Preaching to a Strange NationrnWestern Evangelism and Russiarnby Wayne Allensworthrn”Receive me, then, O Lord and lover of Mankind, even as the harlot, as the robber,rnas the publican, as the prodigal…”rn—The Prayer of St. Basil the GreatrnThe Law on Religion passed this year by the Russian StaternDuma restricts the activities of “non-traditional” religionsrn(Russian Orthodoxy, Judaism, Islam, and Catholicism were accordedrn”traditional” status), requiring a religious group to havernbeen active in Russia for 15 years before acquiring certain legalrnrights, such as the right to own property. The law breezedrnthrough the Duma and was signed by Yeltsin. It is true that thernRussians attempted to portray the law as an attempt to curtailrnthe activities of dangerous “cults,” but everybody knew that thernreal target was Western Protestant evangelizing. The law’s proponentsrnwere effectively able to turn the ‘ote into a public testrnof loyalh: One is either “for” or “against” Russia. The voterncould be couched in such terms because the Russian OrthodoxrnChurch is to many Russians an indispensable part of the landscapernof their homeland and a determinate factor in Russianrnidentit). The familiar onion domes and icons are a warming,rnsoothing element of the Russian lands, like birch trees and therninterminable steppe, (hnagine the sensations, sensory and psychological,rne’oked in many Americans by an image of the tall,rnnarrow spires of whitewashed Protestant churches, surroundedrnby a canopy of oak trees, alongside streams traversed by woodenrnbridges which lead to the brick paved streets of the old. MainrnStreet America—an image that says “home.”) Manv Orthodoxrnchurches were defiled under the communists and lay in ruinsrnfor decades. They are just now beginning to be restored.rnThis imagery is especially evocative of the strong patrioticrnemotions in the post-communist period, when both thernChurch and the Russian nation, persecuted by the old regime,rnWayne Allensworth is a member of the Lutheran Church andrnthe author of The Russian Question: Nationalism,rnModernization, and Post-Communist Russia (Rowmanrn& Littlefield).rnare reviving themselves. The distrust of foreign missionaries isrnnot merely an expression of irrational xenophobia or residualrnSoiet political reflexes, but rather is rooted in a sense that thernWest wishes Russia ill. Since the Great Schism, Russia and thernWest have competed: first for the role of leader of Christendom,rnthen, when the old faith withered, for the messianic role of secularrnsavior of an imperfect world.rnMore to the point, however, is the recent past. Russia has implodedrnand been torn apart internally by nationalist-religiousrnconflict (the war in Chechnya was clearly a war against Russiarnand Russians living there and was driven, in part, by militant Islam);rnNATO, ignoring the collapse of the Warsaw Pact, is expanding,rnnearing Russia’s borders; international financial institutionsrnare attempting (admittedly, in exchange for moneyrnreadily taken by the central government) to dictate economicrnpolicy to the Russians, who are now buried in the rubble of arncollapse many blame, at least partly, on the machinations of thernlikes of Ceorge Soros and Geoffrey Sachs. Russian bookstores,rnmovie theaters, and TV programs are flooded with pornographyrn(both sexual and violent), hard rock music, and the hueksterismrnof consumerist advertising, all of which either originaternin the West or are inspired by Western practices. Simultaneously,rncults (the Moonies and worse) are making inroadsrnamong younger people, and foreign missionaries, loaded withrncash by Russian standards, are competing for the souls of Russiansrnwith the Orthodox Church, which is itself attempting anrninternal rejuvenation as it grapples with its stained past underrnthe Soviets. Catholics are embroiled with both the Russian andrnUkrainian Orthodox Churches over control of certain churchrnbuildings in western Ukraine where uniate congregations arernnow gathering. Protestantism, on the other hand, associatedrnwith consumerist capitalism (in Western as well as in Russianrneyes), is viewed by many Russians as the sure path to radical in-rnDECEMBER 1998/21rnrnrn