The Kalininsky District Court of St. Petersburg fined the Church of Evangelical Christians “Awakening Nations” 50 thousand rubles under a protocol on participation in the activities of an “undesirable organization.” This was reported by the joint press service of the city courts.
According to the court, the Awakening Nations Church on August 8 “took part in the activities of an international religious organization” «Covenant of the TCCN Churches», which the Prosecutor General's Office declared «undesirable» on June 8 of this year (Article 20.33 of the Administrative Code).
The court concluded that the Awakening of Nations church from 27 July 2020 to June 26, 2023 was part of the “Covenant of Churches”, as reported on its page on VKontakte and YouTube channel.
In the public page of the St. Petersburg «Awakening of Nations» on VKontakte there is now one publication dated August 17, which states that the church «previously ceased participation in any joint projects» with TCCN, and also interrupts «all communication with any groups or associations» Testament of the TCCN Churches.»
Pastors Irina Sekacheva and Anton Martirosov emphasized that their church in St. Petersburg has never participated in the financing of TCCN, “is not its structural unit,” “does not share its beliefs” and “does not organize any events on its behalf » They added that they demanded that Testaments remove references to Awakening Nations and references to the church from all resources.
However, the court found that the church continued to be a member of TCCN, since it published recordings of sermons on which the symbols of the “Testaments” are visible.
According to the Prosecutor General’s Office, the “Testament of Churches TCCN” sent collected parishioners made donations to “the Armed Forces of Ukraine and Ukrainian terrorist organizations,” and US citizen Andrei Shapovalov, who runs the organization, “created a destructive association whose activities are aimed at suppressing the identity of followers in order to collect funds.”