Czechia

Bohemia

The Czech Republic was originally known as Bohemia from the late 9th century AD to 1806. For most of their history Bohemia was a Catholic state. Jan Hus did lead a reform movement and seceded from the Catholic church in in the fourteenth century. Jan Huss taught the Church was made of its members and not the clerical hierarchy, and Jesus, not the pope, is it’s head. The Hussites were successful for a century fending off five crusades by the Catholic church, but they eventually were controlled by the Habsburgs. Then, from 1583 to 1611, Prague was the seat of the Holy Roman Emperor, embroiling the Czech people in the works based, Pope worshiping, religion.

Czechoslovakia

When the Habsburg dynasty collapsed, the new republic of Czechoslovakia was formed in 1918. During World War II much of modern-day Czechia was occupied by the Germans who expelled, enslaved, or killed many of the Czech people to make more space for Germans. After the war, Czechoslovakia was a part of the Soviet Union, who, along with the Nazis scrubbed religion from the nation. The Velvet Revolution in November of 1989 brought democracy back to Czechoslovakia, but not God.

The Czech Republic

In 1993 the Slovakians desired to be their own independent country again and so they split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Through their history, the Czech people have been left without the true religion. The Catholic church was dealt a blow by the Germans and all but wiped out by the Communists. Today, the Czech Republic is the 3rd most atheistic country in the world behind China and Japan, and 75-80% of the people claim no religion. When talking to the Czech people about church they only know of the Catholic church and have no interest in it as the priest’s self-interest has alienated the people. In bookstores the Bible can be found in the fantasy section next to the likes of the Lord of the Rings. Other than briefly in the fourteen and fifteen hundreds, the Czech people have had no Gospel witness and so they do not know the way to heaven or even that there is a way. The 10.5 million people of this European nation are a largely unreached people group who need messengers of the Gospel of Peace.

Czechia?

So why do we call it Czechia instead of the Czech Republic? In 2016 the Czech government approved a short name for the nation of Czechia. Just as you refer to the United States of America as the US or America, the Czech people have asked that you refer to the country casually as Czechia, but formally as the Czech Republic.