[1]KREMENETS, Ukraine (BP) – Pastor Ivan Kunderenko believes all Ukrainians are suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), born from Russia’s escalating war on Ukraine.
Challenging to churches, Kunderenko said, is fulfilling both spiritual and humanitarian needs amid the war that increasingly targets civilians [2]. The war also has destroyed at least 700 churches [3] and seen a documented 20,000 [4] and untold additional children kidnapped by Russia.
Kunderenko, pastor of the Baptist Church at Kremenets in western Ukraine and head of apologetics for the Evangelical Baptist Union of Ukraine [5], is among thousands of religious leaders appealing to the global church to pray for Ukraine on Aug. 24, designated a Global Day of Prayer for Ukraine on the country’s 34th Independence Day.
“Every Ukrainian has PTSD. It can be like more damaged, less damaged, but every Ukrainian has PTSD,” Kunderenko told Baptist Press three weeks in advance of the event. “A lot of Ukrainians suffer both psychologically, spiritually and mentally. That’s a given fact.”
Sponsoring the Global Day of Prayer [6] is the All-Ukrainian Council of Churches and Religious Organizations (UCCRO), an interdenominational, ecumenical group representing 95 percent of Ukraine’s religious community, including the nearly 2,775 churches, 320 missions and 113,000 evangelicals in the Baptist Union.
“U.S. churches can pray about not just peace, but all the captured soldiers, all the abducted children, all abducted civilians, so that they would be freed, so that torture would stop,” Kunderenko said. “Because when Russia returns some of the (abducted Ukrainian) soldiers, they look much, much worse than Jews looked in the concentration camps during World War II. Like they’re being unfed, they’re being, I don’t know, tortured in all the wild ways the wicked mind can think about.”
Vitaliy Orlov, pastor of the Sumy Christian Church and founder of the prayer movement “Intercessors for Ukraine,” said Ukraine is in urgent need of prayer.
“From what we (UCCRO) understand, there are over 1 million casualties (deaths and injuries) already from Ukrainian side,” Orlov told Baptist Press of the war’s impact since 2022. “Over 700 church buildings of this or that faith were ruined in Ukraine. Russian army killed over 70 priests or ordained ministers.”
Precise numbers of deaths and injuries are difficult to tabulate, according to [7] the United Nations, whose leaders say there is no safe place left in Ukraine.
For Orlov and other Christian leaders, the war is a spiritual battle for the right to spread the Gospel in Ukraine and Eastern Europe. If Russia prevails in its attempt to capture Ukraine, evangelism increasingly will be criminalized, Orlov and others say [8].
“And if you look at that with spiritual eyes, that’s a war between light and darkness. The same dreadful drones that are produced in Iran, they are used against both Ukraine and Israel,” Orlov said. “And North Korea and their military leadership currently have the strongest alliance ever with Russia, providing Russia with lots of weaponry. And we understand that the evil one, he wants to stop the revival and the spiritual awakening that we observe in Ukraine.”
Orlov likens the spiritual battle to the Pharoah’s order to the midwives to kill all baby boys in the days of Moses’ birth in Exodus 1:15, and to King Herod’s order to kill male toddlers around the birth of Jesus, as recorded in Matthew 2:16.
“They want us to stop preaching the Gospel. Even prior to that full-scale invasion (by Russia), Ukrainians started to come to the 10/40 window to be cross-cultural missionaries there,” Orlov said, referencing a geographical window of 68 countries in North Africa, the Middle East and Asia with many people unreached by the Gospel. “And that’s why it’s a spiritual battle. So there is a spiritual warfare.”
Southern Baptists may support the Global Day of Prayer by committing to pray in 15-minute time blocks [9] and by committing to corporate prayer in churches Aug. 24, with church resources including a short video and bulletin inserts downloadable by scrolling to the bottom of the page [9].
“Together with the office of the President of Ukraine, (the UCCRO) asks all the Christians of the world – since it’s going to be a Sunday – rise up, lift up their prayer voice during their church services,” Orlov said. “We do know the Lord can protect us, so we would like to ask you to join us in your prayers. Lift up your voice.”
Pray for a “just peace,” strength and comfort for the suffering including civilians in occupied territories, stolen children and captured soldiers, organizers ask.
“There is a strong appeal for divine intervention in the protection of innocent lives, healing of the wounded, restoration of communities, and wisdom for the leaders of Ukraine,” Kunderenko said. “These requests reflect a deep reliance on God’s sovereignty in times of turmoil.”
The Global Day of Prayer precedes the annual National Prayer Breakfast of Ukraine, set for Aug. 25 in Kyiv.
Kunderenko’s pastorate of 180 members continues to worship and serve the surrounding community. But when asked how he is handling the suffering as a pastor, he has no concrete answer.
Instead, he references a friend’s Facebook post.
“He wrote a post that really touched my heart. He said, well, people often ask me the same question, ‘How are you holding up?’ And he said, ‘You know what, I really don’t. I still walk, I still breathe, I still, you know, do this or that. But can I say that in all reality I’m holding up?’” Kunderenko recalled the post.
“I don’t know. I don’t think that I’m whole,” Kunderenko said. “Well, I still do what I’m supposed to do, but I do not know if I’m really holding up.”
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