Author ORCID Identifier
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1073-9792
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0886-3965
Abstract
This article considers the changes that have taken place in the Jehovah's Witnesses (JW) from the time of the USSR to today, when believers and their communities are having to fit into new historical circumstances. In peacetime JW occupied a relatively insignificant niche in the structure of religious life of Ukraine, overcoming the wary and sometimes openly negative attitude of the state, society, and other religious communities, formed by the Soviet regime. After 2014 JW are more and more confidently declaring their presence in Ukrainian society. Those who survived persecution and deportation during the Soviet era are regaining their rights as people of faith in a country that has declared freedom of religion and belief. Today, JW, like other citizens of Ukraine, who are suffering from the war and its consequences, are rethinking their role in the life of the country, they are actively helping the needy. Despite all the resource losses (human, material and moral), JW support the life of their communities and Ukrainian society in general. According to the authors, the war has accelerated the processes of civil and national identification, strengthened people’s faith, and intensified socially useful and humanitarian assistance to the needy from religious organizations. Most communities took a patriotic position, contributing in various ways to the victory of Ukraine in the war and the establishment of a stable and just peace.
Recommended Citation
Tytarenko, Vita and Fylypovych, Liudmyla
(2023)
"Post-Soviet History of Jehovah's Witnesses in Ukraine: From a Closed Sect to an Open Denomination,"
Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe: Vol. 43
:
Iss.
10
, Article 5.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.55221/2693-2229.2478
Available at:
https://digitalcommons.georgefox.edu/ree/vol43/iss10/5
Included in
Eastern European Studies Commons, Sociology of Religion Commons, Soviet and Post-Soviet Studies Commons