Ukraine: When Faith Remains
“What do you need most right now?” I asked a group of pastors and members of the congregation on Sunday afternoon in Beregszasz, Ukraine.
“We need first the blessing of God,” the lead pastor replied. A second person responded with just one word: “People.”
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Those simple responses actually tell us a lot about the people of the Reformed Church in Transcarpathia and about the situation in Ukraine now, 2-1/2 years after Russia’s war on Ukraine began. They are a people of deep and abiding faith. And they are watching their own community become depleted, day by day.
Transcarpathia, Ukraine is just over the border from Hungary, the westernmost region of Ukraine and an area that was formerly Hungary before it was annexed by the Soviet Union following World War II in 1946. Today, Hungarians still comprise a portion of Transcarpathia’s population and hold tightly to their Hungarian language, traditions, and faith community. They identify far more with modern-day Hungary than they do with with Ukraine, in part because they feel this westernmost part of Ukraine has been under-resourced and largely ignored by the Ukrainian government for decades.
Transcarpathia is far from the battlefront of Russia’s war on Ukraine, but it is nevertheless severely impacted by the war. Already an economically depressed area before the war, poverty is now deepening. Costs of gasoline and other basic necessities have skyrocketed. Electricity is intermittent at best, out entirely for 8-10 hours every day. But the biggest impact of the war is the loss of its people.
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Men are subject to conscription into the Ukrainian army as of 18 years old and no men 18 or older are allowed to leave the country since the war began. Teenagers younger than 18 have largely left Ukraine to avoid fighting. Some men have gone into hiding, not wanting to fight in a war they believe Ukraine has no chance of winning. Others are fighting in the Ukrainian army; one woman we met told us her husband had just returned after fighting on the frontlines for 22 months. We were told government round-ups of men who aren’t yet in the army are routine and getting more so as the military grows more desperate for men to replace those who have been killed or left.
Families who were able have also left, often leaving behind older parents who couldn’t travel, creating another social crisis in the region among its elderly. All of it leaves Transcarpathia, where we spent all our time while in Ukraine, a region depleted of its best resources: people.
In that context, the Reformed Church in Transcarpathia strives to remain faithful and to address growing social crises. The RCT is the Church in the region with whom the United Church of Christ and Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) has been relating since the start of the war in 2022. Through our long-established partner, the Reformed Church in Hungary (RCH), we’ve been able to provide financial support to RCT programs thanks to the generosity of those who gave to our Ukraine appeal.
I was amazed at the scale of social programs (‘diakonal’ programs) the RCT operates, especially given the RCT’s relatively small size as a church in the region. They are a church representing a dual minority: a Hungarian-based, Hungarian-speaking church located in Ukraine, a Protestant Church in a largely Catholic area. But neither their minority status nor the daunting reality of the war have inhibited their commitment to serving others and doing good.
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They run nursing homes for the elderly and those with dementia; programs for disabled children; shelters for Internally Displaced Persons; feeding programs for impoverished Roma communities in the area; four schools for children; a crisis home for pregnant women; a bakery that produces over 650 loaves of bread every day, all of which is given away; and a variety of other programs aimed at helping the most vulnerable among them. It is astounding. It is also increasingly difficult to sustain, as the number in their community gets smaller and smaller with each passing month.
Back at that church on Sunday afternoon, I asked members of the congregation another question. “What role does your faith play in getting through these difficult times?” A staff person recalled a conversation she had had with an elderly congregant, who had wondered in despair when she would ever see her son again. “There really is no answer to that question,” reflected the staff member. “We can only pray. Perhaps it will be only in the next life that she sees him again.”
There is seemingly no end in sight to the war here. Month by excruciating month it goes on, peace still nothing but a flickering hope and a persevering prayer. But faith remains. It fuels the Reformed Church of Transcarpathia and its mighty ministries and powers the extraordinary vision this church has for a future they still believe in.
O God whose care knows no boundaries, grant your blessing again upon the peacemakers and the faith-keepers. I pray tonight for the Reformed Church in Transcarpathia, giving thanks for their steady, loving witness amid such unimaginable circumstances. Grant them courage where hope is faltering. Comfort them when losses overwhelm. Give them wisdom and creativity sufficient to overcome every obstacle to their ministry. And guide us to accompany and support them, until such a day as peace is again present in their homes, their hearts, and Ukraine. Amen.
The Reverend Shari Prestemon began her service with the national ministries of the United Church of Christ in January 2024. As the Acting Associate General Minister & Co-Executive for Global Ministries she has the privilege of supporting several teams: Global Ministries, Global H.O.P.E., Public Policy & Advocacy Team (Washington, D.C.), our staff liaison at the United Nations, and our Gender & Sexuality Justice Team. She previously served as a local church pastor in Illinois and Wisconsin, the Executive Director at Back Bay Mission in Biloxi, Mississippi, and the Minnesota Conference Minister. Her call to ministry grew, in part, from early Global Ministries experiences, especially service as a Peace & Justice Intern in Dumaguete City, the Philippines.
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