As Ukraine's political divisions play out on the geopolitical stage, the country also faces an unsettling schism among its main churchgoers.  Now Filaret says that Ukraine's growing political crisis is a signal from above that it's time to unite all of the Orthodox faithful into a single church.

Russia's dominant Orthodox Church unveiled its own channel on YouTube on Monday to attract young followers to a faith which has grown increasingly powerful since the fall of communism.

Now that the Russian Duma has approved the Day of the Baptism of Rus’ as a public holiday, leaders of Russia’s Islamic and Buddhist communities say they want their faiths to be recognized in the same way.