On Wednesday, Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) chaired the U.S. Congressional Helsinki Commission hearing on Russia's persecution of Ukrainian Christians.
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00:00:00and friends of Ukraine, and friends of Christians in Ukraine. The commission will come to order.
00:00:05Good morning to all of you who've joined us today. Before we begin, I'd like to acknowledge
00:00:10our members. Congressman Mark Veasey of Texas is here, and we also have an honorary member of
00:00:16Congress, and that is Chaplain Margaret Kibben. She is here, the chaplain of the House. And so,
00:00:23chaplain, thank you. Hey, please come up front, mademoiselle.
00:00:25And so, we're so fortunate to have Chaplain Kibben to be here. The House Seeking Commission
00:00:33has long seen freedom of religion or belief as a priority. Ukraine is a living example.
00:00:38Ukrainians of all backgrounds and creeds are bravely working together for the existence
00:00:46of their country in defense of their homeland, and ultimately in defense of freedom and democracy
00:00:51worldwide. And what we sadly can see, World Colonel Putin is murderously attempting to
00:00:58recreate the failed Soviet empire to benefit the oligarchs, oppressing the Russians first,
00:01:05and then invading liberated republics. And I just left a breakfast for the Central Asian Republics
00:01:13with Ambassador from Kazakhstan, and it can be identified that if he's going to recreate the
00:01:21Soviet Union, that includes the Central Asian Republics, too. It doesn't stop at Ukraine. It
00:01:27doesn't stop at Georgia. It doesn't stop at Moldova. We know that it continues. So, all of us
00:01:33need to be working together for peace and stability and peace through strength.
00:01:38Religious freedom is respected and protected. It's one of the core values Ukraine fights for.
00:01:43Meanwhile, it is illegal in Russia to evangelize, as expressing religion that is not connected to
00:01:50the state is a threat to the facade that World Colonel Putin depends on to stay in power.
00:01:57Christians in Ukraine, particularly evangelical Christians, as we will learn more about today,
00:02:04have been the target of horrific torture and abuse by the Putin forces. Evangelicals are seen
00:02:10by the Kremlin as being pro-American and are specifically sought out for kidnapping and
00:02:16torture. Ukraine, some of which has been occupied for decades and has since the 2014 invasion,
00:02:25which should not be forgotten, 10,000 or more Ukrainians were killed in 2014. And sadly,
00:02:33the world thought this would pass. No, it does not. It continues. It's not safe for Christians.
00:02:38We will learn today, because of World Colonel Putin and his murderers and rapists, that things
00:02:45are not safe. It's not safe for anyone who refuses to submit to the demands of the occupiers. Those
00:02:52who serve a higher power present a real challenge for the war criminal Putin, both in Russia and in
00:02:58occupied Ukraine, as he and the delusional enablers worship the failed Soviet empire.
00:03:05I look forward to hearing about this from our witnesses. In addition, more about Ukrainian
00:03:10religious landscape and how the United States can support our Ukrainian friends living under
00:03:16Putin occupation. Their words will speak for themselves. The testimonies are graphic and
00:03:22incredibly disturbing. And we're very grateful we've been joined by Dr. Andy Harris from Maryland.
00:03:28We appreciate his service. We have first Dr. Catherine Wanner, who is a professor of history,
00:03:37anthropology, and religious studies at Penn State. Additionally, we have, speaking of his
00:03:43experiences in church leadership in occupied Ukraine, is Mark Sergeyev. And I should know,
00:03:54because I'm really grateful that the church I go to, First Presbyterian Church, has been
00:04:01associated with the pastor's church and with Micah Ray in particular. And we appreciate that the
00:04:07pastor's actually visited South Carolina. And we always welcome, as Chaplain Kibben know, we
00:04:15welcome chaplains to South Carolina. Finally, we have former congressional chief of staff of Peter
00:04:22Roskam. Peter is a superhero, of all things, from Illinois, and is now the founder of the Ukraine
00:04:29Freedom Project, Stephen E. Moore. With this, I will turn to any of the commissioners, particularly
00:04:35Mark Vesey, for any opening remarks. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much. And great to be here today.
00:04:47And I want to give my appreciation to the panelists, or our guests, for being here today
00:04:54to come and answer some questions and talk with us about the issues around religion that is
00:05:01happening right now in Ukraine. I think particularly having this discussion that we're doing today
00:05:09with the visit that we're having from Prime Minister Netanyahu, so much of the conflict
00:05:15in that region goes back to the 19th century, much of it based on religion and lots of other
00:05:25sort of, you know, myths and stereotypes and tropes that people have of one another,
00:05:31and trying to figure out how you can live peacefully and at the same time deal with
00:05:38all of these issues, I think it's very timely that we're having it today. And so I want to
00:05:43thank each and every one of you for being here, and I want to thank the chairman for
00:05:46putting this together. I think this is going to be an interesting discussion and a lot to learn,
00:05:50and hopefully we'll have more to share with the American public about what's happening
00:05:55in Ukraine around this topic of Ukrainian Christians as the day progresses. So I appreciate
00:06:02you. Mr. Chairman. Thank you very much, Congressman Vesey, and I really appreciate
00:06:10Congressman Vesey shows the bipartisanship of us working together. Additionally, we have
00:06:16Wiley Nichols, Congressman Nichols, with us today, and he dressed up in a khaki suit,
00:06:21so some people really make us look good. And we begin with Dr. Catherine Warner.
00:06:39...than there are in any country in Europe. They include Baptists, evangelical Christians,
00:06:46Pentecostals, as well as other Protestants. Many factors have contributed to this concentration
00:06:52of Protestant believers in Ukraine, but surely the emergence of tolerance, religious diversity,
00:06:58and religious pluralism as governing principles are key among them. This has created a vibrant
00:07:05religious marketplace in which a plethora of religious groups compete for members, and in
00:07:11which religious symbolism and practice are broadly accepted in public institutions and in public
00:07:17space. When Ukrainian territories fell under Russian occupation in 2014, the persecution
00:07:26of minority religious communities followed. Evangelicals were especially targeted,
00:07:32and I'll discuss why evangelicals incur the wrath of Russian ruling authorities, and specifically
00:07:38what the consequences have been. The repression of evangelicals in the occupied territories of
00:07:45Ukraine has been so fierce because the established religious pluralism that allowed Protestant
00:07:51communities to thrive in Ukraine clashes with the imposition of the Russian world ideology
00:07:58that comes with Russian rule. The Russian world posits that Eastern Slavs are part of a single
00:08:06spiritual and historical civilizational space that includes Russians, Ukrainians, Byelorussians,
00:08:13and sometimes even Moldova and Kazakhstan, and increasingly it really brings in anyone
00:08:19who recognizes the importance of traditional values in the Russian Orthodox Church as their
00:08:24protector. But the key point is that there is no place for Protestants in the Russian world.
00:08:32They are apostates to their faith and traitors to their nation precisely because they have
00:08:37abandoned orthodoxy. The Russian world ideology justifies the repression of religious minorities
00:08:44and privileges Russian orthodoxy as a state-protected guardian of these traditional values
00:08:50of public morality and social and political order. The second reason evangelicals have been
00:08:57targeted is that Baptists and evangelical Christians have long been demonized because
00:09:03of their negative association because of the negative associations that Protestantism
00:09:09carries with the United States. Clergy and active believers are subject to charges of being
00:09:16foreign agents or American spies. The 2012 foreign agent law has been repeatedly used in Russia and
00:09:25now in the occupied territories to crack down on civil society organizations, to silence dissent,
00:09:33and jail even potential members of an opposition. This law is used to restrict religious freedom,
00:09:41freedom of speech, and freedom of assembly. It targets religious leaders, members of NGOs, human
00:09:49rights activists, and independent journalists, among others, by mandating complicated and often
00:09:55contradictory reporting and registration requirements. Non-compliance results in fines, jails,
00:10:03or closure of the organization. As a result, occupation by Russian forces slips easily and
00:10:12quickly into religious repression, especially of evangelicals, because the Russian state implements
00:10:18entirely different policies toward non-Russian orthodox church-affiliated religious communities
00:10:24than the Ukrainian state does. The repressive treatment evangelicals received in the USSR
00:10:31and to a degree continue to experience in Russia is even more brutal and violent in the Russian
00:10:38controlled occupied territories of Ukraine. So let's consider the consequences. Viewed as apostates
00:10:45to their native orthodox faith, traitors to their nation, and foreign agents who undermine anti-Western
00:10:52orthodox conservatism, evangelicals have been subject to searches, abductions, interrogations,
00:10:59unlawful detainment, and torture. They've had their property confiscated, their families threatened,
00:11:06and been subject to physical violence. Pastors are pressured to re-affiliate to religious
00:11:12organizations in Russia, and since 2022, over 40 clergy have faced reprisals and five have been
00:11:21killed. Residents of eight Ukrainian regions under occupation report religious persecution
00:11:28and other violations of religious freedom. In Zaporizhia, there are at least 47 cases, Kherson 20,
00:11:35Lugansk 13, Donetsk 11, and the list goes on. Russian federal law 114, also known as the Yarovaya
00:11:45law, passed in 2016, is so broad so as to leave evangelicals vulnerable to charges of extremism
00:11:54or illegal missionary activities. As a result, many evangelicals were forced to flee the occupied
00:12:02territories. By December 2023, not even two years into the war, over 630 churches and religious
00:12:11buildings had been destroyed or damaged. One third, or at least 206, were Protestants. In occupied Donetsk,
00:12:21there were at least 146 document cases of damaged or destroyed religious buildings,
00:12:27in Lugansk at least 83, Kherson 78, and in Zaporizhia at least 51. Other religious buildings were looted
00:12:36and converted to arsenals, police headquarters, and united Russia offices. Only a few Protestant
00:12:44churches are open in the occupied Donetsk region. There are parts of Lugansk and Zaporizhia regions
00:12:50where not a single Protestant church remains opened. And we'll hear more about Melitopol, a city in
00:12:57southern Ukraine, that at one point had more Protestant prayer houses than Orthodox churches
00:13:02prior to 2022, and today not a single Protestant church remains. There's little to suggest that
00:13:10such repressive measures against evangelicals will cease. In fact, the reverse is likely.
00:13:17As harsh as restrictions are on evangelical communities in Russia proper, they are far worse
00:13:24in occupied Ukraine. Whereas previously most evangelicals espoused an anabaptist pacifism
00:13:31and performed alternative military service, now having declared this a just war,
00:13:39many evangelicals serve in the Ukrainian armed forces. Previous networks of cooperation and
00:13:44association of all kinds, missionary, humanitarian, and educational, that united Russian and Ukrainian
00:13:52evangelicals in common endeavor have been shattered as a result of this war. And this is true for
00:13:57nearly all religious associations and networks, regardless of confession, that linked Russian and
00:14:04Ukrainian co-believers. In sum, the occupation of Ukrainian territories has ushered in religious
00:14:13repression of evangelicals because the Russian state has distinct policies for non-Russian
00:14:19Orthodox church religious communities. This is a long-standing practice and is unlikely to change
00:14:26under the current Russian leadership, and the goal for a democratizing Ukraine and for its allies
00:14:34is to ensure that religious freedom, tolerance, and pluralism are not additional casualties of this war.
00:14:43Russia and its president, Vladimir Putin, must be held accountable for their numerous war crimes
00:14:50in Ukraine so that they will be deterred from further attempts to use religion to inspire
00:14:56violence and to justify repression of religious minorities as they are doing in the occupied
00:15:04territories of Ukraine. Thank you. Thank you very much, Dr. Wanner, and both Congressman Beasley and I
00:15:12were so impressed to find out the level of the number of evangelical churches in Ukraine. That's
00:15:18not widely known, and so the American people need to know this. With that in mind,
00:15:24this hearing is so important. We've been joined by Marionette Miller-Meeks, a congresswoman from
00:15:30Iowa, and then I'm very grateful to Congressman Jim Costa, again bipartisan, from California,
00:15:36and Congressman Robert Aderholt from Alabama. And so, again, it's bipartisan love and appreciation
00:15:43of the people of Ukraine. With that, we now proceed to Pastor Mark Sergeyev of the New
00:15:49Generation Church, which is associated with the Baptist Church. It's a great honor for me to speak
00:15:58on behalf of the commission. The work of the commission is well known in Ukraine, and I'm
00:16:04grateful for the work the commission does on the health of Ukraine, fighting for freedom.
00:16:09Last week, I was at the front line in Chasiv Yar. My role as a chaplain and army, I work for
00:16:17soldiers, and the battles are horrible. And the men and women fighting for Ukraine need spiritual
00:16:25guidance and emotional care, and I am proud to guide and help them and pray sometimes
00:16:34in difficult situations. Every Ukrainian soldier at the front is very thankful for American weapons.
00:16:42They fire javelins all day and fell asleep to the sound of high marks
00:16:49firing in Russian positions, and the soldiers sleep well.
00:16:53I want to say that the same Iran drones that attack Kyiv every night, they attack Israel
00:17:00the same. But American technologies keep us both safe. My journey from Ukraine front
00:17:10to speak today starts four generations ago. I'm a fifth generation of evangelical Christians.
00:17:17My grand-grandfather had been killed by Stalin because he was a Christian.
00:17:22My grandparents and my parents, they were always evangelical Christians, and they've been
00:17:29persecuted, and they were hiding their faith because they're afraid of their lives. I was
00:17:38born in Ukraine in Melitopol city. It's at the Azov Sea. We call it the gates to Crimea.
00:17:45I was born in a free country. My father was a senior pastor of one of Melitopol Christian Church.
00:17:53It was the largest church in that area, and some American visitors often compare us like
00:17:59Joel Osteen's Lakewood Church from Houston. We have a big stage, a big worship team, and
00:18:06we minister to 1,500 people every Sunday. We have 400 kids that attended to Sunday school.
00:18:15We were a spiritual home to the hundreds of Ukrainian families. Before war starts in Ukraine,
00:18:23we have this kind of dream. It's close to American dream to live great life, but
00:18:29Putin doesn't respond to a peaceful means. In February 2022, Russian tanks get inside of my
00:18:38city. They're rolling inside of the city, and I watched on this from the windows of my church.
00:18:45Two weeks later, somebody knocked on the door in my house, wake me up. That was soldiers of Russian
00:18:54Rosgvardiya. Maybe you heard about it somewhere in the news. They take me outside, put me on the
00:18:58ground. I was only in my underwear in that moment. They wake up my oldest son. He's nine years old
00:19:06at that moment in an AK-47 gun in the face. Russians are making a weapon of religion,
00:19:17and they are trying to make my father use the role as spiritual leader for a community to
00:19:24praise their invasions of our city. They told my father, you have 72 hours to record a video
00:19:32in the front of the church building that this is already Russian territory, and Putin is our
00:19:36president. Just relax and wait. Then they give a couple hours to give a list of every businessman
00:19:44who supports the evangelical churches. They love money and always do this. They told him that
00:19:51every day, if we will wait, we will just cut off the fingers on your hand. It's God's miracle that
00:20:02they did not come back with their knives, but they took the building. We have this big, long,
00:20:1140 feet long cross in the front of the building. They cut off this cross and put the Russian flag
00:20:18right now. So now this big auditorium that was used before to praise God and worship God,
00:20:28now they're using it like a concert hall for the Russian military concerts and celebrating Russian
00:20:34holidays. I'm lucky to escape and I'm here right now. It's the life miracle that I'm here alive
00:20:43because I've been in crazy moments. I saw so many civilians killing people, dead people.
00:20:52My kids, everything. If you ask me how it looked like, the picture kind of very old movie about
00:20:58Second World War, if I'm right, the picture looked like the same. Finally, we get out from it.
00:21:06It's a miracle. Before the war started in Melitopol, it's not a big city, but we have 40 evangelical
00:21:13churches in Melitopol. Today, there are not any kind of churches anymore. So the only church
00:21:22left are those who are loyal to Moscow and rather than God. My parents lived through Soviet Union
00:21:31and they say condition today in Russian-occupied Ukraine are worse of believers than they were in
00:21:38Soviet times. I encourage the commission to go to RussianTorturesChristian.org
00:21:45where you can see videos from my church, how they look like before war and security cameras,
00:21:52how Russian breaking into our churches in the dead of the night and Russian TV footage
00:21:57of Melitopol Christian Church being used for Russian Patriarch ceremonies.
00:22:05I will close the story of my friend Lena. She's a part of my church. She's a small group leader.
00:22:13Two months ago, Russian soldiers came in her house and take her because, you know, when they shut
00:22:22down every church in Melitopol, Christians go under the ground to worship God and they get
00:22:29it together in small groups. Now she's in prison in Donetsk because she's just a Christian leader
00:22:35because she just believe in God. Two months ago, yeah, they take her and now
00:22:43they give her seven years because she's a Christian and she's believing in God.
00:22:50Last night, I have fortunately to have a conversation with one American Christian
00:22:56leader and he told me that he's concerned about the Ukrainian government persecuting Christians.
00:23:02Fortunately, I was able to have him understand the truth that he was hearing Russian propaganda
00:23:08and the real truth is that Russian torturing, oppressing and sometimes murdering Ukrainian
00:23:14Christians in my city and across occupied Ukraine and simple for being a Christian.
00:23:21I'm only one voice and the voices against mine are powerful, but I'm grateful to Commission
00:23:29for giving me a voice, power and helping Americans and the whole world know the truth
00:23:38of Russian's horrible oppressions of Ukrainian believers. Thank you very much and
00:23:45may God bless you all, may God bless America. Thank you so much, Pastor Tseyev and we just
00:23:52appreciate again, we appreciate your visit to South Carolina and just indeed, Micah is such
00:23:58a champion for you and indeed, again, the significance of this hearing, I'm very grateful
00:24:04that we've been joined by Senator Roger Wicker of Mississippi and the good news is that as the
00:24:09House members run off to vote, we've got somebody who's very capable to keep the hearing going.
00:24:15And so with this, he's appreciated for so many different reasons, all right?
00:24:20So I want to now recognize Stephen Moore.
00:24:25Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for the honor of testifying before this commission today.
00:24:30As you so graciously mentioned, I was once a chief of staff to a member of leadership
00:24:34here in the House of Representatives. Hey, say it, Peter Roskam.
00:24:37Yeah, Peter Roskam. Hey, a dear friend.
00:24:39Anyone know Peter Roskam? Hey, a friend of Senator Wicker here.
00:24:44Yeah, and he still has a lot of friends here in the House of Representatives. I was honored to
00:24:50be his chief of staff for seven years. And so as much time as I've spent in Congress,
00:24:56this is my first time on this side of the dais in this position right here.
00:25:01So it's particularly an honor for me to do this. And as a former staffer, I want to complement
00:25:07the knowledge and the professionalism of the staff of the Helsinki Commission. The work of
00:25:12the Helsinki Commission is quite respected in Ukraine and it's largely because of the
00:25:17personal relationships the staff has developed with people over there.
00:25:21And so they've been great to work with. So five days after Russia's full-scale invasion,
00:25:27I went to Ukraine to try to help my Ukrainian friends get to safety
00:25:31and provide humanitarian goods. I created the Ukraine Freedom Project and used that
00:25:37as a vehicle to bring supplies to Kiev when that city was surrounded on three sides by Russians.
00:25:43We got food to Harkiv while it was under siege. And I was one of the first wave of people at
00:25:48Akhmadov Children's Hospital earlier this month when it was bombed. In my two and a half years
00:25:54living in Ukraine at war, I've seen and heard many things that nobody should. Even so, it's
00:26:00only a fraction of what the Ukrainians are going through. Some of the most horrific stories I've
00:26:05heard are from Ukrainian Christians who have been tortured by Russians. Russians occupying Ukrainian
00:26:12territory seek to systematically crush faith. Millions of Christians in occupied Ukraine are
00:26:20worshiping underground, as my colleague Mark Sergeyev said, in fear of torture in prison for
00:26:26their beliefs. Protestants make up less than four percent of Ukraine's population, but Protestants
00:26:32have borne the brunt of the Russian abuse. To fully understand why, I want to tell you about
00:26:39the role of the Russian Orthodox Church, which is not a church as we would think of one, but it's a
00:26:45working arm of the Kremlin. Patriarch Kirill, the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, recently
00:26:51declared a holy war on Ukraine and the West. He promised that Russians who die fighting in Ukraine
00:27:01will have all their sins washed away. He stopped short of offering 72 virgins, but the strategy of
00:27:07creating martyrs is much the same as ISIS. Russians see Protestants as believers in an American
00:27:14religion and think that they must be agents of America, like Russian Orthodox priests are agents
00:27:19of the Kremlin. I first became aware of Russia's torture of Christians in Ukraine in 2022,
00:27:26when Viktor Chernaevsky told me of his torture. Viktor was a pastor in Luhansk and had been
00:27:33evacuating people from occupied areas. One day, Viktor was leaving with a group of people that
00:27:39included a pregnant woman and a newborn infant, and the Russians pulled him over and took him to
00:27:46the basement. Now, going to the basement is a euphemism for torture, and they kept Viktor in
00:27:55the basement for 25 days, including one day when he was tortured with an electrical taser like you'd
00:28:02use it for self-defense, and a Russian Orthodox priest stood over him and tried to cast demons
00:28:09out of him for being an evangelical Christian. Viktor's story is far from unique. Only days
00:28:18into the occupation of his city, the Russian FSB came for Alexander Silvetnikov, pastor of the
00:28:25Light of the Gospel Baptist Church. The Russians beat him with rubber batons for three days, trying
00:28:31to make him confess to being an agent of the CIA. When they released him, he had to be wheeled out.
00:28:39His assistant pastor did not survive his torture. We've collected, as Mark had mentioned, we
00:28:46collected many similar testimonies on our website, RussiaTorturesChristians.org, but
00:28:51unfortunately, most Ukrainian Christians can't speak out. One Ukrainian believer who escaped to
00:28:57Poland told us that after he went public with his torture, a Russian FSB agent in the still-occupied
00:29:05hometown called him and told him what his teenage niece was wearing to school that day.
00:29:14This is the level of oppression. This is the level of detail the Russians go into to keep Christians
00:29:21oppressed in Ukraine. So, while Russians are trying to overtly destroy Christianity in Ukraine,
00:29:29in America, Russia's work to cover it up and spread false narratives to mislead Christians
00:29:35is active and ongoing. Right here on Capitol Hill, Russian money is behind the effort to persuade
00:29:43members of Congress that the Ukrainian government is persecuting Christians. The commission's
00:29:48excellent work on this subject in 2023 helped the world understand why this is Russian-inspired
00:29:55nonsense, but let me review. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church for decades, the branch of the
00:30:03Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine, is home to thousands of clergy who have spent their lives
00:30:08reporting to Patriarch Kirill in Moscow. About 100 of these clergy are either in prison or on trial
00:30:14for espionage-related offenses, but this is just scratching the surface. We polled Ukrainians and
00:30:24our polling shows that hundreds of thousands of people have left the Ukrainian Orthodox Church
00:30:31because they heard their local clergy say things against Ukraine or saw them do things to help the
00:30:37Russian war effort. So, this national security threat is widespread, yet a Russian-Ukrainian
00:30:45oligarch who is currently a deacon in the Russian Orthodox Church is paying a team of international
00:30:51lawyers and lobbyists, American lobbyists, hundreds of thousands of dollars to spread this false
00:30:56narrative inside Congress and cover up for Russian war crimes against Ukrainian Christians.
00:31:03Prominent members of the media and even some members of Congress continue to tell Americans
00:31:06that the Ukrainian government persecutes Christians. To understand the extent to which
00:31:11Russian propaganda has penetrated American media, the Ukraine Freedom Project polled Republican
00:31:16primary voters on their attitudes towards Russia. A quarter of Republican primary voters agreed with
00:31:22the statement, Russia is a country that promotes and encourages traditional family values. Now, this
00:31:27is Russia, the country that tortures Christians. Russia, the country that uses rape as a weapon of
00:31:33war. Again, this is Russia, the country that brags about kidnapping hundreds of thousands of
00:31:39Ukrainian Christians and they promote traditional family values. We pulled how, sure, 25 percent of
00:31:50Republican primary voters agree with the statement that Russia is a country that promotes and
00:31:55encourages traditional family values. So, and we asked how they got this information. Again, 25
00:32:01percent of all Republican voters believe this narrative. Among those who get their news from
00:32:06Tucker Carlson, it's 38 percent. Among those who get their news from Joe Rogan, it's 47 percent.
00:32:12Perhaps the most indicative to the degree to which our adversaries are collaborating
00:32:19is that people who get their news from TikTok believe it at the rate of 35 percent.
00:32:26So, I want to thank the commission for giving me today's opportunity to highlight the stories of
00:32:31so many brave Ukrainians, people I've gotten to know who have suffered for their faith and their
00:32:36country and to highlight the work of my organization to help Ukrainians and tell their stories of
00:32:41torture at the hands of Russians. Thank you very much, Stephen. And indeed, we're having votes now
00:32:50and so what we'll be doing, I'll do five minutes and Rachel Bellman in our office is really a
00:32:56taskmaster. She's going to watch the five minutes. I can't go beyond five minutes, Rachel. So, and
00:33:02then the House members will depart, vote, come back. In the meantime, everybody will be the
00:33:09beneficiary because Senator Roger Wicker will be in charge. And with that, it's a good one. Hey,
00:33:17but please, five minutes go. Indeed, I want to thank each of you and sadly, actually, Stephen,
00:33:25when you say TikTok, this is confirmation that there's an axis of evil. Okay, the axis of evil
00:33:31is the Chinese Communist Party, war criminal Putin and the regime in Tehran. And all Americans
00:33:37need to recognize and we're in a war and conflict we didn't start or want. And that is, it began
00:33:45February 24 in 2022 with the invasion by war criminal Putin into Ukraine. It continued with
00:33:54the invasion by the puppets of Tehran on October 7 into Israel. And sadly, it challenges, of course,
00:34:03the people, the Chinese Communist Party, Taiwan. And so we need to recognize that. And then I
00:34:10personally want to point out that indeed, Pastor, your bravery and the church that I go to,
00:34:17First Presbyterian Church in Columbia, South Carolina, is a sponsor of Russian Language
00:34:22Ministries. And it's Alex and Irina Ponaroff, who have worked throughout the Slavic world
00:34:30to promote love of Jesus, not politics. And indeed, our church sponsors programs for
00:34:42missions in Haiti, in Guatemala, in Wales, and Ukraine. And we've worked closely
00:34:54with Russian Americans coming to our church and love and affection that we have
00:34:58for the people of Russia. And so it's not political. And so it's just so insulting
00:35:03to think that American missionaries are political. It's not. It's at a love of Jesus.
00:35:11That's what it is. And with that in mind, and indeed, Stephen, you've brought it up, and that is
00:35:19the Russian narrative, which is a nice term for propaganda. How can we counteract that? And
00:35:27what messages can we have? Well, so we actually did, we've done extensive polling on this. And
00:35:35so we took a poll in the immediate aftermath of the vote on April 20. And what we found was that
00:35:4422% of Republican primary voters had heard something about the Tucker Carlson
00:35:52narrative that Ukraine is persecuting Christians. But the good news is that my organization,
00:35:57the Ukraine Freedom Project, and many of our allies, we had a lot of allies doing this,
00:36:02we ran a campaign for most of the last year leading up to the vote, telling Americans,
00:36:08particularly Republicans, particularly Republican evangelicals, that Russia is torturing and
00:36:12murdering Ukrainian Christians for their faith. And so while 22% heard the Russian narrative,
00:36:1934% had heard our narrative. So it's a matter of getting good information to people about what is
00:36:26actually happening in Ukraine. And, you know, in the crazy times that we live, we are fortunate
00:36:33to find out that the truth still works. Hey, the truth shall set you free. And Pastor Sergeyev,
00:36:41indeed, I was recently in Armenia, where it became so clear that war criminal Putin is
00:36:46trying to recreate the evil, failed Soviet Union. And so that means every former Soviet
00:36:52republic is at risk, whether it be Armenia, or we see immediately in Ukraine, we've already seen in
00:36:58Georgia, we see in Moldova, we've seen threats to Estonia, over and over again. And so with the
00:37:04persecution of Christians today, in the occupied areas, how does that relate to the Soviet
00:37:11persecution? Well, sir, I wanted to say one thing. Like I always I've been months ago in the US and
00:37:20sharing the stories, we have to understand that this war is not about territories. Because Russia
00:37:26has the biggest territory. Some people I met Americans, they say this is a fight for resources.
00:37:33And I'm smiling because it's crazy. They have so many resources. I mean, this is war is about it's
00:37:39a spiritual war, they're trying to rebuild an empire. And like Ronald Reagan said that, that
00:37:46was an empire of evil. And this is true. And I see this in my, my, my parents generations, I see
00:37:54they're afraid because they, they know this. And like I said before, I have this, the whole
00:37:59generation generation who fight for freedom just to to be a Christian. And we see this they trying
00:38:06to do and how I see right now, it's, they start to close in the churches. Now they're going deeply
00:38:12because they take the buildings, they're going and clean up the small groups. And Patriarch Kirill
00:38:18has a big conversation with one mayor from the city, Koloboron, we call it in Ukraine. And he
00:38:25said, if you will not kill them, all Protestant people, you will not win in Zaporizhia area. And
00:38:33they make it publicly. So they're making kind of Christian jihad. And this is the problem.
00:38:38Again, thank you for each of you for your courage. And now I,
00:38:42I'm very happy to turn it over to Senator Roger Wicker from this great state of Mississippi.
00:38:48Well, thank you. Thank you. And do do hurry back.
00:38:56Mr. Veazey, do you have time to, we have time for you to ask your questions. If you
00:39:02I'll go ahead and recognize you. Oh, thank you very much. Dr. Warner, I wanted to ask you about
00:39:08the persecution of Protestant Christians and occupied Ukraine. And can you compare that to
00:39:16how other religions may be treated there? I know that there are Mormons there, that they're
00:39:21Jehovah's Witnesses, that there are other religions out there. How are those other religions being
00:39:26retreated? How are they being treated in comparison? I think there's religious repression.
00:39:35There's religious repression of all non-Orthodox, Russian Orthodox Church-affiliated religious
00:39:40communities. For example, in Ukraine, the second biggest faith group is the Catholic Church,
00:39:48the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. And they also are targeted for repression of their clergy and
00:39:55believers and the like. The problem is, though, in the occupied territories, there are very,
00:40:01very significant numbers of specifically Baptist and Pentecostal communities. And those faith
00:40:08groups have been especially targeted. They are targeted in Russia. They were targeted in the USSR.
00:40:18But those Baptist and evangelical Christian communities predominate in Ukraine during the
00:40:25Soviet period, even. And certainly in the post-Soviet period, those evangelical communities
00:40:30have continued to grow. They are what's more extremely active in the society, both politically
00:40:38in terms of social service provision and social policy formation and the like. And so it's
00:40:47specifically for a multitude of reasons that evangelicals, Baptist, evangelical Christians,
00:40:55and Pentecostals, those religious communities and those religious leaders have been especially
00:41:02targeted. They are seen as a threat to orthodoxy. They are quite visible. They are quite effective.
00:41:10And I would think that since the outbreak of the full-scale invasion that these Protestant
00:41:19communities have been even more active in terms of providing humanitarian aid and serving not
00:41:27just their own communities, but serving the nation more broadly. And for these and many
00:41:32other reasons, the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine feels particularly threatened.
00:41:41They have historically, because of the American connection with Protestants, with Protestant
00:41:46faith groups, but even more acutely today. Yeah. Oh, wow. Mr. Sergeyev, I wanted to ask you.
00:41:54Mr. Sergeyev? I wanted to ask you about the young people in Ukraine. I think that one of the missions
00:42:07that we went on in Birmingham, England a couple of years ago, we stayed right across the street
00:42:12from a church there. And I went and talked to the pastor and he was telling me how church membership
00:42:17in England had been just dwindling everywhere, really. And of course, in order for churches
00:42:24to continue to grow and prosper, you have to have young people there that participate and feel
00:42:30comfortable and safe being in churches. And I wanted to ask you, what impact has this had on
00:42:35young people in Ukraine? And how do you think that they will view church and church attendance
00:42:42and being affiliated with churches in the future, should these persecutions continue to happen?
00:42:49Sir, I want to say one sure thing. In the last two years, as I said before, I'm not only the
00:42:58youth pastor, I was a worship leader. We have a big YouTube channel of worship songs. So America
00:43:04was a big example for us for a long time. I mean, we sing the same songs, we translate them on
00:43:08Ukrainian language, and even the Russian language. So in the last two years, me and my brother, we
00:43:15made 12 times a big worship school. And through this worship school, the young generation came
00:43:22more than four and a half thousand people, musicians, they're still in Ukraine, still believing.
00:43:28And we kind of, from one place, we have, yeah, we're still fighting, we have a war. Every night,
00:43:35they're shooting the missiles, putting the drones. But in that same moment, I see how many young
00:43:42generation, they're still believing and coming. And we have so many open new churches right now,
00:43:48even in Ukraine, in the midst of the whole chaos, the young generation still believing. And I told
00:43:54today before to Dr. that, just last year, I just posted one story on my Instagram, 15 seconds,
00:44:03come together, and just let get together on Maidan Square in the center of Kyiv and pray about our
00:44:10soldiers. 500 young adults came from one story. And we just get together, we've been there two hours
00:44:16and any kind of officer, police officer came and said, hey, go home. I mean, we have this big freedom
00:44:23in the midst of the war. And we just get it together and pray. And it's not a problem for me
00:44:28to make any kind of evangelical movement and put the stage in front of somewhere square and just
00:44:35worship God. So I see a future, you know, and I'm still believing that God has a calling for this
00:44:41nation. That's where we're still fighting. Thank you, sir. Well, thank you very much,
00:44:51Representative Veazey. And perhaps members of the House will be able to return.
00:45:02I can say that there are a number of senators who feel very strongly about this issue.
00:45:08We're getting ready for hearings, getting ready for markups, and there's an important joint
00:45:14meeting of the Congress today. So people will be coming in and out. I think at this point,
00:45:23I'll take the liberty of making my opening statement. It may be then that members of
00:45:33the panel would like to respond to anything I might say. But I do want to thank my colleagues
00:45:42in the House and our great staff on the Helsinki Commission for putting this together. And I
00:45:51certainly appreciate the attendance today. This is a very large crowd, and I see people identified
00:45:58as clergymen, and certainly I am sure there are members of a variety of religious faiths.
00:46:10It's interesting that today a number of us in the House and Senate will stand
00:46:18honoring the right of people of the Jewish faith to live and to have a homeland where for once in
00:46:27the history of several millennia, they'll be able to be safe. And so I think the Helsinki
00:46:38Commission and this hearing stands for a larger principle, and that's our First Amendment right
00:46:44to freedom of religion as part of freedom of expression. Our witnesses today remind us of a
00:46:51tragically overlooked victim of the dictator Vladimir Putin's war on Ukraine, and that's the
00:46:58Ukrainian evangelical community. Former U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious
00:47:04Freedom Sam Brownback has been a leading advocate on this issue. And at this point, I would
00:47:12enter for the record a piece he wrote highlighting the mistreatment of those Christians. It's
00:47:20dated Friday, April 19, 2024, and I hear no objection. So without objection, it will be
00:47:28admitted. Under Russia's thumb, evangelical leaders have been systematically persecuted
00:47:34for their faith. Some have been tortured or sent away. Some have been killed. Groups of
00:47:39evangelical faithful have been forced to assemble in secret. They know their gatherings could be
00:47:45violently disrupted at any time and that they could suffer physical harm without a moment's
00:47:51notice. In at least one instance, Russian soldiers swarmed a church as congregants were
00:47:57singing songs of worship. And I do appreciate, Mr. Sergeyev, the fact that you like to sing
00:48:04the same hymns as we do. I'm old-fashioned myself and like the traditional hymns.
00:48:11There's a bit of debate in my denomination about that. But Russian soldiers have evicted members
00:48:19and turned Ukrainian churches into propaganda offices. In Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine,
00:48:27there's no accountability for these crimes. Vladimir Putin plays by his own rules. Inside
00:48:32Russia, he broadcasts the lie that evangelicals are political tools of the United States.
00:48:39To the rest of the world, he falsely claims that Ukraine is actually the one persecuting
00:48:44believers. And as witnesses have said just today, he's persuaded some
00:48:55vocal, visible voices in the United States, unbelievably, to make that assertion.
00:49:04It's almost inconceivable that that could be taking place. Vladimir Putin lies because there's
00:49:11no honest reason for his assault on Ukraine. Only a cloud of falsehoods can obscure his crime and
00:49:18create the illusion that he's doing God's work. It reminds me of what we used to call during the
00:49:26Soviet era, the big lie. Leaders tell a lie so fantastic and so vast that some people,
00:49:42gullible people, hearing that can't imagine that anyone would tell such a tale if it weren't the
00:49:49truth. That's the big lie. And Mr. Putin has learned from some of the masters of the big lie
00:49:58that dominated the USSR during time. Erasing evangelical churches is part of Mr. Putin's
00:50:07goal to erase Ukraine as a nation. Evangelical churches reflect the tradition of religious
00:50:14freedom in Ukraine. That spiritual legacy has flourished in the country since the fall of the
00:50:19Soviet Union, the kind of regime Russia hopes to reassert. That's what they're up to. It's Ukraine
00:50:27today. It's a couple of provinces in Georgia. It's attacking at the border of Armenia. There are too
00:50:38many places where Mr. Putin's Russia is involved to think that he's doing anything else. The kind
00:50:49of regime cannot allow religious freedom because free thinking presents a threat to a tyrant like
00:50:55Vladimir Putin. It exposes his lies to the detoxifying effects of the open air. The United
00:51:02States and Ukraine prioritize freedom of religion. In Russia, Putin permits the practice of organized
00:51:09religion only if he deems it sufficiently loyal to his regime. Russian invaders will require that
00:51:16Ukrainian evangelicals swear loyalty to Putin before allowing them to practice their faith.
00:51:23This vile threat asks simply that Ukrainian evangelicals violate their faith by placing a man
00:51:31above God. Vladimir Putin demands that believers forswear their allegiance to Christ and place it
00:51:38in the hands of a murderous, godless tyrant. So I urge us all to be skeptical when we hear malicious
00:51:45lies that Russia is a haven for Christian civilization and traditional values. What a
00:51:53fantastic lie. In Russia and Russian-occupied Ukraine, there's no respect for the primacy of
00:51:59conscience, the freedom of the individual, and the dignity of human life. The occupiers defile
00:52:05churches, abduct and torture pastors, as we've heard today in testimony, and erase whole
00:52:11congregations. Russia has forced the once vibrant Ukrainian evangelical community underground. To
00:52:18the Ukrainian evangelicals risking their lives every day by expressing their beliefs, I have to
00:52:25say this. Keep the faith. Justice will come for the Russian aggressor. And I say that to members
00:52:34of all faiths, all religions, of whatever stripe. In Ukraine, you have a right,
00:52:48no matter what your beliefs are, to express your faith. And it is my fervent hope that the
00:52:54United States and other members of the OSCE will stand for justice for the Russian aggressor.
00:53:03Now at this point, that concludes my formal statement. And we've already entered into the
00:53:11record the article from April written by my former colleague, former Representative and
00:53:20former Governor Brownback. Let me ask you, and I'll start with Mr. Moore,
00:53:28in about the third or fourth paragraph of Ambassador Brownback's article,
00:53:37he mentions the Russian Orthodox Church as you described it, Mr. Moore. But
00:53:47I hope you'll help us clear up
00:53:52a statement that I've heard you make that seems to contradict what I understand
00:54:01Ambassador Brownback is saying. He says there is a now independent Orthodox Church of Ukraine,
00:54:08which is fully in support of freedom of religion and does not answer to Russia. So if you would
00:54:15discuss that and tell us your understanding of the Russian Orthodox Church from Moscow,
00:54:22which is still present in parts of Ukraine, as opposed and compared to the now independent
00:54:29Orthodox Church of Ukraine. Yeah, happy to help out on that. So in 2019, the Ukrainian Orthodox
00:54:38Church, not to be confused with the Orthodoxy, which I did confuse, but the Orthodox Church of
00:54:47Ukraine is the homegrown Ukrainian branch of Orthodoxy that reports to the Patriarch in Kyiv,
00:54:59where the Ukrainian Orthodox Church is the branch that reports to Moscow. And if you
00:55:10look at this over time, at the beginning of independent Ukraine, the Ukrainian Orthodox
00:55:20Church was attended by probably 70 percent of Ukrainians. And so this is the one that reports
00:55:25to Moscow. And as that church became increasingly more pro-Russian, then more and more Ukrainians
00:55:34left it. And, you know, we have polling that details this and shows we asked people, you know,
00:55:41we did basically a customer service poll of former members of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church,
00:55:48and we found out why they left. You know, a majority of them left simply because they felt
00:55:55that the church was too pro-Russian. And as I mentioned in my testimony, about 8 percent left
00:56:03because they had seen the clergy do something to aid the Russian war effort or to say something
00:56:12against Ukraine. So, you know, the majority of Ukrainians are voting with their feet, so to speak.
00:56:20They're leaving the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which is loyal to Moscow, and they're joining
00:56:26the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, which is the one that has a patriarch in Kiev.
00:56:32So does that help with your question?
00:56:39Well, let me see if I can rephrase this.
00:56:44Sure.
00:56:46There is the Orthodox Church of Russia with a patriarch in Moscow.
00:56:54There was a Ukrainian Orthodox Church with a patriarch in Kiev who answered to the patriarch in Moscow.
00:57:04There was. Now, Dr. Wenner, would you like to take issue with that?
00:57:13It's a complicated situation.
00:57:14Well, it surely is.
00:57:16I'll try to...
00:57:17That's why it's taking me some time.
00:57:19I'll try to be... There's the Russian Orthodox Church that has a patriarch in Moscow.
00:57:23And for over 300 years, Ukrainian religious life was under that...
00:57:31Such as it could be under the USSR.
00:57:33Correct. Such as it could be.
00:57:35But the Russian Orthodox Church was the one church that was allowed to function
00:57:40in a somewhat unencumbered way, unlike, for example,
00:57:44evangelicals that were heavily, heavily monitored and repressed in the Soviet Union.
00:57:49Having said that, the Russian Orthodox Church did exist throughout the Soviet period and continues to exist.
00:57:56So the churches after Ukrainian independence, those Orthodox churches in Ukraine
00:58:02became known as the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate
00:58:05because they are institutional connections that bring them...
00:58:10They're under the patriarch in Moscow.
00:58:13This became, after almost three decades of an independent Ukrainian state,
00:58:19this became increasingly unacceptable in Ukraine
00:58:22that they did not have their own Orthodox Church with their own patriarch.
00:58:28And of course, especially after 2014, when the war broke out,
00:58:33momentum for severing ties with Moscow mounted.
00:58:38And it was at this period, Stephen's correct, in 2019,
00:58:42a separate Orthodox Church was formed.
00:58:45But that means in Ukraine, there are two Orthodox churches,
00:58:50which is a highly unusual situation.
00:58:53One Orthodox Church has a patriarch or a leader in Kiev.
00:58:58The other Orthodox Church is not entirely independent.
00:59:04It's not entirely autonomous.
00:59:06It has a very amorphous and evolving relationship,
00:59:11but it still is formally connected with the Moscow Patriarchate.
00:59:15But can we both agree, can Mr. Moore and Dr. Wenner both agree
00:59:22that there is a now independent Orthodox Church of Ukraine
00:59:27that does not answer to anyone in Moscow?
00:59:29Correct. That's correct.
00:59:32Mr. Sergeyev, would you like to comment on this before I move on to another topic?
00:59:38I'm sure you can't imagine why anyone would stay in the Orthodox Church and not join yours,
00:59:47but that's their right, isn't it?
00:59:49We have, before the war started in Minotopol, we have a big community of pastors
00:59:54and we have great relationship with, and even Moscow Orthodox Church.
00:59:58But as a chaplain, I can say a couple of weeks ago,
01:00:02when I come back from the front line, I've been in one area, one city,
01:00:06where was one Orthodox, Moscow Orthodox Temple,
01:00:10and it's right now completely destroyed by Russians.
01:00:13But our soldiers, Ukrainian soldiers, take one priest pop from this
01:00:21and Russia change this priest on 90 Ukrainian soldiers.
01:00:28Russia give for one Orthodox priest 90 Ukrainian soldiers
01:00:35who've been in prison.
01:00:37It tells us a story that how many...
01:00:40In a prisoner exchange?
01:00:42Yeah, they change one on 90.
01:00:45So, so many agents of Russia work inside of Ukraine
01:00:51and they look like Christians.
01:00:54They making services and kind of worshiping God,
01:00:58but they are just working for a pudding.
01:01:02And this is a fact.
01:01:06I'm like a military chaplain and I know these stories how they look like.
01:01:10So, this church for Ukraine, it's very dangerous, really, for our nation.
01:01:17I understand from one side, we are living in democracy country
01:01:23and we are believing that everything is okay.
01:01:26Yeah, we have to build our church and be free in our religious faith.
01:01:30But as I see, every church, every pastor
01:01:35who run away from occupation in Melitopol,
01:01:38they support Ukraine, Greek Catholics, Roman Catholics,
01:01:43Kiev Orthodox Church,
01:01:45but only one priest who still there in occupation and work with Russia
01:01:49is from the Moscow Orthodox Church.
01:01:52So, it's the facts that I just give you and we're praying,
01:01:57but yeah.
01:02:02Okay, well, in the occupied territory,
01:02:12are the churches that do not answer to Moscow,
01:02:19are they all underground or are some of them still able to operate in the open?
01:02:25And how do underground churches meet and work?
01:02:30They have to move from place to place.
01:02:31Just describe that.
01:02:33There is not anymore any kind of evangelical churches in occupied territories.
01:02:38Oh, really? Okay.
01:02:39Yes.
01:02:39Not even underground?
01:02:42Like I said before, a couple of small groups
01:02:45and even they come in sometimes in the houses and take them in prison.
01:02:50Small prayer groups, things like that.
01:02:52Five, three people.
01:02:53Right.
01:02:54I cannot say here publicly because so many people,
01:02:57it's dangerous for them, but I'm still in contact with these people, with the leaders.
01:03:02And sometimes they're not even, we just change the numbers.
01:03:07We speak secretly because it's dangerous for their life,
01:03:12but we understand how many, I know how many people still,
01:03:16members from my church still there in occupied territories
01:03:18and still getting together to pray, but it's dangerous for their life, really.
01:03:24Well, okay.
01:03:24Now, I assume in the areas of Ukraine that are not occupied by Russia,
01:03:33is there total religious freedom?
01:03:37A hundred percent.
01:03:38Okay.
01:03:39And I believe it's true that by some 70 plus percent in the last presidential election,
01:03:48the voters in Ukraine elected a Jew as their president.
01:03:52Is that correct?
01:03:54He's not active Jew.
01:03:58Well, he says he is.
01:04:00He's Jewish, yeah.
01:04:01Okay.
01:04:02I might add that the defense minister is Muslim.
01:04:06There you go.
01:04:07All right.
01:04:08So, is there any hint of a reason why any independent observer would say
01:04:23there is a problem with religious freedom in the non-occupied part?
01:04:30I mean, are the Russian Orthodox churches discriminated against by the government
01:04:36or by the police in the free part of Ukraine?
01:04:43Dr. Wenner.
01:04:45There is a motion to discuss the status of what's called
01:04:50the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate.
01:04:53The status of this religious group in Ukraine.
01:04:59And that's because, you know, you very accurately depicted the attitude of the Russian state
01:05:06towards repressing dissent of any form.
01:05:13One of the things that Vladimir Putin has instrumentalized, even weaponized, is religion.
01:05:21And he has weaponized this, I would go beyond what was stated earlier,
01:05:26not just in the former republics turned independent countries of the former Soviet Union,
01:05:32but he is doing this around the world.
01:05:35That is to say, using the Russian Orthodox Church, if you will, almost as an arm of Russia
01:05:43to pursue Russian foreign policy and to enhance the geopolitical position of the Russian Federation
01:05:52and to alter alliances in favor of the Russian state.
01:05:58So this is one of the reasons why the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate,
01:06:05that at least formally still has institutional connections to Moscow,
01:06:10becomes an object of concern in Ukraine today.
01:06:15Beyond that one issue, I think there is tremendous religious freedom in Ukraine.
01:06:24And that's why Protestant communities were not only able to be created, but to grow in Ukraine.
01:06:32And why, I would say even before 2014,
01:06:40they in fact had Ukraine, if you will, as a base that served Eurasia.
01:06:46In other words, Protestant communities in Ukraine were very, very active in terms of
01:06:52humanitarian, educational, missionizing endeavors.
01:06:56And this, of course, is seen as a threat in Russia precisely because of the potential
01:07:03growth of Protestantism that that represents.
01:07:06And given the negative associations of Protestantism and specifically of the Baptist Church
01:07:13and evangelical Christian and Pentecostal churches,
01:07:16then that makes then a multiplication of potential American spies, if you will,
01:07:22to use their rhetoric throughout wherever those particular faith communities should grow,
01:07:29be they in Eurasia, be they on the African continent, be they in the occupied territories
01:07:38of Ukraine. And that is why the position of the Russian Orthodox Church by and large
01:07:43has been to shut down those churches,
01:07:47shut down those kinds of missionary, educational, and humanitarian efforts.
01:07:54Let me ask you to expound on that. But first of all, am I pronouncing your name correctly?
01:07:59You are, you are.
01:08:00It's Wanner.
01:08:00Yes.
01:08:01Okay. Well, then compare with us other former USSR countries. And then I think you mentioned
01:08:11Africa also. Are Protestant congregations in Ukraine currently and have they been sending
01:08:22missionaries to these other places like the former USSR in Africa? Or how has it spread?
01:08:29To the extent that that is possible. I mean, of course, that's wavered, that wavers
01:08:34over time and of course, country to country.
01:08:37But where is which former USSR countries are doing better in that regard, in allowing
01:08:47religious freedom and allowing other...
01:08:50If you want to count the Baltics, I mean, they're, of course, part of the EU. And so
01:08:53they then adopted EU legislation. But of the other former republics turned independent
01:09:00countries of the former USSR, I would say there's none.
01:09:02The stands...
01:09:04They do not surpass Ukraine in my view.
01:09:07Because for example, I mean, there are robust Muslim communities in Ukraine as well,
01:09:12that are driven by immigrants from primarily Muslim countries of the former Soviet Union
01:09:18to Ukraine, as well as by a burgeoning Afghan community in Ukraine. So there's quite a few
01:09:26Muslims in Ukraine at this point. And they too are quite vocal, they serve,
01:09:30they too serve as chaplains in the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
01:09:33Um, which one of you could give us some statistics about
01:09:40religious affiliation and membership in Ukraine? How many Baptists are there? How many
01:09:48new Ukrainian Orthodox there? Does anybody have those statistics?
01:09:53Yeah, okay. Mr. Sergey, I have a couple of phrases.
01:09:57We have the Baptist Union. This Baptist Union has more than 2000 churches in Ukraine. And now
01:10:07it's the biggest Baptist Union in Europe. If we count the people, we have Pentecostal Union,
01:10:15we have more than three and a half thousand churches in Ukraine.
01:10:19What percentage of the population would be in those two?
01:10:22It's not a big one. It's not the United States. I mean, I think it's kind of 3%.
01:10:30We've polled it. And so Protestants are about 4% of the Ukrainian population. But oddly enough,
01:10:38Baptists are the third largest Christian denomination after there's Orthodox,
01:10:42there's Greek Catholic, about 10%. And then Baptists is the next biggest
01:10:48denomination. Among Orthodox, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church that reports to Moscow
01:10:57is in that 4% range as well. And again, they've just, they're down to 4%. Yeah, so their
01:11:05percentages have plummeted. And the Orthodox Church of Ukraine has, I want to say, around 50%.
01:11:15I can get those numbers to the commission, but it's a very large percentage.
01:11:21Well, listen, Mr. Chairman, I do believe my five minutes has expired. Let me just end with this.
01:11:33Here's why freedom has got to win out in the end. And I want to quote from Ecclesiastes.
01:11:45Third chapter, 11th verse, he has set eternity in the hearts of men,
01:11:53yet they cannot fathom the work that God has done from the beginning to the end.
01:11:59There is something in the human soul that makes most of us seek to understand eternity
01:12:10and spiritual things. And when freedom allows that to flourish, humankind is better.
01:12:21And what you are about and what you're doing is so important. I'm so grateful
01:12:27to each of you for taking a stand and for helping us understand it better
01:12:32on this side of the Atlantic. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
01:12:36Thank you, Acting Chairman. And we're really grateful. The first string was here,
01:12:40now the second string. So we now proceed to Congressman Wiley Nickel of North Carolina.
01:12:48Thank you so much. Good morning. Slava Ukraini.
01:12:54It's great to be with you. I just returned several weeks ago from a bipartisan bicameral
01:13:00visit to Ukraine for about a week. We were joined by Senator Wicker, your colleague,
01:13:05Joni Ernst, had a very important fact-finding mission. And the issue of persecution of
01:13:14evangelical Christians in Ukraine is an incredibly important topic. And I'm really glad to be joined
01:13:21in a bipartisan way here to shed light on this, because this is an issue that is not getting
01:13:26enough attention right now. Thank you to the U.S. Helsinki Commission for organizing today's
01:13:31hearing and to our witnesses again for being with us. Ukraine is a nation with a rich tradition of
01:13:38religious freedom. It's home to many Christian denominations. Unfortunately, under Russian
01:13:42occupation, these communities have faced severe repression and violence. When I traveled to
01:13:48Ukraine earlier this year, I heard about the atrocities firsthand and had the opportunity
01:13:53to meet with Tamila Tesheva, the permanent representative of the President of Ukraine in
01:13:58the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, and Dr. Viktor Yelensky, a Ukrainian scholar and politician. We
01:14:04discussed their efforts to prevent further humanitarian human rights violations and to
01:14:10protect victims of the Russian occupation. I hope that today's hearing will shed further light on
01:14:15these atrocities and highlight the urgent need for Ukrainian victory to restore and protect
01:14:21religious freedom. First question, Mr. Moore, thank you so much for your leadership. It must
01:14:28be unusual to be on the opposite side of the hearings here today, but so far you seem to be
01:14:37doing very well. Thanks. Yeah, well, you guys make it easy. Thank you for that. You know, I'm grateful
01:14:42for your work with the Ukraine Freedom Project. It's been crucial to documenting and exposing
01:14:48Russia's systematic oppression of Ukrainian Christians. Can you talk more about the
01:14:54specific challenges you've faced in bringing this information to the international community's
01:14:58attention? Sure. Well, there's getting the information to begin with because the atrocities
01:15:05are all happening in the occupied areas and, you know, oddly enough, the Russians are not welcoming
01:15:10me there. And so getting that information is difficult. And then because of so many people
01:15:20like Pastor Sergeyev have friends that are still in these occupied territories, there's a lot they
01:15:27can't say. So the Russians are very good at oppressing people and finding leverage on them
01:15:35and making them do what they want. And the Russians don't want this to get out. So that's a
01:15:42problem. And then there's just generating interest among it. You know, when, you know, we, so we
01:15:49started a campaign in earnest last September, almost a year ago now. And, you know, I wrote an op-ed
01:15:55and I shopped it around to everyone I could possibly find. And no one wanted it. It took me
01:16:01weeks. And finally, a niche publication for Christian foreign policy called Providence Magazine,
01:16:08a great bunch of folks doing really good work, took my first op-ed. And from that, then that
01:16:14generated a lot of other work. And ultimately, as more and more people got involved in this,
01:16:20and more and more, and we were able to, you know, there was a hundred articles about this between
01:16:29October and, and April, and we were responsible for about 70 of them. And so, so generating that
01:16:38interest, and then also, finally, just working against the people who are, who are not constrained
01:16:47by the truth. The Russian propagandists are not constrained by the truth. And, you know, they have
01:16:52more money than we do by a lot. You know, we, you know, if we get into the six figures and fundraising,
01:16:58it's a, you know, that that's a good year for us. And meanwhile, the estimates of Russian propaganda
01:17:04spending worldwide is like $2.4 billion. So there's a massive tide that we're swimming against.
01:17:15And, you know, and again, as I mentioned to Chairman Wilson earlier, fortunately, the truth still works.
01:17:22Thanks so much. Pastor Sergiev, can you describe the impact of Russian occupation on your church
01:17:29community, and how your congregation has been able to maintain their faith and resilience during such
01:17:36a truly difficult time?
01:17:38Excuse me, how they what?
01:17:42How they've been able to maintain their faith, the impact of Russian occupation on them?
01:17:48Well, look, 80% of our members run away. We have so many, a couple of churches, small churches in
01:17:57Germany right now, and get it together so many people at Ukrainian territory, free territory,
01:18:03but we still have kind of 300-200 in small groups. I said before, I cannot tell you how much, how,
01:18:13how much, how, where. But the good news is that so many Ukrainians get to Europe, and now we have
01:18:23hundreds of new churches open, because they're, they, they're free people, and they believe in
01:18:29God, and they just spread the gospel and open up the new churches. I mean, I've been, this is 24th
01:18:36country in last two years for me, I've been twice in Israel. And I met so many Ukrainians that work
01:18:42in Israel right now and preaching the gospel and sharing the stories. They run away from one
01:18:48war nowadays in Israel, got another one war, some of people from Ukraine, third time they coming
01:18:56back to Europe from Israel, because they, Hamas is shooting in. Yeah, but I think this is kind of
01:19:05new level of faith, I think, and we're just sharing the stories. And I really still believe
01:19:11that God has a big calling for this nation. That's why I'm here sharing the story. And that's
01:19:15why I'm coming back tomorrow to Ukraine, because there are soldiers waiting for me to listen to
01:19:20help. And we have a big community of chaplains right now, it's kind of new way. And actually,
01:19:26I want to say a big thank you to every American chaplain that coming to Ukraine and helping us,
01:19:33because you have a big experience. The story of American chaplain is 200 years, we have only nine
01:19:39last nine years, like we have this experience. And we were waiting. And we're very faithful for
01:19:47support of chaplains who serve to Ukrainian nation and teach us how to do this whole thing
01:19:54and work with the PTCR. Is that correct? But they said in Ukrainian, how to how to help to do
01:20:02soldiers because even even yesterday, I saw the helicopter and I'm a little bit afraid because
01:20:09always when I see something in the sky, really inside of me, I'm preparing that if somebody have
01:20:16to shut down or it gonna come come in some buildings. Yeah, so this is our life right now.
01:20:22Thank you so much. My time is expired. If I could just add one thing I'd like to just because it's
01:20:27timely. It's something that that Pastor Sergei have mentioned, you know, the so the first place
01:20:35that Hamas went after October 7, was to Russia to Moscow to see Putin. And Putin has been periodically
01:20:44organizing summits between the Palestinian terror organizations, Iran, and he's doing this in Moscow.
01:20:54So as as, as we listen today to Prime Minister Netanyahu speech, and we listen to the protesters,
01:21:02I just want to make sure that everyone's aware of of who Hamas allies are, who's Iran's allies.
01:21:10It's Russia, it's Moscow, it's Putin. That's a great point. And just on the chaplain issue,
01:21:15you know, I was glad to see that the chaplain for the US House of Representatives joined us earlier,
01:21:19I saw her here. But thank you so much, Chair Wilson, for your leadership on this issue,
01:21:23bringing much needed attention to this is very important issue. Thank you very much, Congressman.
01:21:29Again, you can see it's bipartisan, Democrat, Republican. And indeed, as we conclude,
01:21:36I appreciate, Stephen, you bring up, hey, connecting the dots. There are good people
01:21:41who simply are not connecting the dots. The dots are perfectly clear. It's called Iranian drones
01:21:49being used by war criminal Putin to kill Ukrainians. Okay. But that's just one dot. I mean,
01:21:55they're dots everywhere. Hamas showing up in Moscow, Hamas showing up in Beijing.
01:22:00How could this be? And Hamas really is a puppet of the regime in Tehran. But and so I just want to
01:22:09thank you all, we've got to educate the American people, because there are good people who are
01:22:13just not understanding that we're facing an axis of evil. And that is the regime in Tehran. We've
01:22:20got war criminal Putin and the Chinese Communist Party. And they're working together, collaborating
01:22:26together to invade democracies. And their goal is really, they are very eager to let us know in
01:22:34English, that is death to Israel, death to America. And so it's a foreign war today,
01:22:40but their plan is to bring it here. And so I want to thank you. And then we also need to
01:22:47get across that, indeed, what war criminal Putin is trying to do, the way he has misled the people
01:22:54of the Russian Federation, is to recreate an empire. But they need to know it's the failed
01:22:59Soviet empire, for the benefit of oligarchs. It does not benefit the people of Russia. And I've
01:23:04had wonderful visits, I had my business cards in Russian. And I was so hoping, Chelyabinsk is
01:23:12sister city of my hometown, Will's hometown of Columbia, South Carolina. I'm very grateful to
01:23:18have visited Novosibirsk. One time, Stephen, there was a billboard in English that said,
01:23:24Welcome to Novosibirsk, the Chicago of Siberia. I have had a University of South Carolina student
01:23:31who was from St. Petersburg as an intern in my office. And I stayed with this family in St.
01:23:35Petersburg. And so I just had such high hopes, visits to Moscow. I led a delegation to place a
01:23:42wreath at the world's largest open cemetery, the victims of the siege of Leningrad, and half a
01:23:48million people buried in an open cemetery. And we put a wreath there in the shape of the United
01:23:54States, in red, white and blue flowers to show our love and affection for the people of Russia.
01:24:00And while I was there, I found out that the success, Dr. Warner would know, but I didn't know,
01:24:05and that is that the success of Joseph Stalin to stop Hitler at Leningrad was due to American
01:24:13lend-lease. All of the equipment that the Soviets used was equipment provided by the United States
01:24:21to our, at that time, Soviet allies. And so over and over again, we have a deep affection for the
01:24:27people of Russia, and we want the best. And a final point that really, I had the opportunity
01:24:33gruesomely to visit Bucha. And so I was there, and I met with a grandmother who told about, she was
01:24:40just driving along with her 16-year-old grandson in the front seat, and the Russian soldier, without
01:24:46any provocation, without any warning, shot and killed her grandson on the front seat of the car.
01:24:52And then I, we visited with the family who, their family members were taken out of their home,
01:24:57they're in Bucha, and they took the family out, hands tied behind their back, shot them in the
01:25:03head and buried them in a yard. And then putting it in perspective for Americans, and visiting
01:25:08Bucha, I could have been in any American subdivision, a suburban area. The homes were very
01:25:16Americanized. And in fact, something that we can all identify, two blocks from where the
01:25:22executions took place, there is still a functioning drive-thru McDonald's. We're not talking about
01:25:30some third world nowhere. And so it's just so important that we support the people of Ukraine,
01:25:37support the people of Israel, support the people of Taiwan, that we maintain the borders of Ukraine,
01:25:42the borders of Israel, the borders of Taiwan, and the borders of the United States.
01:25:47And with that, we are adjourned.