communist leadership in 1989. Due to the work of new, mostly U.S. missionaries, the number of the Protestants in the country almost doubled by 2001 and is soon to overtake the number of the Roman Catholics in the country. According to estimates in 1991, the 5,000 to 6,000 Bulgarian Pentecostals made that denomination the largest Protestant group. The Pentecostal movement was brought to Bulgaria in 1920 by Russian emigrants to the United States. The movement later spread to Burgas, Yambol, Sliven, Plovdiv and Varna. It gained popularity in Bulgaria after freedom of religion was declared in 1944, and the fall of Zhivkov brought another surge of interest. In 1991 the Pentecostal Church had thirty-six clergy in forty-three parishes, with sufficient concentration in Ruse to petition the government to establish a Bible institute there. The Union of Evangelical Congregational Churches in Bulgaria is a Congregational church established by American missionaries in the late 19th century. In 2006 the Advent Christian Church had 7,637 Bulgarian members . The Adventist movement began in the Dobruja region of Bulgaria at the turn of the century and then spread to Tutrakan, Ruse, Sofia, and Plovdiv. It gained momentum in Bulgaria after 1944. During communism, mainstream Adventists maintained the right to worship. Some twenty parishes with forty pastors remained active through that era, although a breakaway reformed group was banned because of its pacifist beliefs. Some Adventists were imprisoned for refusal of military service. See also Orthodoxy in Bulgaria Roman Catholicism in Bulgaria References External links Institute for Bulgarian Protestant History, offering a rich online archive of publications and documents on the topic Helping Hands Bulgaria