Religious Life in the Late Soviet Union

From Survival to Revival (1960s-1980s)

Barbara Martin, Nadezhda Beliakova, Barbara Martin, Nadezhda Beliakova

• Publisher: Taylor & Francis
• Year: 2023
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9781000930436
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Ethnic Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

This book presents the first large overview of late Soviet religiosity across several confessions and Soviet republics, from the 1960s to the 1980s. Based on a broad range of new sources on the daily life of religious communities, including material from regional archives and oral history, it shows that religion not only survived Soviet anti-religious repression, but also adapted to new conditions. Going beyond traditional views about a mere "returned of the repressed", the book shows how new forms of religiosity and religious socialisation emerged, as new generations born into atheist families turned to religion in search of new meaning, long before perestroika facilitated this process. In addition, the book examines anew religious activism and transnational networks between Soviet believers and Western organisations during the Cold War, explores the religious dimension of Soviet female activism, and shifts the focus away from the non-religious human rights movement and from religious institutions to ordinary believers.

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half-Title Page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication Page
• Contents
• List of Figures
• List of Contributors
• List of Abbreviations and Acronyms
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1 Change of Ritual Practice under Communism: The Case of the Russian Orthodox Church in Soviet Ukraine in the Late 1950s to Early 1970s
• 2 The Erosion of Tradition: Life Cycle Rites among the Orthodox in the Kama River Region (1950s–1980s)
• 3 The Rybnitser Rebbe and Underground Jewish Religious Life in the Soviet Town of Rybnitsa (1960s–1970s)
• 4 Funeral and Memorial Rites of Moscow Muslims in the 1960s–1980s
• 5 The Boundaries of Legality as an Approach to the Study of Soviet Religious Policy: The Case of Evangelical Christians-Baptists
• 6 Trying to Leave the Religious Underground: Registration of Catholic Communities in Late Soviet Kazakhstan
• 7 The Activism of Soviet Pentecostals in the 1960s–1980s
• 8 Gender Specificity of Protest Activism in Unregistered Groups of Evangelical Christians-Baptists in the Late Soviet Union
• 9 A Christian Feminism in the USSR?: A Historical Overview of the Religious Women’s Club “Mariia” (1980–1982)
• 10 Startsy, Samizdat and Underground Seminars: The “Parallel Polis” of Young Russian Orthodox Converts in the 1970s–1980s
• 11 Anatolii Vaneev’s Circle as a Phenomenon of Informal Church Community in Leningrad in the 1970s–1980s
• 12 Longing for Truth, Morality, and Enchantment: Late Soviet Spiritual Searches and Journeys to Islam, 1970s–1980s
• 13 The Entry of Indian Spiritual Movements into the Cultural Space of Soviet Latvia in the 1970s–1980s
• 14 Astrological Samizdat in the Context of (Post-)Soviet Esoteric Culture
• Index