activist and smuggler who was later convicted of drug smuggling and spent 5 years in prison.

Bentley, a self-declared communist, came to global attention in 2022[citation needed], with a series of statements, and videos, about his intention to “liberate Ukraine from Nazis”. By July 2016, he had been baptized into the Russian Orthodox Church.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Bentley

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/

Russia's Newest Law: No Evangelizing Outside of Church | News ...

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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)

Most “evangelical” types see anyone and everyone else as heretics at best and heathen at worse and cannot be bothered to learn even a smidgen of ecclesiastical history. They think that “true Christianity” began with their sect’s founder.

Actually, it is the basic gospel (versus baptism itself making one a Christian, much less as an infant) and other distinctive teachings (such as espoused as dogma in Catholicism) which are not manifest in the only wholly God-inspired, substantive, authoritative record of what the NT church believed (which is Scripture, in particular Acts through Revelation, which best shows how the NT church understood the gospels) that basically differentiates btwn a true church verse a false one.

In the West, traditional conservative evangelicals who most strongly esteem the Bible as the supreme authoritative and accurate word of God (and thus evangelize) have long testified to being the most unified conservative major religious group in America, thus voting 80% for Trump, and even Romney (and would for Putin, if he would uphold the US constitution, but which he opposes), - despite formal organic divisions, and 3 fundamental areas of disagreement (predestination, Pentecostal gifts, eschatology.

Meanwhile, polls of Russians find most are nominally orthodox, and only marginally more opposed (48 percent) than the non-Orthodox/nonbelievers (46 percent).

Rather, it is those who contend the most against cults that are also affected. Outside "approved" (PC) churches and other religious sites the Yarovaya law broadly forbids in word and deed "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 requiring "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,"

The US meanwhile is at war with Christianity.

Indeed, against God, even as seen by these dated stats.

So which represents more evil in your opinion?

Putin is also at war with God while a type of ally in opposing LGBTQ and hindering abortion. His rehabilitated model Stalin was an ally against Hitler though an enemy of Christians. True ones know "that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness." (1 John 5:19) And Ukraine, insofar as its embraces the Western Left is also an an enemy of basic Biblical Christians.

The difference is btwn a country in which one can yet freely express and evangelize as the Bible commands and lobby to see its morality reflected in laws - as the Left does with its faith and feelings-based ideology - versus one which criminalizes this activity. As Russia does to varying degrees, though sometimes allowing expression for show.

The Left of the West opposes Putin as a competitor for domination over all.

The difference is btwn a country in which one can yet freely express and evangelize as the Bible

What country are you actually attributing that has that freedom? Because it's not the USA, not anymore. You aren't allowed to do so in front of abortion clinics, can't do that in schools, can't do it as a presidential candidate without facing backlash.

It's not Ukraine either. Trust me, I am no supporter of Russia or Putin, but we screwed the pooch by fomenting this Proxy war, and the consequences will be severe as well.

What country are you actually attributing that has that freedom? Because it's not the USA, not anymore. You aren't allowed to do so in front of abortion clinics, can't do that in schools, can't do it as a presidential candidate without facing backlash. .

No country allows completely unfettered free expression, thus it is a matter of degrees. Here, while typical public forums include public parks, sidewalks and areas that have been traditionally open to political speech and debate, yet - aside from liberal protestors when treated as a protected class - one cannot impede traffic or access. Mileage may vary relative to the local interpretation.

However, there is a vast difference btwn a law that broadly forbids any evangelism of the public except by the state church, and one that places certain time, place and manner restrictions on expression public places.

It's not Ukraine either. Trust me, I am no supporter of Russia or Putin, but we screwed the pooch by fomenting this Proxy war, and the consequences will be severe as well

Not unless you believe that Putin is not seeking former Soviet glory, with a goal of regaining all that it lost, and thus that he is not a threat to NATO allies and the US, or that the latter are no longer worth defending and that they would be better off under Putin. At least spiritually.

Meanwhile, China is learning and gaining from all this.

Your comment was not about freely expressing:

freely express and evangelize as the Bible commands and lobby to see its morality reflected in laws

My response was focused on speaking about the Lord in any public area.

So, do you want to try your answer again?

Not unless you believe that Putin is not seeking former Soviet glory, with a goal of regaining all that it lost, and thus that he is not a threat to NATO allies and the US, or that the latter are no longer worth defending and that they would be better off under Putin. At least spiritually.

No, that wrong thinking is reserved for you Zeepers, and you also believe once he regains control over Ukraine he will gobble up the entire EU. Neither Putin nor Russia has the where with all to accomplish that.

Russia is not the USSR, and Potin is not Joseph Stalin.

NNATO has become the threat to Russia. Putin has stated that Ukraine & Gorgia are red lines as far as Russia's National Security is concerned. Keep threatening and we will have WWIII on our hands, which I am convinced is exactly what the elites who seek to create a One World Government are itching to start.

Russian blogger:

The body of the murdered “Texas” is not given to his wife.

The wife of Russell Bentley (call sign “Texas”), killed in Donetsk, cannot gain access to his body. She reported this to our channel. At the same time, Lyudmila thanked us for making the information public and asked us to make the story of her husband's murder as public as possible .

“He loved Russia. He was ready to die for our Donbass. But what they did to him is a real mockery,” said Lyudmila.

Let us remind you that Russell was detained in Donetsk on suspicion of espionage. After interrogation, the American was raped by one of the servicemen. According to information from the wife of the deceased, the Texas was detained by tankers of the 5th brigade. They suspected that he was passing information to NATO countries.

At this point, there is no official information about the circumstances of the death of a prominent fighter for the Russian world. Russell Bentley gave 10 years of his life in the fight for the freedom of the Russian Donbass. Now he needs to be buried with honors, and not hide his body from his wife.

https://t.me/kremlin_secrets/3975

Well, there’s always Win Worley.

ATTACK! ATTACK! ATTACK!

https://wrwpublications.com/