Category - communism

Churches remember 'holy disorder' and the fall of the Berlin Wall

Ecumenical News International — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 09:40:46 +0100

A prayer service for peace in the East German city of Leipzig exactly 20 years ago triggered the chain of events that a month later led to the opening of the Berlin Wall.

Hungary recalls end of Iron Curtain with mixed emotions

Stephen Brown — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 01:00:22 +0100

Hungary has marked the 20th anniversary of a symbolic opening of the Iron Curtain, which once separated it from neighbouring Austria, amid warnings from churches that Europe remains divided.

East German Protestants remember their day of liberation

Stephen Brown — Sat, 09 May 2009 01:00:11 +0100

A regional Protestant church in former East Germany has launched a special Internet blog to mark the 20th anniversary of rigged elections in May 1989 that led to protests which helped end 40 years of communist rule.

East Germany's peaceful revolution remembered in church campaign

Stephen Brown — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 22:52:43 +0100

Christians in eastern Germany have launched a campaign to mark the 20th anniversary of the peaceful revolution that overthrew communism, with a light sculpture shone onto the walls of the regional parliament building in Erfurt.

Czech churches become financially distinct from state

Ecumenical News International — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 07:27:08 +0000

The Czech government has agreed, after almost two decades of dispute, to compensate churches for properties confiscated under communist rule, and also to make them financially independent from the state. The details are being sorted.

Stalin's victims remembered at site of church used for killing field

Ecumenical News International — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 09:40:42 +0000

President Putin has attended a memorial service conducted by Patriarch Aleksei II, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, at a church built near a Soviet police secret killing field, to commemorate the victims of Josef Stalin.

German Protestant warns churches against being kidded by capitalism

Ecumenical News International — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 18:38:00 +0100

An East German Protestant who played a big role in the movement that led to the end of communism and the Berlin Wall in 1989, has warned against the church becoming seduced by the "friendly embrace" of capitalism.

Post-communist churches challenged to find responses to consumerism

staff writers — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 08:20:54 +0100

Perseverance, a cardinal virtue that enabled them to survive decades of Soviet domination, is "no longer enough" for Estonian churches confronting "a newly materialistic" culture.

Is Marx's gospel a dead letter?

Simon Barrow — Wed, 16 May 2007 09:14:08 +0100

Responding to Pope Benedict's strictures on Marxism and the Christian message, Jordan Tchilingirian, researcher for the religious thin-tank Ekklesia, commented today that peoples’ views of Marx

Polish Christians face moral dilemmas of communist era

Ecumenical News International — Sun, 13 May 2007 16:08:02 +0100

Attempts to bring to justice past participators in human rights abuses in communist-era Poland are raising moral dilemmas for Protestant and Catholc Christians across the country. New law makes the issues unavoidable.