Around 400 Baptist churches in Ukraine ‘lost’ due to Russian invasion: seminary president
by Michael Gryboski, Christian Post:
Around 400 Baptist churches based in the occupied parts of Ukraine cease to exist due to the Russian invasion, according to a seminary president who lives in the Eastern European nation.
Yaroslav Pyzh, president of Ukrainian Baptist Theological Seminary in Lviv, told the Baptist Press in an interview published Monday that “about 400 Baptist churches” had been “lost.”
The seminary leader confirmed the number of lost congregations to The Christian Post and outlined how he arrived at that estimate.
“This estimate comes from territories that have been occupied or are occupied,” he explained to CP. “As well, it includes some of the churches where I pastor and people just move out of the country. Also, this is the number that Baptist Union of Ukraine is using.”
Pyzh defined “lost” as meaning “the churches that ceased to exist because of war-related circumstances,” with this sometimes meaning the “buildings are destroyed,” but ultimately that in “all cases people left,” either being “displaced in Ukraine” or moving to “other countries.”
The seminary president suggested that the denominational affiliation of the churches may have been a factor in the hostility they faced since Russians have been known to consider Baptists to be “agents of the West.”
“But in most cases, people were leaving because it is impossible to live in the war-torn territories,” Pyzh added.
Related Posts
Tags
Share This
