Evangelical Christians in Russia were forced to pay a “tax on faithfulness” in 2022, which will likely increase this year as part of a government crackdown on non-Orthodox faiths, rights investigators tell Worthy News.
In what has been described as an extraordinarily courageous step, hundreds of evangelical Christians in Russia have signed an open petition calling on Russian President Vladimir Putin to stop his invasion of Ukraine, Christianity Today (CT) reports.
Since Russia annexed the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine in 2014—one of the central points of conflict in the current clash between the two countries—Protestant Christians in the territory have faced greater government penalties for practicing their faith.
As many as eight people were injured after a Russian teenager tried to blow himself up in an apparent suicide attack outside a Christian school and a monastery, officials said Monday.
Russia has stripped several Christian institutions of their right to offer higher education, several sources confirmed.
A Russian court has fined an influential priest for publicly denying the existence of the new coronavirus and urging his followers to ignore government ordered lockdowns.
At least 3 evangelical churches have been closed in Russia over the last 6 months, in spite of President Vladimir Putin’s pledge at a recent conference to “do everything” to protect Christians in the Middle East.
Concerns among Russian Christians that the government’s antiterrorism legislation, adopted last year, would take away their religious freedom have been proven true.
Evangelical Protestants make up the majority of the 181 cases prosecuted by Russian authorities under the country’s notorious ‘anti-missionary’ laws, which came into force last July, according to a report. Christians were also prosecuted in Crimea, which Russia occupied in 2014.
Russia’s ongoing crackdown on religious minorities, foreign missionaries, and evangelists has earned it a spot among the worst countries in the world for religious freedom.
Russia has brought an administrative case against a religious leader under the country’s controversial new package of anti-terrorist laws.
An American man is among the first group of people to be targeted under new anti-evangelism laws in Russia.
Christians in Russia are grappling with a new law that effectively makes it illegal for them to share their faith, preach or pray outside of officially designated sites.
The Slavic Centre for Law and Justice, an affiliate of the American Center for Law and Justice, said a new manner of carrying out missionary work in Russia will have to be established.
Last month a court in the Russian city of Orel sentenced a pastor to five days in prison.
Christian organizations in Russia that teach secular education may face harassment from government officials, according to Barnabas Aid.
A congregation of evangelical Christians in Russia’s capital Moscow were without a church building Tuesday, September 11, after workers with bulldozers and other equipment destroyed their Holy Trinity Pentecostal Church complex, protected by local police, witnesses said.
As protesters demanding more freedom and fair elections prepared to demonstrate in freezing temperatures in Moscow Saturday, February 4, a major Russian mission group warned of more difficulties for evangelical Christians and other, religious, minorities in Russia and other former Soviet Union nations.
ICEJ NEWS – 09/05/2001 On his three-day visit to Moscow, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has met with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov, receiving some encouraging support in the battle against Palestinian terrorism, but with no apparent breakthrough in Israel’s bid to halt Russian arms sales and nuclear transfers to Iran. Sharon’s agenda has included attempts to enlist Russian help in a worldwide campaign to exert pressure on PLO chief Yasser Arafat to stop the intifada violence, to convince Putin to reduce nuclear supplies and know-how to Iran, and to interest Russian businessmen in Israeli opportunities. … Read more