Revival, but only with state permission: In Belarus, Franklin Graham's Festival of Hope raises questions about religious freedom

For three nights starting Friday, the Chizhovka Arena in Minsk will hold the largest gathering of evangelicals ever in Belarus’s history, according to organizers.

Organizers expect around 9,000 people to enter the indoor sports arena for the Festival of Hope, organized by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association (BGEA) from May 15 to 17. Franklin Graham is scheduled to preach on the final two nights, and a choir of more than 1,300 singers, as well as musicians from Belarus, Russia, and the United States, will also take the stage.

For Leonid Mikhovich, one of the event’s coordinators, the scale itself marks a significant moment. “We’ve never had anything like this,” he told CT, noting that even in the 1990s, when post-Soviet religious life briefly bloomed, gatherings of this size were unheard of. “We had large activities, maybe up [to] 1,000,” he said, “but nothing like this.”

A coalition of Belarusian evangelical networks, including United Church of Christians of the Evangelical Faith in the Republic of Belarus and the Union of Evangelical Christian Baptists of the Republic of Belarus, is facilitating the festival. Mikhovich, who is also the general secretary of the Baptist Union, said that while Belarus’s evangelical churches have long operated in parallel and partnered on outreach programs, this is the first time they are coordinating at a national scale.

Mikhovich believes the event also gives the small evangelical community in Belarus a sense of legitimacy. “For us, to have something like this in an arena of this importance, it’s almost a kind of legalization,” he said.

In a country where the authoritarian government tightly manages the public square and constrains civil society, the festival represents a rare moment of visibility for evangelicals, who make up less than 2 percentof the population. Meanwhile, the Belarusian Orthodox Church, which is under the authority of the Moscow Patriarchate, makes up 60 percent.

But while organizers like Mikhovich describe the gathering as a milestone, religious liberty monitors caution it may not bring greater freedoms for evangelicals. Instead, experts warn, the event highlights how authoritarian systems can selectively permit large religious gatherings while maintaining restrictions on everyday religious life.

Belarusian Evangelicals Fear Growing Isolation

Pastor Vitaly Chichmarev doesn’t hesitate to use the word persecution.

“Yes,” he told CT, “the Belarusian church is persecuted.”

Chichmarev, who leads Light of Hope, a Baptist congregation in Minsk, recently spent seven months in prison. He was arrested in front of his teenage daughter in early 2022 for his participation in the massive 2020 protests against the controversial reelection of Belarus’s authoritarian president, Alexander Lukashenko.

He is back serving his congregation in the nation’s capital now. He’s happy to return to church work, be at home with his family, and release an EP of some new music with his rock band AntiVirus. But he hasn’t forgotten the big picture in his country, Belarus. He believes the situation for Christians there is dire.

“We are not able to rent rooms for meetings,” he said. “New churches are not allowed to register. Catholics have had buildings taken away from them. Among the Protestant pastors, some, like me, have been in jail.”

The Norway-based human rights organization Forum 18 agrees. The group has documented a tightening web of restrictions on the free exercise of religion in Belarus. Secret police surveil evangelicals and other religious groups, raid their churches, contrive evictions, and detain religious leaders. Authorities require extensive bureaucratic paperwork to approve church buildings, to allow any meetings outside of church buildings, or to permit foreign visitors, who are frequently denied entry into the country.

These restrictions have grown more serious as Lukashenko has cracked down on every part of civil society that might challenge his control. He has been in power since 1994 and is frequently called a dictator by international observers.

The US government is also “concerned about the constraints on religious freedom in Belarus, as part of the whole-of-society human rights repressions committed by the Lukashenko regime,” according to a spokesperson at the Department of State. US officials, including embassy representative Ruben Harutunian, have met with Belarusian authorities to advocate for more freedom. In particular, the US urged the regime to ease state pressure on clergy for participating in political life in Belarus.

The challenges have deepened because of the international situation. Belarus is sandwiched between Russia, Ukraine, and European Union member states Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland. It has become a close ally of Russia and supports its eastern neighbor in the war with Ukraine. Because of the conflict, Belarusian churches have found themselves cut off from global partners.

This has taken a toll on churches like Chichmarev’s. Light of Hope had around 100 members in 2020. About 45 remain, with more than half of the congregation fleeing to Poland, Georgia, and other countries to avoid military mobilization and escape the ongoing repression.

Article 31 of the Belarusian constitution provides accommodations for church gatherings and the public profession of faith. According to the government, there are 3,563 registered religious institutions in Belarus, representing 174 religious organizations.

Evangelicals, however, account for less than 2 percent of the population. And they are treated as second-class citizens under the law, according to Leonid Mikhovich, president of the Baptist Union in Belarus and rector at Minsk Theological Seminary. Even so, Mikhovich is ambivalent about using the word persecution.