Free Religious Communities in the North-West of Russia Between 1917 and the Late 1920s

Abstract

The article deals studies the existence and activities of the free Protestant communities (Baptists, Evangelists, Adventists, Pentecostals) in Petrograd/Leningrad and the Russian North-West, from establishment of Soviet power until the end of the 1920s. Soviet power had mixed consequences for the free communities. On the one hand, the new ruling party’s generally negative attitude to religion and its orientation towards constructing an atheist society had negative consequences for all religious organizations. On the other hand, due to elimination of the state church, free communities acquired equal rights with other religious groups. During the first years of Soviet power, anti-religious repressions centered first and foremost on the Russian Orthodox Church. The attitude of the new regime towards religious sects that were previously oppressed under the tsarist regime was more tolerable. Atheist propaganda in the 1920s was not so active as in the next decade. Confiscatory measures against church organizations had less serious consequences for free communities that did not possess considerable assets or real estate. During the 1920s, due to the difficulties experienced by the Orthodox, Roman-Catholic, and Lutheran churches, the free sects managed to intensify their activities and to expand their influence among the believers in the North-West, especially among the ethnic minorities (Finns, Estonians, Latvians, Germans). This situation had lasted until the late 1920s, when a total offensive against religion was initiated.