[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 186 (Thursday, November 9, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5444-S5445]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                                Ukraine

  Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, recently, I had the opportunity to 
meet with a group of religious leaders from Ukraine. They represented 
multiple Christian denominations, plus Islam and Judaism. They spoke of 
the role faith is playing in the resilience and determination we have 
seen from the Ukrainian people.
  One of the religious leaders who spoke to me was Dr. Ivan Rusyn. He 
is president of the Ukrainian Evangelical Theological Seminary. His 
seminary trains evangelical ministers from various Protestant 
backgrounds. It was hit by six Russian rockets when Russia invaded.
  Dr. Rusyn lives in Bucha, and we all see that as being infamous by 
the atrocities that were committed against civilians by the Russian 
occupiers and also some of those people being brought before the world 
court for inhumane treatment. In fact, Russian soldiers even occupied 
Dr. Rusyn's home.
  Under the Soviet Union, Ivan and his family had to practice their 
faith in secret because evangelicals were imprisoned if caught.
  In today's Ukraine, he and fellow Ukrainians are free to practice 
their faith. In fact, he told me that the relief work his seminary has 
been doing since the full-scale invasion has been bringing more and 
more people to the church.
  Dr. Rusyn is a humble, soft-spoken man with a clear and powerful 
message. He said that in the midst of war, it is sometimes hard to feel 
the presence of God, but in coming to the United States with this 
delegation and meeting people who care about the suffering of the 
Ukrainian people, he felt God's presence more than ever. His strong 
faith in God and his deep concern for his fellow Ukrainians impressed 
me.
  Dr. Rusyn also told me about the persecution of his counterparts in 
the Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine. That is about 20 percent of 
Ukraine. Religious leaders are kidnapped, and evangelicals are singled 
out for persecution just like in the days of the old Soviet Union. A 
Ukrainian priest among the group told me that most of the faith leaders 
sitting in my office are on Putin's hit list to be singled out for 
persecution or death if they fall into the hands of the Russian 
military.
  Under Vladimir Putin, Russia has passed a law as recently as 2016 
requiring all religious organizations and churches to be registered 
with the Russian Government. The law bans what the law calls 
``missionary activities'' like preaching, like praying, like 
disseminating religious materials outside of officially approved sites 
within Russia.
  According to a special report by the Institute for the Study of War, 
Russia has used this 2016 law to prosecute American Baptists and 
Pentecostal missionaries operating in Russia and also to outlaw most 
Mormon missionary work and to burn foreign-distributed Bibles not 
properly registered with the state.
  According to this report by the Institute for the Study of War, the 
Russian state has also persecuted Seventh-day Adventists, Jehovah's 
Witnesses, Roman Catholics, Presbyterians, Methodists, Lutherans, and 
Orthodox church groups that are not affiliated with the Russian state.
  Russia's Prosecutor-General's Office declared four evangelical 
Christian groups as ``undesirable'' organizations as recently as 2021. 
Now, that effectively had banned these organizations from operating 
within Russia.
  Russian authorities in occupied Melitopol raided a Ukrainian 
evangelical pastor's home in August 2022 and accused the pastor of 
being associated with the same undesirable organizations that Russian 
authorities banned in Russia in 2021.
  The former head of Russian-occupied Donetsk declared in May of 2015 
that Ukrainian Orthodox Church members, Greek Catholics, and 
evangelical Christians were ``sectarians'' and that occupation 
authorities would only recognize the Russian Orthodox Church, 
Catholicism, Islam, and Judaism.
  The Russian Orthodox Church plays a role in the Russian state that is 
hard for Americans to understand. Most importantly, with all the 
killing going on in Ukraine, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church 
has blessed that war by particularly saying Putin is doing the right 
thing.
  In our country, we know, under our Constitution, the Founding Fathers 
prohibited the establishment of a state church and enshrined a right to 
the free exercise of religion in the First Amendment. This was done to 
allow religion to flourish independent of our government.
  Now, by contrast and great contrast, the Russian Orthodox Church has 
always been not just a state church but an instrument going back as far 
as the tsars of Russia. Under the Soviet Union, it became an instrument 
of the KGB, the Russian secret police.
  In fact, the current patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church was a 
KGB agent. As I have indicated already in these remarks, that 
individual has blessed this war, and with his being a KGB agent, it is 
no wonder he is so close to Putin, who also worked for the KGB. That 
same Russian patriarch has vocally, as I am saying again, supported the 
brutal invasion and has told Russian soldiers they will be absolved of 
all sins should they die in the Ukraine military operation.

  Because the Russian Orthodox Church acts as a tool of the Russian 
state, many Orthodox churches in Ukraine have joined the restored 
Independent Orthodox Church of Ukraine. Some church officials in 
Ukraine who remained loyal to Moscow have been documented to act as 
agents of influence and espionage on behalf of the Putin regime, so 
naturally some have been arrested by Ukrainian authorities.
  One Ukrainian Orthodox priest who was captured by the Russian 
military shortly after the full-scale invasion back in February 2022 
tells how his captors tortured and interrogated him, demanding to know 
what part of the Ukrainian secret service he worked for--you know, 
assuming that they do in Ukraine like they do in Russia: that the 
church might be part of some government scheme to narrow freedoms or 
whatever, for that matter. These Russians assumed that because their 
priests are tied to a successor to the KGB, Ukrainian priests, then, 
must be agents of the Ukrainian state, which is not the case.
  The Ukrainian Government also canceled a lease with the Russian-
affiliated Orthodox Church at the Kyiv Lavra Monastery--a national 
historic landmark owned by the Ukrainian state right there in the 
center of the capital of Ukraine, Kyiv. The lease cancelation led to 
false reports of the Ukrainian Government's persecuting Christians. 
However, 2 weeks after the Russian-aligned church officials left, a 
member of my staff visited this same monastery and received a blessing 
from a Ukrainian Orthodox priest. So I can confirm that Christian 
services are still performed there; only now it is in the Ukrainian 
language.
  Incidentally, the former Russian Orthodox head priest at the 
monastery

[[Page S5445]]

was apparently nicknamed ``Mercedes'' because he collected Mercedes 
cars. That is not the hobby you would expect of a lot of spiritual 
leaders.
  Putin likes to pretend that Russia is some kind of defender of the 
Christian faith, but in reality, Russia is one of the most secular 
countries in the world.
  The Soviet Union, as we know, was an atheist state, so most countries 
that share a Soviet past have lost much of their religious life. That 
is doubly true in Russia, where, according to a 2018 Pew Research poll, 
only 7 percent of the people attend weekly church services, only 18 
percent of Russians pray daily, and only 16 percent feel that religion 
is very important in their lives.
  By comparison, in Ukraine, these people are significantly more 
religious than Russians, with well over twice as many people attending 
weekly services at 17 percent, with 30 percent of the Ukrainians 
reportedly praying daily, and with 23 percent saying that religion is a 
very important part of their lives.
  Russia has been designated by our own State Department as a ``country 
of particular concern'' and, according to that designation, is 
``engaging in and tolerating systematic, ongoing, and egregious 
violations of religious freedom.''
  By contrast, Ukraine has religious freedom, and there is no state 
church, so it is no wonder that Ukrainians are more active in their 
faith.
  I was encouraged by Dr. Rusyn's account of his own growing ministry. 
He also said he has contributed chaplains from his seminary to the 
military since the full-scale invasion--something that was not 
previously a tradition of Orthodox countries. As a result, evangelicals 
are particularly well represented as military chaplains. Now, I am sad 
to say, one of his students has already been lost while serving as a 
chaplain at the frontlines.
  I am going to go back to this report by the Institute for the Study 
of War that I referenced earlier.

       [T]he most common victims of Russian religious persecution 
     after Ukrainian Orthodox are Protestants, particularly 
     evangelical Baptists. Protestants of all denominations were 
     the victims of 34 percent of the reported persecution events 
     that [the Institute on the Study of War] observed. Baptists 
     made up 13 percent of victims--the largest single group after 
     Ukrainian Orthodox. . . . Russian forces' persecution of 
     Protestants is most intense in southern Ukraine. Protestants 
     were the victims of 35 percent and 48 percent of the reported 
     persecution events in occupied Kherson and Zaporizhia oblasts 
     respectively. Protestants suffered two-thirds of the reported 
     repression events in occupied Mariupol City.

  The Institute for the Study of War report also cited an incident 
where Russian troops ``commandeered a Kherson-based Ukrainian 
evangelical Baptist educational institute from March-November of 2022 
and established a garrison and crematorium there to cremate killed 
Russian soldiers. The institute's rector stated that Russian soldiers 
repeatedly harassed the Baptists, calling them `American spies,' 
calling them `sectarians,' and [calling them] `enemies of the Russian 
Orthodox people.' One Russian officer reportedly told workers at the 
institute, `Evangelical believers like you should be completely 
destroyed . . . a simple shooting would be too easy for you. You need 
to be buried alive,' and another Russian soldier reportedly said, `We 
will bury [Baptist] sectarians like you.' Russian soldiers raided and 
closed another Baptist Church . . . in September 2022. Congregants 
reported that armed Russian soldiers interrupted their worship service 
and stated, `Your feet will not be here after referendum. We have only 
one faith, Orthodoxy.' ''
  Nearly 500 religious sites and spaces were damaged, destroyed, or 
looted during the first year of the Russian invasion. People of faith 
in Ukraine are suffering. Dr. Rusyn's ask of Americans is a simple 
thing: ``Please hear our cry.''
  Toward the end of my meeting with the Russian faith leaders, the 
rabbi in the group made another ask of me. He said the Ukrainians need 
our prayers. This was echoed by other Ukrainian faith leaders in my 
office.
  I agreed to keep the Ukrainian people in my prayers. I ask that my 
fellow Americans of faith also surround the Ukrainian people in prayer 
at this very difficult time. And I pray that they feel the very real 
presence of God amidst their suffering.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alaska.