Bikivnya Forest on the outskirts of Kiev

My friend, Maksim Rakovich, took me into the Bikivnya Memorial Forest where it is estimated over 100,000 innocent Ukrainians were killed in 1937 by Stalin’s order. They were killed simply because they had an education or a business or a relative in Poland. They were killed because they were deemed “enemies of the State.”

Blood cries from the forests of Ukraine and from unearthed ditches in the cities. Russia was a vicious tyrant, frightened by the intelligence and good will of the Ukrainian people. The very people who helped save Russia from its own enemies were senselessly slaughtered.

I felt the sorrow in the ground and in the trees and in the very air itself. I felt the pain in Maksim’s heart as he described the horror of those days. The embroidered cloths represent a life. Each cloth has a beginning and an end. The embroidery represents the beautiful contribution of the lives so violently cut short. The KGB hired drunken thugs to carry out their murderous plan. On one tree I saw the picture of a young man with the dates 1902 to 1937. He was only thirty-five years old and shot in cold blood and buried like a beast. On another tree I saw the picture of a beautiful young woman killed for no reason whatsoever other than the demonic hate of Stalin and his henchmen.

From this sorrowful soil, from a history of triumph and terror, a beautiful church is emerging. The church of Ukraine will show us all how beauty rises from ashes and how the sharp cries of mourning turn to laughter. Out of the soil of Ukraine the beauty of the Gospel will grow and capture the imagination of the world.

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