Soviet Evangelicals Since World War II, Walter Sawatsky, 1981

nce. The first year of the program was well received, but only one Soviet student from Estonia was present.56 BWA and EBF actions have been hampered by their own constitution. According to the constitution of the BWA, the organization may accept an additional Baptist union into membership only if Baptist unions from that country already in the BWA give their approval. For this constitutional reason they were prevented from interfering in the split that took place in the Soviet Union, and prevented from establishing relations with the Reform Baptists directly. But that is a formal argument—the ruling might easily have been broken. Just after the split became irrevocable in 1961, A. I. Mitskevich had himself urged the BWA leaders to interfere by sending its workers with recognized authority to countries where there were divisions.57 But when even minor references to persecution of the Initsiationiki were made at an EBF Congress in 1965, Russian leaders became very upset and threatened to walk out. EBF leaders did not consider themselves in a posi- tion to call their bluff and were reduced to wishing other believers would take up the cause of the Initsiativniki. The early failure to hear and understand the Initsiationiki appeal damaged the reputation of the BWA. As early as 1963 the Initsiativniki had sent a letter to the president and general secretary of the BWA, informing them of the split and that the Moscow leadership had been excommuni- cated.°8 The Initsiativniki also tried to establish contact with William Tolbert, president of the BWA (1965-70), as well as president of Liberia. Tolbert visited the Soviet Union in 1970 and in published remarks greatly disappointed the hopes of the CCECB. Bratskii Vestnik reported him as saying: “I would also like to remind this group of Baptists (CCECB) that ‘to go along this road is wrong. Indeed it is wrong to ignore the laws of the 376 Soviet Evangelicals Since World War Il country or to permit disobedience, and also to treat the authorities with dis- respect.”5® A more specific statement in support of state policy the au- thorities could scarcely have hoped for. No other Baptist leader has condemned the CCECB leaders as strongly in public. Most of the other BWA leaders were deeply embarrassed by Tolbert’s remarks and no doubt embarrassed that Tolbert had not been properly briefed, that he did not even know of the existence of the Reform Baptists before his trip. But the BWA remains severely hampered to the present in its ability to respond to the Reform Baptists because of the veto powers of the AUCEGB. German immigrants from the Soviet Union, some of them hav- ing been charged by Russian congregations before their departure to represent them at the World Baptist Congress in Stockholm in 1975, asked permission to attend the congress. Unofficial talks wer