The Church in Croatia
Throughout the 1900s, Croatian Latter-day Saints who embraced the restored gospel overseas returned to then-Yugoslavia to share their faith, establishing the gospel in their home country. Today Croatian Latter-day Saints continue to share their faith and serve in their communities.
History of the Church in Croatia
In the early 1900s, a few Croatian converts who had joined the Church abroad returned to share the gospel in their homeland. John Stosich (also known as Janko Stošić), who was baptized in the United States, preached as a missionary in Zagreb in 1911. Eviza Arbić Vujičić, who was baptized in Hungary, returned to Yugoslavia in 1918, and she kept the faith in relative isolation until her death in 1937.
In 1971 another Croatian joined the Church abroad: basketball player Krešimir Ćosić embraced the restored gospel while a student at Brigham Young University. Later, over the course of his professional basketball career in Croatia, he was a shining example of how members of the Church strive to live. Ćosić helped translate the Book of Mormon into Serbo-Croatian, and he also helped secure permission for missionaries to enter Croatia.
The first branch in Croatia was organized in 1974 in Ćosić’s hometown of Zadar. The Church continued to spread to other cities, and a district was formed in 1980, with headquarters in Zagreb. In 2012 nearly 400 people from Croatia and its neighboring areas gathered near Zadar to commemorate the local history of the Church and to train leaders for its future.
Stories of Faith
More Areas of the Church
Notes
- Campbell, Beverly, Ann Madsen, and Ankica Ostarčević. Kresimir Cosic: His Own Spiritual Journey. Provo, Utah: Y Mountain Press, 2014.
- Četrdeseta obljetnica od osnutka Crkve Isusa Krista svetaca posljednjih dana. Adriatic North Mission, 2012. Church History Library, Salt Lake City.
- Davis, Dick, and Duane Hiatt. “Kresimir Cosic—Basketball and Baptism.” New Era, Feb. 1974, 8–13.
- Mehr, Kahlile B. Mormon Missionaries Enter Eastern Europe. Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University Press, 2002.