Political Religion and Pragmatics in Soviet Atheisation Practice: The Case of Post-Stalinist Soviet Lithuania

Abstract

ABSTRACT The article discusses the outcomes of Soviet attempts to create an atheist society. It uses the concepts of political pragmatics and political religion to explain the kind of secular society Soviet atheisation politics created. It claims that the politics of secularization was led primarily by political pragmatics in order to build a society of loyal Soviet citizens rather than by the dogmatically declared claim of creating a society of atheists with strong materialist views. The article focuses on political measures to develop a non-religious worldview (or ethics) in Soviet Lithuania in the 1960–1980s: the authority's motivation to promote secular ethics, the efforts to institutionalize the ethical search, and the acknowledged failures in satisfying the needs of the society. It shows that by the end of the 1980s, atheisation policies had resulted in a plurality of secular worldviews: ideological as well as religious indifference, secular humanism, New-Age like spiritualism, and even neo-paganism.