FightLife Heals Armenia’s Disenchanted Youth With Sports and Christian Values

“Our Christian principles — of respect, forgiveness, and service to others — are the foundations of our community, where athletes feel supported not only physically but spiritually. Families are reassured by knowing their children are in a safe environment where faith is as central as fitness. This framework has helped parents see FightLife as more than a gym; it is a trusted institution shaping future leaders with discipline, compassion, and resilience,” said Ayvazyan.

As a sanctuary, FightLife is a healing outreach to those traumatized by the grave losses during the 2020 war, and Azerbaijan’s consequent ethnic cleansing in 2023, which forcibly displaced over 120,000 indigenous Armenians from their ancestral homeland. The displaced refugees were resettled across neighboring Armenia and other countries. Fifteen-year-old Erik Bagiyants’ displaced family settled in the city of Vanadzor. One of eight children, Bagiyants, who lost his father in the 2020 war, found it challenging to be among strangers in Vanadzor. When he found FightLife’s community, he found “strength and purpose” which encouraged his faith.

“I have chosen to fight harder, grow stronger, and carry the memory of my father as a motivation. For me, FightLife is a second family and the path toward reaching my dreams,” said Bagiyants.

A Ray of Hope Amidst Dire Social Challenges

Two of FightLife’s three gyms in Armenia are in Vanadzor, a city of 100,000, and one of the country’s most socially and economically challenged cities. Over the past five years, they city’s crime rates have reached nearly 40 percent. Petty theft, substance abuse, and street violence disproportionately impact the young population, who face higher unemployment and limited access to constructive social outlets.

“FightLife offers an alternative path: a place where discipline and sport can counteract the exterior social pressures, transforming potential vulnerability into strength and leadership,” explains Ayvazyan.

While most members at the Vanadzor gym are local youth, many travel long distances daily from the surrounding regions. Among them is fifteen-year-old Hamlet Darchinyan who travels 14 miles daily from his northern hometown of Spitak.

As the epicenter of the December 1988’s 6.8 magnitude earthquake, Spitak, Armenia, was leveled into rubble. The 11,000-populated city still carries the traumas of the devastating aftermath of the most destructive earthquake in the Soviet Union’s history, which left 25,000 dead, 20,000 injured, and half a million inhabitants in the region homeless.

“Hamlet’s parents work as bakers in Russia and sacrifice a significant portion of their earnings to cover his daily taxi fees, so he can maintain his training. This sacrifice is worth it for his parents, who see FightLife’s positive impact on their son’s faith, character, discipline, and future,” Ayvazian said Hamlet’s father didn’t take his son to Russia seeing how FightLife’s impact on his son’s growth has made him “a stronger, better version of himself.”

This March, FightLife opened a third gym in the northern rural village of Tsaghkahovit. With just over 2,000 in population, the village sits on the slopes of the 4090-meter-high Mount Aragats — the highest point in the Republic of Armenia.

Guided By Personal, Lived Challenges

Born in Russia, Georg Ayvazyan and his mother moved to Vanadzor when he was 3, having just lost his father in a car accident. With the city steeped in youth drug and alcohol addiction and street violence, Ayvazyan took up martial arts at age 13 for self-defense and to stay clear of the crime-ridden influences.

Following the 2020 war, Ayvazyan saw the younger generation’s demise into the “darkness of addiction and street violence.” Leading a team, he established the first “Christian martial arts gym” in Vanadzor, naming it FightLife. It provided the youth training and guidance for a healthier lifestyle, away from addiction and violence–forces which Ayvazyan withstood as a youth.

Ayvazyan is also the father to two daughters and an 11-year-old son who is a mixed martial arts fighter at the FightLife Vanadzor gym. He proudly recounted his team’s faith-based sportsmanship at a recent international competition when a FightLife athlete defeated his Azerbaijani opponent and celebrated the win without too much fanfare. When Ayvazyan noticed the young Azerbaijani fighter’s coach harshly reprimanding him for losing the match, he approached the young athlete, and extending “a true spirit of sportsmanship” assured him of future victories.

“In choosing compassion, we demonstrated that even in the midst of national conflict, humanity and respect must prevail,” said Ayvazyan.

With emphasis on “Sport, Nation and Faith,” Ayvazyan hopes 10 additional FightLife gyms will soon sprout across rural regions “where youth lack spiritual direction and safe, structured environments.”

“Greater participation in international competitions will give young athletes the exposure and experience needed to elevate their careers and demonstrate the unbreakable spirit of the Armenian people. At its core, FightLife is not simply a set of gyms — it is a movement that provides young Armenians the tools to overcome trauma, build character, and find hope amidst difficulties. Every punch, every training session, every victory in the ring carries a larger meaning: that strength, when guided by faith and respect, can transform lives and communities,” Ayvazyan cited the transformational powers of FightLife in Erik Evoyan’s life.

Following his army service completion, Evoyan got involved in alcohol abuse and destructive behaviors to cope with his trauma as a veteran. Finding the FightLife community gave him a fresh start, a new direction with intense discipline, training, a newly discovered faith in God, and unconditional support from the FightLife community. Replacing alcoholism with boxing, Evoyan reinvented his lifestyle, and focusing on perseverance, earned the 2024 and 2025 Suzuki Boxing Championship in Poland.

“No matter how dark your past, there is always a way forward through hard work, discipline, and faith,” said the twenty-four-year-old Evoyan, now one of FightLife’s inspiring coaches who shares his story of resilience, motivating other young athletes.

(This article originally ran in euronewsweek.co.uk in November. Jackie Abramian is committed to amplifying the work of women peace-builders, change makers and social entrepreneurs. She is a social enterprise advisor and the founder of Global Cadence consultancy.)