A Russian-inspired clampdown on evangelicals – or the advance of social liberalism.
That was the choice many evangelicals in Moldova faced. And it appears they opted for religious freedom first and foremost, according to a Crosslinks mission partner.
The pro-European Party of Action and Solidarity (PAS) secured around 50% of the public vote during the recent national elections, comfortably defeating the pro-Russian Patriotic Electoral Bloc.
Many evangelicals in Moldova are believed to have voted for PAS. Graeme Innes, who has worked as a missionary in Moldova since 2003 and lived there since 2017, told en that while many will not agree with every aspect of the party’s policy agenda, they will have decided to vote for them for “geopolitical or economic reasons”.
He revealed that while many believers fear that closer ties with the European Union (EU) will lead to an advancement of socially liberal ideology in Moldova, the Patriotic Bloc would likely have placed the nation “firmly back in league with Russia”, potentially compromising the religious freedom that Moldovan Christians enjoy.
He said: “Where Russia rules, evangelicals face more hostility, opposition and even persecution. Russian law prohibits public evangelism. Evangelicals are in prison in Russia and Belarus. Just ten miles from where I write this, public evangelism is forbidden, and when I go there to evangelise, it has to be done clandestinely.”
Innes revealed that Moldova has experienced a “tremendous spiritual awakening” since the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 1990s, to the extent that Don Carson once said that no part of Europe had seen such substantial gospel growth in the last 40 years as Romania, Moldova and Ukraine, a bloc now dubbed the “Bible belt of Eastern Europe”.
However, Innes stressed that things would change markedly if Russian influence takes hold: “A new Iron Curtain has descended across Europe, and with regards to the freedom to engage in gospel ministry, the difference on each side of that new curtain is stark.”
“In Europe, nowhere is there greater freedom from the authorities to allow believers to publicly proclaim the gospel than in Moldova and Ukraine. No officials will ever stop us from proclaiming Christ. We have wonderful religious freedom.”
