POWER AND «OPIUM OF THE PEOPLE»: ANTI-RELIGIOUS AGITATION AND PROPAGANDA IN SOVIET UKRAINE IN 1944–1991

Abstract

The article analyzes the implementation mechanism and organizational system of anti-religious agitation and propaganda in Soviet Ukraine. The author recorded a conflict between the republican and all-union centers for religious cults regarding the implementation of religious policies and atheization of the population. It is analyzed how the change in the state leadership of the USSR in 1954 led to a radical reassessment of the ideological struggle with religion as a relic of class formations in the minds of people.It was established that in the 1960s cinematographic works were actively involved in anti-religious propaganda. The actual number of regional commissioners to the Council for Religious Affairs also increased, committees for assistance were set up in all cities and districts of the regions, public councils for the coordination of anti-religious work were organized under the regional committees of the Communist Party of Ukraine. It was found out that within the framework of the atheistic education of society, the Soviet leadership introduced the concept of Soviet «non-religious» holidays and rituals, honoring the leaders of communist labor. The structural formalization of organizations responsible for the introduction of the new Soviet rituals in the 1970s is analyzed.The article describes the employment of the media resource and state publishing houses that published millions of copies of atheistic periodicals and literature for the sake of «eradicating the religious consciousness of the masses» by the party leadership. The reduction of state influence on the affairs of believers since the mid-1960s and the harsh criticism of the liberal course in relation to religion at the All-Union Conference of Commissioners for Religious Affairs in 1972 are analyzed. It is proved that, despite the «Perestroika», the idea of religion as a reactionary ideology and the need to transform the society of mass atheism into a society of general atheism prevailed in atheistic education.The author found out that in the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine a discussion on the importance of rethinking the strategy of religious policy to establish a dialogue with churches and guaranteeing believers the possibility of religious freedom began only in 1990.