Minni Kauts, a 77-year-old Lutheran, grew up 93 miles from Lasva, Estonia, in a village across the border in Russia. When she was a girl, Communists burned down the local Lutheran church. A few years later, during World War II, Germans burned down the whole village and moved the ethnic Estonians to a settlement in Lasva of about 1,500 people. Kauts stayed, married, raised a family and joined the Communist Party.
Recently widowed, Kauts now has grown increasingly active in the Pindi Church, part of the 200,000-member Estonian Evangelical Lutheran Church and a short walk from her home.
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