Ukraine Evangelicals Urge Mike Johnson To Vote For More Aid

(ConservativeSense.com) – House Speaker Mike Johnson is receiving more pressure to approve a spending bill that would send billions in aid to Ukraine, this time from an Ukrainian evangelical Christian group.

Rev. Anatoliy Kozachok wrote a letter to Johnson on March 26, which reporters have now obtained. Kozachok is the senior bishop of the Ukrainian Pentecostal Church and the Presiding Chairman of the Ukraine Council of Evangelical and Protestant churches. In the letter, the bishop tells the House Speaker that Ukraine and its churches need his “vote and help today.”

Congress recently returned from a two-week break to reconvene, but Johnson did not mention plans for a vote on President Joe Biden’s aid bill that would send $95.3 billion to Israel, to Ukraine, and to secure the Indo-Pacific region around Taiwan, as well as toward humanitarian aid for the Gaza Strip. The bill passed the Senate in February after the original version, which included a bipartisan border security deal, was blocked by Republicans for failing to meet their demands regarding the border.

Kozachok pleaded with Johnson and said the “Russian invaders” were “destroying” evangelicals and accusing them of working for the US government’s interests. The bishop claims that every evangelical Christian in Ukraine is now “a target” for the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB). He also said the Russian Orthodox Church published a document recently that endorses and advocates for more “atrocities” and “further invasion.”

Leaders of the Southern Baptist Church also wrote to Johnson on Monday, April 8. The House Speaker is a former official of this denomination. They reiterated Kozachok’s pleas and urged Johnson to support Ukraine. The letter also noted how Baptist organizations have been among “the largest contributors” to providing relief for Ukraine since the Russian invasion and subsequent war.

Kozachok told the House Speaker in his March letter that, on behalf of 8,000 Ukrainian churches, they ask for his “prayers and action.” The bishop said that without military assistance, many more “brothers and sisters in Christ will die.”