United Methodist bishops denounce Russian attack on children's hospital in Ukraine
The United Methodist Church House of Bishops has denounced Russian forces’ attacks on civilian targets in Ukraine, especially a recent strike on a children’s hospital in the nation’s capital.
In a press release on Wednesday, the UMC House of Bishops condemned “Russia's ongoing attacks on civilian targets, most recently the atrocious attack on the Okhmatdyt Children's Hospital in Kyiv.”
“We call on governments and the international community to hold Russia accountable for its actions and to maintain the demand for the withdrawal of Russian troops from Ukrainian soil,” the bishops stated.
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“We support the Ukrainian Council of Churches in holding the Russian Orthodox Church accountable for its support of Russia's invasion and war against Ukraine.”
The UMC leadership also expressed opposition to “war and all other forms of violent conflict” and said they “support Ukrainians in their struggle for freedom and justice.”
“We stand with the United Methodists in Ukraine in their tireless work to shelter internally displaced people and to bring hope and comfort,” they continued.
“We call on all Methodists to pray for the freedom of Ukraine and for a just and lasting peace. As we yearn for the day when there will be no more war and people will live together in peace and justice.”
Earlier this month, the Russians launched a series of missile attacks on cities in unoccupied Ukraine, including Kyiv, the invaded nation’s capital, killing approximately 30 people.
One of the buildings struck by the attacks was the Okhmatdyt Children's Hospital of Kyiv (also spelled Kiev), striking the facility even as some patients were in surgery.
“Among the victims were Ukraine’s sickest children,” said Volker Türk, a United Nations official who visited the facility shortly after the attack, as quoted by The Associated Press. “This is abominable, and I implore those with influence to do everything in their power to ensure these attacks stop immediately.”
For its part, the Russian government has denied any wrongdoing.
On Feb. 24, 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine, having previously annexed the Crimean region of the Eastern European nation in 2014 during the Obama administration. Russia also took over the Republic of Georgia during the Georgia-Russia war in 2008 when George W. Bush was president.
Since Russian forces invaded, there have been numerous reports of Ukrainian Christians, especially those not belonging to the Orthodox Church, being persecuted by the military.
Months after the war began, Yaroslav Pyzh, president of Ukrainian Baptist Theological Seminary in Lviv, told The Christian Post that around 400 Baptist congregations in Ukraine had been “lost” due to “war-related circumstances.”
In April, a group of religious freedom advocates sent a letter to House Speaker Mike Johnson calling on him to recognize the persecution of Christians under Russian occupation amid accounts of pastors being harassed or even tortured by soldiers.
