The Island

A few posts ago, “9 of Them”, we mentioned we’d like to feature some of their stories. Here is the first one.

One of the students in Sweden is from Ukraine, Dima. We met him and his wife, Zhenya, while we were still there running Titus. They’re really an incredible couple, intelligent, passionate believers, from atheist background.

So what are they doing with YWM in Sweden? They are part of bringing Jesus to people who don’t know who he is. Anyway, we got started talking about the Orthodox church while we were there. Why? Well, the Orthodox church is the major Christian presence in Ukraine and the post-Soviet world. And I’ve been on a major learning curve since we arrived. We’ll do some posts in the future, talking about the Orthodox church. And we watched this very interesting movie with Dima and Zhenya, called The Island in English (you can see its facebook page here). During the Soviet years, the Russian Orthodox church dwindled because of the soviet states radical atheistic marxism seen in repression of religion. Listen to some of these stats:
– In 1917-1939, over 50,000 Orthodox priests vanished, 1000 churches & 60 seminaries were closed
– by 1933, of 600 churches in Moscow only 100 remained open
– by 1941, 98% of all Orthodox churches in Russia were closed
(“Eastern Orthodox Christianity”, Daniel Clendenin, p44).
Wow!
Anyway, the story of the Island takes place during WWII. The main character becomes a priest after having committed a grave sin. It’s an interesting story and we will bring it home with us in summer, if you’re interested, let us know and we’d love to watch it with you. It will give you some understanding of what it means to live here.

As Clendenin very appropriately states … “where this all will lead remains to be seen”.