For such a long time I thought that Christianity only came to the area of Rus, present day Ukraine, in 988 when Prince Volodymyr was baptized and forced all citizens to be baptized. As I have come to know and now share with you, my readers, Christianity’s advent into the area much predates that Baptism of Ukraine as we celebrate it.

In the last issue of this Bulletin, I shared with you that SS Cyril and Methodius first came to this area in 860. They stopped Chersonesus in Crimea, where they met a Rusyn and discovered a Gospel and Psalter written in the language of Rus. With the help of the local bishop, Georgiy, they also discovered the relics of St. Clement, Pope of Rome, who was martyred in the Crimea in the 1st century. In 867 they presented the relics of Clement to Pope Adrian II. It was after this trip to the Crimea that Cyril, with the assistance of his brother Methodius, developed the Cyrillic alphabet and began to translate religious texts into Slavonic.

In their chronicles Greek authors John Zonaras, Michael Glycas and others wrote that Rus converted to Christianity during the reign of Askold and Dyr and that Byzantium sent an archbishop there.

In 874 Patriarch Ignatius sent a bishop to Rus and established an Eparchy in Crimea which was juridically subordinate to the Patriarch of Constantinople.

Oleh, Prince of Novgorod, conquered Kiev, killed the Kievan princes Askold and Dyr and forced citizens back to paganism.

Christianity was, however, widespread in Peremyshl at the time when St. Methodius was the archbishop of Moravia.

Prince Oleh signed in 911 a treaty with the Greeks and peoples from Rus began to visit Byzantium. In 945 Prince Ihor, who followed Prince Oleh, signed another treaty with Byzantinum. This treaty was the first document in Kievan Rus to recognize Christianity.

Upon the death of Grand Prince Ihor, his wife, Olha, became the ruler of Kiev, because of their son Svyatoslav’s minor age. During her reign (959) she converted to Christianity.

Prince Volodymyr emerged victorious from the fratricidal war among the sons of Svyatoslav. He steadily came under the influence of Christians. Of his five wives, four were Christian. In 988 he led an assault on a Crimean city which was a major Byzantine colony. After taking the city, he demanded that the Byzantine   emperors give him their only sister, Anna, in marriage. The emperors agreed but   insisted upon a precondition to the marriage, namely Volodymyr’s conversion to Christianity.

Through this whole story we see the movement of God in bringing Christianity to a people. Byzantium has, throughout the history of this area, been the major religious force.

I am sure that most people only think about Christianity coming to the area that was known as Rus in the 10th century when Volodymyr the Great had all of the citizens of his kingdom baptized (988). The roots of Christianity, as you will see, were already planted in this area of the world much earlier.

In the 2nd century the Crimean Christian community was replenished by Christian, Greek and Jewish exiles banished by Emperor Trajan. Then in the 2nd and 3rd centuries the Goths, who actually migrated from Scandinavia in the 1st century and settled on the southern shores of the Baltic Sea and the lower portion of the Vistula River, moved to the area between the Don and the Dniester rivers, settling southward, along both banks of the Dnieper river. They destroyed the Greek colonies along the Black Sea as well as all signs of   Christianity. However, Christians captured by the Goths spread their religion among their captors. Once the Roman Empire recognized Christianity early in the 4th century (i.e., Edict of Milan 313), a large portion of the Goths also converted.

During the 3rd century the first Scythian Eparchy was established in the city of Toma, later called Constance. It served Christians along the Black Sea between the Dniester and Dnieper rivers. A bishop by the name of Evanhelic actually served in that area between 284-292 CE.

The Church historians writing during the 3rd to 5th centuries considered Scythia to be one of the countries where Christianity was established. A number of them attest to the fact that St. Andrew was in Scythia. This is probably why the Slavic three-bar cross is called the Cross of St. Andrew.

Small stone and marble crosses were widespread among the Christians in the Kiev region and in Volynia. They date from between the 4th and 5th centuries. They are not symmetrical and have no images.

Crosses found that date from the 6th century depict the suffering of Christ while 7th century crosses show Christ’s crucifixion together with other references to his death. These crosses were discovered during archeological digs in this area in the 19th and 20th centuries.

Syrian and Armenian writings first use the term “Rus” to refer to the lands north of the Caucasus. In later years the term was applied to the lands around present-day Chernihiv and Pereyaslav.

By the end of the 8th century, Christian communities were organized in the middle and upper Dnieper areas. In the 20^th century archeologists discovered Christian burial grounds in those areas dating from the 8th century.

In 860 the first bishop was assigned to Rus to minister to Christian communities composed of Varangians and Slavs and SS Cyril and Methodius visited this area