Translate your church service into Russian

Slavic churches and their children

From the late 1980s, thousands of evangelical Christians from the Soviet Union came to the United States as religious refugees. Many settled around Sacramento, Seattle, Portland and Spokane, and founded Slavic Baptist and Pentecostal churches that are now large and well established. In those churches the services are in Russian, sometimes Ukrainian, and the grandchildren of the founders speak English first.

Many Slavic churches now run an English youth service or invite English-speaking guest speakers for conferences and revivals. That is where Russian translation helps: when a young pastor preaches in English, or a guest comes from another church, the older generation can follow in Russian without a whispering interpreter in the front row. When the main sermon is in Russian, set Russian as the speaker language so the youth and visitors can follow in English.

Russian speakers in English-speaking churches

Russian is also the shared language of many people who are not Russian. A software engineer from Kazakhstan, a nurse from Moldova and a family from Kyrgyzstan may all attend a nondenominational church in Denver or Charlotte, and Russian is the language they have in common. Live captions in Russian let them follow the whole sermon instead of catching every third sentence.

Russian and Ukrainian side by side

Many Ukrainians speak Russian, and some speak it at home. Since 2022, others prefer not to hear it in church. ChurchTranslate offers both, so you do not have to choose for anyone: switch on Russian and Ukrainian and let each listener pick. Each language only uses credits while someone listens to it, so offering both costs nothing extra on a Sunday when only one is used.

How it works

1. 01
   Scan the QR code

   Show it on the screens or send the link in the church's Telegram or WhatsApp group before the service.

2. 02
   Choose Русский

   The listening page opens in the browser. No account and no download are needed.

3. 03
   Listen and read

   With an earbud in, the sermon sounds in Russian a few seconds after the speaker, with captions on screen. Listeners can also show the original English text.

How good is it?

The translation follows a sermon, prayers and announcements well. Bible names, quotes and church terms are the hardest part, and Slavic evangelical churches have their own vocabulary built up over generations. ChurchTranslate keeps a terminology list per language and corrects known terms in the captions, but it will not always use the word your congregation expects. For a counseling conversation or a very personal moment, a Russian-speaking person remains better. See church interpreter or AI translation.

Cost

One credit is one minute into one language. A two-hour Sunday service with English preaching translated into Russian uses 120 credits. Four of those a month fit the Lite plan ($65, 480 credits). Conferences and revival weeks can be covered with an extra pack that never expires. See the pricing.