Personal, political and religious freedoms

Question 1

How did the Tsars and Communists limit personal freedoms?

Answer 1

• By using the legal system, the police and armed forces, propaganda and censorship

Question 2

How was the orthodox church useful to the Tsars?

Answer 2

• It acted as a useful form of social control

Question 3

How was the church treated under the communists?

Answer 3

• Religion was considered the ‘opium of the people’ (the view that religion was like a drug that took peoples minds away from worrying about social and economic problems.)
• Immediately after the 1917 revolution it appeared that the church would be left to its own devices
• Bolsheviks made the ‘Decree on the separation of the Church from the State and School from the Church’

Question 4

What were the restrictions on church?

Answer 4

• Withdrawal of state subsidies
• Prevention of religious groups from possessing property
• Anti religious pressure groups designed to promote atheism were encouraged, such as the 1925 League of Militant Godless

Question 5

How did Stalin deal with churches?

Answer 5

• He continued to close churches and many of the clergy suffered during the Great Terror of the 1930s.
• By 1938, there was only 16 working orthodox churches. compared with 224 in 1930, and the number of clergy had been reduced by 60%.

Question 6

How did Khrushchev deal with Churches?

Answer 6

• He believed that in order to speed up the implementation of communism, religious prejudices had to be eradicated.
• The Twenty - second Party Congress of 1961 issued a new ‘moral code’ which was essentially a substitute for the bible.

Question 7

How were non orthodox members treated?

Answer 7

• Most leaders either encouraged conversion to orthodox church or resorted to restriction of practice.
• For example, a law in 1883 gave Old Believers the right to meet in their houses of prayer but banned any public promotion of their beliefs.
• Nicholas II in 1905 allowed Orthodox believers to convert to other Christian denominations.
• But in 1910, the rights of a non orthodox were restricted, with the Baptists being hit worst.

Question 8

How were minority religious groups treated?

Answer 8

• An official anti religious campaign launched in 1958 meant that religious activity of any kind was under scrutiny unless it was conducted in an official place.

Question 9

What happened to religion in 1958?

Answer 9

• Religion was considered officially to be unscientific and therefore to the detriment of the well being of the people.