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Pilgrims in Ukraine: Campus ministry curiosity to many 

Dec. 10, 2004	 News media contact:   Matt  Carlisle * (615) 742-5470* 
Nashville {04585}

NOTE: Related resources are available online at http://www.umc.org.

An UMC.org Feature
By Renee Elder*

In a city filled with Christians, Fred and Stacy Vanderwerf still find
themselves answering some probing questions about what their United Methodist
campus ministry is doing in Lviv, Ukraine.

While the questions may be tough, their answers are simple and forthright:
They are helping students grow in faith and develop a deeper relationship
with Christ.

"For some of the parents, especially, there seem to be legitimate concerns
about whether our faith could be identified as a sect," Stacy points out.

Protestant religions remain something of a mystery in this city traditionally
dominated by Greek Catholic, Russian Orthodox and Ukrainian Orthodox
congregations. The region also has seen a recent influx of religious sects.

"We explain to them about Protestants; and we are usually able to reassure
them," Stacy says. "We're actually glad when people ask questions. We've had
some wonderful conversations as a result."

The couple, who met and married while attending Asbury Theological Seminary
in Wilmore, Ky., began their Lviv ministry in 1999. After college, Fred, a
native of Minnesota, spent several months staying with friends in Ukraine,
where he met the Rev. William Lovelace, district superintendent for the
United Methodists in Ukraine.

"We felt God moving us in the direction of Ukraine," Fred says.

Lviv has a reputation as a city of and for intellectuals and with a large
number of college and universities, it seemed a place ripe for campus
ministry.

"It has been absolutely amazing to see how God has guided us here," Fred
says. "We have watched God take a group of three students who met in our
living room and totally transform our lives together with them. Also, the
group of three has grown to 30 in regular attendance for Bible study and
still many more for other weekly events. We have had to move out of our
apartment and use not only the living room but the whole place as meeting
hall, office and place of fellowship."

The Vanderwerfs and their son, Levi, who is almost a year old, live downtown
near many of the students.

Work in the Ukraine is part of the Russia Initiative, says Vladimir
Shaporenko, an executive with the United Methodist Board of Global
Ministries.

"We've worked with Ukraine for quite some time, since 1994-95," Shaporenko
says. "We have a number of organizations involved. We're working actively on
social issues, orphanages, schools, youth camps every summer. This is what
attracts people initially. But it takes years to break the ice."

Lovelace, the district superintendent, says there are 15 established
Methodist congregations throughout the Ukraine with about 1,500 members. 

"The strategy is to keep a missionary presence here and share the strengths
the Methodist Church has developed during its 300-year history in America,"
says Lovelace, who lives in Kiev. His wife, Helen, runs a humanitarian
program for street children.

Olia Tishkovets, 21, a senior at the Ivan Franco National University, is a
leader in the Vanderwerfs' program in Lviv. "We have Bible study once a week,
English club once a week, and then other small group meetings," she says. 

Like many of the students, she has belonged to the Greek Catholic Church most
of her life but found a special blessing with the Vanderwerfs. "This group is
very important for me," Tiskovets explains. "It has changed my life in a lot
of ways. It made my faith come alive... Our group is not about religion. It's
about faith."

This summer, students from Stacy Vanderwerf's hometown of Lubbock, Texas,
visited-leading the Pilgrims, as the Lviv campus ministry group is known, in
worship, study and fun.

The Americans' goal was forging friendships with the Ukrainian students and
inviting them to consider a deeper relationship with Christ, according to
Evie Burleson, a student at Texas Tech University. "I think Methodism
...allows for an open relationship, something they don't really have a
concept of over there," she says.

The 10 Texas students met with the Lviv students in the city and then led a
five-day retreat in the Carpathian Mountains. Amanda Hines, 23, an intern at
the Wesley Foundation in Lubbock and a member of the mission team, recalled
one particular prayer session as especially memorable.

"After one of the (Ukrainian) students started, a whole bunch started coming
up to pray with us," Hines says, recalling the joy on the Vandewerfs' faces.
"Stacy says they had been waiting four years for the time when their students
would finally open up and have a realization about community, about being in
prayer for each other and themselves, and being open about their faith."

*Elder is a freelance writer in Raleigh, N.C.

News media contact: Matt Carlisle, Nashville, Tenn., (615) 742-5153 or
newsdesk@umcom.org.

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United Methodist News Service