Ukraine is fighting against Russia while families search for children taken from occupied territories. Policymakers in Washington debate aid levels and the scope of Ukrainian strikes into Russia. Former Miss Ukraine and Christian advocate Lika Roman says the world must view the war through the eyes of abducted children and persecuted believers.
Roman grew up in western Ukraine near the Slovak border and she says she “received Jesus into her heart” at 8 years old. She studied international relations at university, worked in a beauty salon, and turned down modeling contracts in Japan because she did not “feel peace.” A client later invited her to a national beauty contest; she prayed, accepted, and won Miss Ukraine 2007.
Her mission is now to help Ukrainian children taken by Russian occupiers. “The most valuable thing that we have is people and their lives, and especially children,” she says.
Roman cites 20,000 Ukrainian children already reported stolen and says “the numbers are much, much higher.” She tells lawmakers, “We are their voice,” and adds that “it is not only numbers, it is the names of the kids, it is their stories.” She says most of those children have parents or relatives in Ukraine. “Can you imagine how it is to be separated and they do not know what is happening with their kids? It is heartbreaking.”
Faith communities have shaped her advocacy. She says that a congressional resolution on abducted children “originally came from the faith community,” and she visits Washington to support it.
She also speaks for pastors and believers under occupation. “I am representing all the believers and pastors on the east of Ukraine who are tortured and imprisoned and their churches are taken from them,” she says. “There is no freedom of faith there.”
The full-scale invasion in 2022 changed her work overnight. Roman planned to speak at a youth conference in Melitopol on Feb. 24 but, after feeling “no peace,” decided to cancel. Within days Russian forces occupied the city and imprisoned the pastor who invited her. She left Ukraine on the first day of the war and traveled to a Polish border town that became a massive refugee hub. There she joined faith-based teams. “I was helping them not to be sex trafficked,” she says, describing how she connects families to pastors and nonprofits and gives out her phone number to Ukrainians boarding buses to unfamiliar destinations.
She says Russia is not winning the war and argues that Russian forces “are terrorizing and terrorizing.” She is thankful for Western help, saying support from Americans and Europeans is “standing for values, what we really believe is freedom.”
Hope for wounded soldiers comes through another Christian witness, international speaker Nick Vujicic, who was born without limbs. Roman helped organize an event where he encouraged veterans who lost arms and legs in earlier fighting. She says if he can live a “very full life and meaningful life,” then they can as well.
