People and institutions of faith are needed in the effort to rescue Ukrainian children forcibly taken by invading Russian forces from their homes and families, child advocates say.
“Religious groups need to understand their power and to know the significant difference they can make if they get involved in this work,” said Gillian Huebner, co-leader of Bring Kids Back, a Ukrainian government initiative designed to coordinate international efforts to locate and return children abducted in the Russian invasion.
Gillian Huebner (Photo by Dan Gross)
Congregations and faith-based organizations “can make a really huge impact through advocacy and by being outspoken on this issue,” said Huebner, an advocate for international child rights and executive director of the Collaborative on Global Children’s Issues at Georgetown University.
While the need has been all too clear since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, the practice dates back even further to Russia’s illegal annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014.
Bring Kids Back estimates more than 19,550 children have been seized during the war, frequently after the murder of parents, being separated from captured families or being kidnapped from homes, schools and orphanages.
While more than 1,600 have been returned by various means to Ukraine or other safe locations, the forced removals continue, the group said. “It’s more than a tragedy; it’s a deliberate attack on Ukraine’s future.”
Those taken are sometimes transported to Russia, where they are placed with adoption agencies, which is a violation of international law, while others have been moved to Belarus, Crimea and other border territories, Huebner said.
Some victims have been indoctrinated and trained to fight against Ukraine, she added. “If that happens when they are under the age of 18, that would be considered child soldiering, which is a war crime.”
Grassroots and global efforts to find and return the thousands of remaining abductees continue to evolve, meanwhile.
“I have met quite a few mothers who have just gone to extreme lengths to rescue their kids.”
“I have met quite a few mothers who have just gone to extreme lengths to rescue their kids,” Huebner said. “They have put themselves in extraordinary danger to get them back. There has been an extraordinary effort on the part of aunties and grandmothers, as well.”
Groups like Save Ukraine, the International Coalition for the Return of Ukrainian Children and Bring Kids Back also are bringing expertise and resources to bear to find and return children kidnapped by Russia.
“A lot of people have been innovating along the way and there has been some extraordinary work by open-source intelligence researchers doggedly tracking where these kids have been taken,” Huebner said.
Those who have been rescued in some cases were removed in clandestine operations and underground railroad networks.
“Remember, in areas occupied by Russia you have nobody to talk to and the police are Russian controlled. In some cases, families have been able to maintain contact and in other cases the child reached out and a rescue operation was organized.”
Those rescued have shared harrowing stories about their captures, treatment and the deplorable living conditions endured at the hands of their captors, Bring Kids Back reported.
“I wanted to escape through the backyard but was afraid they might shoot me,” a 13-year-old survivor said. “So, I had to get in the truck with them. It was so scary.”
“I wanted to escape through the backyard but was afraid they might shoot me.”
Russian authorities explained to a 12-year-old girl that her removal from Ukraine resulted from being abandoned by a parent. “The Russians said that my mother did not need me and that I would be given to a foster family in Russia.”
Faith groups worldwide have become involved in the campaign to rescue Ukrainian children through advocacy and humanitarian aid.
Numerous U.S. religious leaders sent a letter to President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio in April urging them to pressure Russian President Vladimir Putin to return the abducted children to Ukraine.
“The forced deportation of nearly 20,000 Ukrainian children is not just a tragedy — it is a grave moral and legal atrocity. This is not an unfortunate consequence of war — it is a deliberate and systematic act of injustice,” according to the letter signed by groups such as World Relief, Baptist General Convention of Texas’ Christian Life Commission, Southern Baptist Convention Ethics and Religious Liberties Commission, National Association of Evangelicals, Women of Welcome, Family Research Council and several Catholic and Protestant congregations.
The letter was delivered at the height of the Trump administration’s drastic cutbacks on international aid, including funds assisting organizations working in Ukraine.
The groups explained how abducted Ukrainian children are subject to “political re-education,” illegal adoption and “forced assimilation” in Russia.
“The Russian government has denied Ukrainian children access to their families, subjected them to physical abuse and failed to provide them with adequate food and care,” the letter says. “We urge you, as leaders of the free world, to ensure that Ukraine’s children are returned home without precondition in advance of peace talks. Ukraine’s children must not be used as bargaining chips in geopolitical negotiations. Their safety, dignity and right to be reunited with their families must be non-negotiable.”
Huebner suggested congregations and religious leaders pressure their political representatives and also support groups like Save Ukraine, Bring Kids Back and World Relief in their efforts to find and return children abducted by Russia.
“For churches that want to engage in this, it’s not difficult to figure out how they can do that effectively,” she said.