When the Russians invaded Ukraine in February 2022, there were more than fifty evangelical theological institutions in the country – many of them newly established following Ukraine’s independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. In thirty years, Ukraine developed the most extensive network of evangelical seminaries in Eastern Europe. While initially heavily dependent on foreign missionaries, the decade of the 2010s was a time of rapid growth, positive relations with government authorities, and an increased number of Ukrainian faculty with graduate degrees.
When Russian troops attacked, supported by heavy rocket and artillery fire, seminary leaders, faculty, staff, and students went into action. Female seminary students, wives of seminarians who had been drafted into the Ukrainian army, and seminary faculty and staff chose to help the vulnerable, especially the elderly, refugees, and children caught in the conflict. This developed into a “theology of presence” – a sense that they were now being called to be Christ’s presence during the war. Their education equipped them to realize that they had important roles to play – serving meals to the hungry, providing housing for refugees, helping to evacuate people from the war zones, providing medical assistance, and offering a listening ear and compassion to those who had experienced trauma from the loss of family members or the destruction of their homes.
Roman Soloviy, Chairman of the Eastern European Institute of Theology in Lviv, described three examples of how evangelical seminaries became communities of compassion when the war broke. Seminary leaders at the Ukrainian Evangelical Seminary and the Ukrainian Bible Society evacuated their families, students, and many of their staff to western Ukraine and remained in Kyiv despite its attempted encirclement by Russian troops. They lived with daily rocket fire, which often meant retreating to bomb shelters, and still delivered bread, groceries, and medicines to villages in the surrounding areas.
Tavriski Christian Institute volunteers had to evacuate their campus, but they still provided assistance to the residents of Kherson during its ten months of occupation by Russian forces. They delivered food and medicine to nearby Russian-occupied territories, purchasing produce from local farmers and then distributing it to those in need. After the Russians were pushed out of Kherson, they helped to rebuild the city despite heavy daily shelling by the Russians.
Lviv Theological Seminary and Chernivtsi Biblical Seminary both turned their schools into humanitarian relief centers, providing housing for displaced Ukrainians on their campus and assisting the refugees in nearby camps set up for displaced persons. Leaders at all three schools, and others as well, provided support for refugees regardless of their language or religious affiliation, treating them with dignity and respect.
Similar support programs were put into action by Catholic and Orthodox churches, and the cumulative effect of these religious initiatives has had a significant impact on government officials who witnessed this amazing grace. Ukrainian people of faith decided to “walk their talk.” During a terribly violent war initiated by a Russian autocrat and his cronies, God’s people made it clear that “It doesn’t have to be like this!”
Christian educational leaders decided to resume their academic programs beginning in the Spring of 2023 and to make their campus a community of reflection, in which the school has an inclusive, shared mission to serve others and to learn how to respond to the pressing issues caused by the war from a Biblical perspective.
There are immediate needs on several seminary campuses that were heavily damaged and, in some cases, destroyed; many institutions must now rebuild facilities that were hit by Russian missile and artillery attacks. An even more difficult challenge is the loss of teaching faculty; more than forty members of seminaries in Ukraine have fled to Europe or North America, many who served in leadership roles. Some have returned for brief periods of time, and then left with no intention of returning.
Many of these seminaries are also looking at longer-term goals, including becoming full universities that equip both pastoral and lay leaders, as well as expanding professional programs to include counseling and trauma care. These schools also have a goal to become a community of hope. It is hard not to become weary and hopeless in the face of an ongoing war with an autocratic empire that uses fear and violence as weapons. The goal of these schools is to show how Ukraine can restore its national life and build a democratic future with religious freedom.
Religious freedom in Ukraine has been a valued quality of life in recent decades, and this freedom has empowered and enabled seminary leaders and other educators to work together to meet immediate relief needs. They trusted each other, and the experience of forming teams to get important tasks done has laid the foundation for future partnerships.
Defeating Russia and forcing their army to retreat from Ukraine is the critical next step. The United States and Western Europe need to step up – and step up now – in support of the courageous Ukrainian armed forces. Then they can begin to rebuild their country and make it a vibrant democracy – a model for Europe.
Resource: Roman Soloviy, “Theological Education in Wartime,” InSights Journal for Global Theological Education (Volume 8, No. 1), a resource of ScholarLeaders International.