The persecuted church needs our help and support. “When the Church does not feel pain with those that are part of them, the Church's nerves ... become dead." Sabrina Wurmbrand, co-founder of The Voice of the Martyrs.
LITERATURE LIST - PERSECUTED CHURCH UNDER COMMUNISM
Standing with the persecuted church
This list contains Testimonies of the Persecuted Church under communism in the former USSR, Romania and Bulgaria, and of the Persecuted Church in nowadays communist China including the Uygur province, and North Korea.
Reading these testimonies may help us understand the situation of our Christian brothers and sisters in prisons and camps, help us identify and feel one with them, and may help us prepare for what we as western Christians might face in the near future.
These books are not about the suffering church but are testimonies from those who suffered themselves. At the same time they share about the great deeds of the Lord in their circumstances. Many prisoners for Christ testify, “The Lord Jesus was never so close to me as He was in my prison cell.”
Why this selection from testimonies from communist countries only? Because Christians from former communist countries recognise features from totalitarian communism emerging in our modern western society. See Live not by lies by Rod Dreher, the last book of this list.
Some of these books are still available from on line bookstores. From some titles only used copies are available for in some cases very high prices. Some are available for free from for instance Archive.
LITERATURE LIST
Title
Vanya
Author
Myrna Grant
Country
USSR
Out of the dark shadows of Soviet atheism rose a fearless young man whose boldness for Christ would make him a testimony to millions of believers around the world. This is the true story of Ivan (Vanya) Moiseyev, a soldier in the Soviet Red Army who was ruthlessly persecuted and incarcerated for his faith. Through two years of trial and torture, he never denied his Savior, and he never hesitated to share the gospel with anyone who would listen. You’ll be inspired to live for Christ in your own world as never before after you experience the gripping story of a believer named Vanya.
Title
Aida of Leningrad
Author
Myrna GraaMichael Bourdeauxnt
Country
USSR
Title
Irina - A love stronger than terror
Author
Hermann Hartfeld
Country
USSR
The true story of a young Russian woman who led a group of Russian Christians who want to enter into a dialogue with the government, hoping in this way to reduce the pressure, which was being exerted on the church. The dialogue, which Christians tried to enter into from honest motives, was turned into a farce by the government, which ended up in prisons and psychiatric institutions for Irina and her Christian friends.
The KGB itself informed the author Hermann Hartfeld that he would pay with death for publishing the KGB’s methods in Irina. He was imprisoned for seven years and eventually expelled from Russia.
Title
The KGB’s most wanted
Author
Joseph Bondarenko
Country
USSR (now Latvia)
The captivating story of a young pastor named Joseph, who in a twist of fate lived a life mirroring his biblical predecessor. The book exposes the realities and truths of Soviet Oppression that was hid to the outside world behind the Iron Curtain of the 1960’s. Inside the walls of the GULAG, Bondarenko faced near-starvation, beatings, torture and evil, seen and unseen, all because he boldly proclaimed the Gospel and refused to accept the ways of communism and the ways of the hammer and the sickle.
Title
Suffering, Martyrdom and Rewards in Heaven
Author
Joseph Ton
Country
Romenia
This book offers a comprehensive survey of these ideas through biblical and historical investigation from the time of the writing of the book of Job to the present. It advocates close attention to God’s original purpose for the creation of man as explanation for the complex issue of suffering and martyrdom. Suffering and martyrdom for the faith are always accompanied in the biblical literature with the promise of great rewards in heaven.
Title
Tortured for Christ
Author
Richard Wurmbrand
Country
Romenia
Months of solitary confinement, years of physical torture, constant hunger and the anguish of mental cruelty. All of these were experienced and witnessed by Romanian pastor Richard Wurmbrand during his 14 years in prison for his religious beliefs. This is his inspiring story of courage and faith.
Title
The diary of happiness
Author
Nicolae Steinhardt
Country
Romenia
Nicolae Steinhardt (July 12, 1912 – March 29, 1989) was a Romanian writer, Orthodox hermit and father confessor. In 1959, he refused to witness against a former school colleague. As a consequence, he was accused of “crimes of conspiracy against social order”,and sentenced to thirteen years of forced labor, in gulag like prisons.
Title
Tortured for Christ
Author
Haralan Popov
Country
Bulgaria
Haralan Popov was a successful minister in Bulgaria when he was arrested and sentenced to 15 years imprisonment as an American spy, at a widely publicized trial in Sofia. Enduring torture and brainwashing in communist prisons and labor camps, Haralan Popov remained faithful to God. After his release, Dr. Haralan Popov founded Door of Hope International in 1972.
Title
The eyes of the tailless animals - Prison memoirs of a North Korean woman
Author
Sook Ok Lee
Country
North Korea
As supervisor of the material distribution center, she was summoned outside to speak to the bureau chief, but was quickly shoved into a car. She did not return to her family that night and would not see her husband alive again. In prison, where she endured six years of inhumane treatment, Soon Ok Lee learned that her “crime” was refusing to satisfy the greed of a government officer. She witnessed the horrendous tortures and mass killings of Christians, and could not understand why they stubbornly refused to bend to the government’s demands that they deny their faith. A modern day equivalent of the Holocaust.
Title
Bold as a lamb (About Pastor Samuel Lamb)
Author
Ken Anderson
Country
China
In 1950 China’s Christians numbered about a million. Today, estimates range between 30 and 70 million! How did this body of believers grow so rapidly under atheism and materialism? Bold as a Lamb is the true story of Pastor Samuel Lamb. Imprisoned for more than twenty years for preaching the Gospel, he became the beloved secret pastor to hundreds of fellow inmates. After his release in 1978, he built a phenomenal “house church” congregation of more than a thousand.
Title
The Chief Witness: Escape from China’s Modern-Day Concentration Camps
Author
Alexandra Cavelius, Sayragul Sauytbay, etal.
Country
Northwest China, Uygur area
This book is not written by a Christian but is very likely that our brothers and sisters suffer from the same circumstances in prison as the author did.
This rare testimony from the biggest surveillance state in the world reveals not only the full, frightening scope of China’s tyrannical ambitions but also the resilience and courage of its author. In recent years, northwest China has become home to over 1,200 penal camps, modern-day gulags that are estimated to house three million members of its Kazakh and Uyghur minorities. Imprisoned solely due to their ethnicity, inmates are subjected to relentless punishment and torture, including being beaten, raped, and used as subjects for medical experiments. The camps represent the greatest systematic incarceration of an entire people since the Third Reich.
Title
Foxe’s Book of the Martyrs: 2000 years of martyrdom
Author
John Foxe
Country
Worldwide throughout history
In 1563, John Foxe began writing a book in tribute to Christian martyrs, beginning with Stephen, the first believer who died for the cause of Christ. He wanted the Church to remember the martyrs, for he knew that the blood of the martyrs truly is the seed of the Church. Martyrdom is not a thing of the past. The Christian Church continues to endure great persecution in many places around the world. In fact, more Christians were affected by persecution, including martyrdom, during the twentieth century than in all previous centuries combined. Listen to the cries of the martyrs, and let their faith, courage, and love touch your life.
Title
Live not by lies - A Manual for Christian Dissidents
Author
Rod Dreher
Country
Eastern Europe under communism: lessons for today
For years, émigrés from the former Soviet bloc have been telling Rod Dreher they see telltale signs of “soft” totalitarianism cropping up in America. He explains how the totalitarianism facing us today is based less on overt violence and more on psychological manipulation. He tells the stories of modern-day dissidents–clergy, laity, martyrs, and confessors from the Soviet Union and the captive nations of Europe–who offer practical advice for how to identify and resist totalitarianism in our time.
