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Christianity in Azerbaijan is a minority religion. Christians who estimated between 280,000 and 450,000 (3.1%–4.8%) are mostly Russian and Georgian Orthodox. There is also a small Protestant Christian community which mostly came from Muslim backgrounds. Due to the very hostile relations between Azerbaijan and Armenia, Armenian Christians have practically entirely fled the country, and so the Christians in Azerbaijan are members of various other groups, mostly Russians.

History

Christianity spread to territory of present-day Azerbaijan in the first years of the new era. The first stage of this period is called the period of Apostles Bartholomew and Thaddeus (same ones who Christianized Armenia), who spread the new religion by the benediction of the first patriarch of Jerusalem Yegub.

Eastern Orthodoxy

Adherents of Eastern Orthodox Christianity in Azerbaijan are mainly ethnic Russians and Georgians. Russian Orthodox communities belong to the Russian Orthodox Church in Azerbaijan. Entire territory of Azerbaijan is under ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Russian Orthodox Eparchy of Baku and Azerbaijan, centered in the Holy Myrrhbearers Cathedral in Baku.

Oriental Orthodoxy

Adherents of Oriental Orthodox Christianity in Azerbaijan were mainly ethnic Armenians. The Armenian Apostolic Church had no community besides the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic until the ethnic cleansing of Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh. Before the outbreak of the war, Armenians formed the largest Christian population in the country. Today, Armenian churches in Azerbaijan remain closed, because of the massacres of Armenians in the 1990s and generally being banned from entering Azerbaijan. During the First Nagorno-Karabakh War, despite the constitutional guarantees against religious discrimination, numerous acts of vandalism against the Armenian Apostolic Church were reported throughout Azerbaijan. At the height of the Baku pogrom in 1990, the Armenian Church of St. Gregory Illuminator was set on fire, but was restored in 2004 and is currently used as library.

Other denominations

There is only one congregation in the Catholic Church in Azerbaijan: a church in Baku was opened in 2007.

There are eleven Molokan communities. The Molokans are a Protestant minority which, much like other Protestants, center their beliefs on the Bible and reject church hierarchy. There is also a German Lutheran community, likely to number less than 7,000 Protestants. According to Rev. Elnur Jabiyev, the former general secretary of the Baptist Union in Azerbaijan, up to 2010, there were eight or nine evangelical churches in Baku but these have now been prevented from openly meeting together by the authorities.

About 2.5% of the population belong to the Russian Orthodox Church (1998). The Russian Orthodox Church in Azerbaijan has the Eparchy of Baku and the Caspian region with a seat in Azerbaijan. Among the famous landmark Russian churches are Church of Michael Archangel and the Holy Myrrhbearers Cathedral; the once grand Alexander Nevsky Cathedral has been destroyed by the communists in 1937.

The Albanian-Udi Church, established in 2003, is of the Udi people minority in Azerbaijan.

See also

• Church of Caucasian Albania
• Russian Orthodox Church in Azerbaijan
• Georgian Orthodox Church in Azerbaijan
• Catholic Church in Azerbaijan
• Molokan
• Religion in Azerbaijan
• Christianity by country

Notes

1. "Global Christianity – A Report on the Size and Distribution of the World's Christian Population" (PDF). Pew Research Center. Archived (PDF) from the original on 1 February 2021. Retrieved 27 January 2022.
2. "5,000 Azerbaijanis adopted Christianity" (in Russian). Day.az. 7 July 2007. Archived from the original on 28 May 2013. Retrieved 30 January 2012.
3. "Christian Missionaries Becoming Active in Azerbaijan" (in Azerbaijani). Tehran Radio. 19 June 2011. Archived from the original on 19 February 2014. Retrieved 12 August 2012.
4. Православие в Азербайджане / Православие.Ru Archived 19 October 2013 at the Wayback Machine
5. United States Department of State, Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 1992 (Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, February 1993), p. 708
6. Memorandum from the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights to John D. Evans, Resource Information Center, 13 June 1993, p. 4.
7. Implementation of the Helsinki Accords: Human Rights and Democratization in the Newly Independent States of the former Soviet Union" (Washington, DC: U.S. Congress, Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, January 1993), p. 116
8. "Armenia Church Leader Meets Aliyev". Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. 27 April 2010. Archived from the original on 27 March 2023. Retrieved 28 May 2023.
9. "Idea online". Archived from the original on 22 August 2013. Retrieved 10 April 2020.
10. "Община – АЛБАНО-УДИНСКАЯ ХРИСТИАНСКАЯ ОБЩИНА" (in Russian). Archived from the original on 2 March 2012. Retrieved 30 November 2020.

Further reading

• De Cordier, Bruno; Boboc, Cristina (2017). "From Once-Dominant Minority to Historical Christian Outpost on the Southern Caspian: Azerbaijan's Orthodox Christians". Central Asian Affairs. 4 (4): 358–383. doi:10.1163/22142290-00404003.
• Adherents.com – Religion by Location: Azerbaijan
• Fahlbusch, Erwin, ed. (1999), "Azerbaijan", Encyclopedia of Christianity, vol. 1, Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, pp. 175–176, ISBN 0802824137

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