Can this Hungarian church survive Orban?

The World

Earlier this year, 30 armed officers from Hungary’s tax authority raided the offices of the Hungarian Evangelical fellowship. The authorities accused the church of “regularly deducting contributions from employees between 2015 and 2019.” But this is just the latest in a long series of attacks by the Hungarian state against the church, which is led by Pastor Gábor Iványi, one of President Viktor Orban’s fiercest critics, and once a longtime ally. The US Congress’s Commission on Security and Co-operation in Europe says Hungary’s government “may be trying to squeeze Ivanyi’s fellowship out of existence.” The church operates a network of homeless shelters, schools and elderly homes. Can it survive?

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