The Good Men Project launched as an online publishing site and social platform focussing on the evolving role of men in the 21st-century. This week it covered an interview with Christina Laschenko, churchwarden of the Anglican church of Christ Church Kyiv, at the eastern end of our Diocese, and how they are sustaining Anglican worship, pastoral care, and spiritual resilience in wartime, and without a resident chaplain.
Firstly Ms Laschenko talked about living in fear of sudden attack: “We all realise that a ballistic missile can come any moment and hit you wherever you are: in church, at school, in a theatre, in a department store, at your workplace, at home. It takes only 2 minutes between the air raid siren and the arrival of a ballistic missile which is targeting your neighbourhood”.
She then went on to describe how people deal with long term insomnia and the impact that faith can have: “The more people suffer from war the more resistant they are towards the enemy’s pressure. Of course, we are all exhausted. But coming together to a church after sleepless nights, singing together, praying together and meditating on the God’s Word, as well as having traditional tea afterwards – all that revives our body, mind and spirit in the most unexpected and powerful way.”
And she talked about the added difficulties of living without a chaplain: “We have been worshiping without a permanent chaplain since 2008. Many expat missions, businesses and organisations quit Ukraine by 2014, and our chaplaincy membership … declined considerably. Since 2008 and till 2022 we enjoyed regular visits of locums during Advent-Christmastide and Lent-Eastertide seasons. We are hugely thankful to all those chaplains who served faithfully and supported us spiritually during all those years….
“After the beginning of the full-scale invasion, it became clear that chaplains could not come and stay for 4-6 weeks as it was before, as they could not get insurance for an extended stay in the war zone. Under those circumstances Archdeacon Leslie Nathanial has come up with an unprecedented solution: a visiting chaplain once a month for the service with the Holy Communion. Between August 2024 and October 2025 Rev Kasta Dip, a chaplain from Warsaw, has made 12 trips to Kyiv. Each trip takes 18 hours by bus or by train, 3-4 hour stay in Kyiv for the Sunday Eucharist Service, and then 16-18-hour trip back to Warsaw. We are very grateful to Fr. Kasta for the long-term and routine sacrifice of his time and comfort.”
And about the congregation: “As of now we have between 12 and 18 regular Sunday visitors with huge spikes of attendance (up to 50 people) on special occasions, on Remembrance Sunday, Carol Service, Easter Day etc. Expat membership of our congregation is subject to rapid turnover because of the short-term contracts in the war zone. This summer we have seen the third massive ‘exodus’ of expats and now we are in the intermediary period of gaining new members. Ukrainian part of the congregation has been restoring gradually since a shock of February 2022.”
The interviewer’s final question concerned what “genuine, useful support for your community” would entail. This is what she said: ”The biggest threat to our resilience and spiritual strength is to find ourselves in isolation amid a war of attrition. That is, a sense of connectedness, a sense of support from the broader Anglican community, a sense of inclusion into all-Anglican processes is fundamental. The forms of belonging and inclusion might be different……Physical presence and ability to share the worship together becomes increasingly important with each month of the lasting war. I have no ready solutions for how that could be done; at a first glance it looks impossible. But here again we come back to St. Paul: ‘with God all things are possible’. This brings us back to prayer: please pray for the Anglican, and broader, for the Christian community in Ukraine”.
This is an extremely engaging and uplifting article, of which these are just snippets. Do read it and please remember to pray for our community and all communities in Kyiv. And when you go to church this Sunday, please remember our Anglican brothers and sisters at Christ Church.
Read the article here.
PIcture above: Christ Church Kyiv