About us
We are a Protestant church, the Olomouc congregation of the Baptist Union in the Czech Republic (Bratrská jednota baptistů).
The history of the Baptist church in Olomouc goes back to the 1960s. A small group of believers gathered in Olomouc. They attended the services of various local Protestant churches, but longed for a church community of their own. After long and difficult negotiations they were granted permission to establish a mission station. The Olomouc mission station, founded in January 1965, was attached to the church in Šumperk.
Services were held every Sunday afternoon in the prayer hall of the Church of the Brethren. Pastors came regularly from Šumperk. There were lively ties between Šumperk and Olomouc. The believers from Olomouc liked to travel to Šumperk, especially for baptisms or thanksgiving services, and those from Šumperk in turn came to Olomouc.
After the 1989 revolution the Lord added new brothers and sisters. The founding of the Bible School in 1991 (later the Dorkas College of Social Work and Theology, closed in 2019) played an important role in the life of the station at that time. Joint services began to be held on its premises. God blessed the mission efforts of the whole community.
In 1993 the station declared that it wanted to become an independent church. At the meeting of the Council of Church Representatives in Prague on 6 November 1993 this decision was confirmed, and the Olomouc church was accepted among the churches of the Baptist Union in the Czech Republic.
We see our church as one part of the church of Christ in Olomouc. Today our church has about 90 members and some 40 children. After 26 years (since becoming independent in 1993) we have our own premises in the former Lípa cinema building on tř. Svornosti. It is not a sacred space but a multi-purpose building, which we see as a gift and a tool from God. The church is made up of people, not a building. Our wish is that every person in Olomouc and the surrounding area would hear about Jesus’ love for people and find their place in God’s family.
History of the Baptists in the Czech Republic
Bratrská jednota (Brethren Union) – we identify with the legacy of the original Unity of the Brethren (Jednota bratrská), a bright chapter of our history. The Unity of the Brethren was faithful in preaching the gospel and in interpreting the Bible – the Holy Scriptures. For this faithfulness they were respected throughout the Christian world.
Baptists – this was originally a nickname given to our predecessors. It comes from the Greek word baptizein – to baptize, to immerse. It shows that we practice the baptism of those who have freely decided for the Lord Jesus Christ, believed the gospel, deeply repented and received from the Lord the grace of the forgiveness of their sins. On the basis of this faith they are baptized by immersion in water.
Our predecessors were the Anabaptists, who formed the radical wing of the worldwide Reformation. In the 16th century they were persecuted and wiped out for their faith. They fled to our lands from Switzerland through Germany and settled in South Moravia. There they founded “brethren courts” – communities of fifty to sixty families. They are known as the Habans. Their number reached as many as fifty thousand. These were communities strictly guided by the Bible. That is why they experienced God’s blessing and reached a high level in various crafts and in farming. After the Battle of White Mountain the Habans too had to leave Moravia, and the historical continuity with the Anabaptists was broken.
The worldwide Baptist movement developed from the early 17th century, especially in England and America, from where it spread to other countries. The first Czech Baptist church was founded in Hleďsebe near Veltrusy in 1885. It later moved to Prague. Further churches were founded – Brno, Jablonec nad Nisou, Vsetín, Praha-Pankrác. During the First Republic, extensive mission work gave rise to more churches – Bělá pod Bezdězem, Brno-Husovice, Zlín, Kroměříž, Lipová, Pardubice, Ostrava, Vikýřovice, Vysoké Mýto. After the Second World War many emigrants returned home and formed new churches in the depopulated Sudetenland – Aš, Cheb, Teplá, Žatec, Lovosice, Liberec, Šumperk. Today our union has 40 churches (local congregations) and about two thousand five hundred members. Worldwide, some 100 million people identify as Baptists.