BARANOVICHI, Belarus — Pastor Dmitry Osyko was fined about two weeks’ average wages Dec. 14 for leading a worship service in November in a private home in the western town of Baranovichi, a court official said.
The two homeowners, Stepan Paripa and Nikolai Pestak, were each fined more than one month’s average wages. Their Baptist congregation refuses to seek state registration, and officials arrived at the service to declare it illegal. “They can’t use a private home as a place of worship,” local religious affairs official Ruslan Krutko, who interrupted the service, said. “You couldn’t use a private home as a public toilet, could you?”
He said the church members need a registered place of worship to be able to “pray to God.” Church members insist that Belarus’ Constitution and Universal Declaration of Human Rights guarantee their right to meet for worship freely with others. Pastor Osyko is the latest of many religious leaders who have been fined for leading unregistered worship.
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