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p Leonid Brezhnev called the new USSR Constitution adopted in October 1977 a concentrated result of the path travelled by the Soviet people over the past 60 years. This outstanding document of our era is a striking manifestation of the triumph of the ideas proclaimed by the October Socialist Revolution and of successful realisation of Lenin’s behests. Together with the economic and political achievements of mature socialism, with its enormous progress in spiritual development, the USSR Constitution reflects the major gains of socialist democracy and the Soviet people’s broad rights and freedoms. Freedom of conscience takes a prominent place in the system of political rights and freedoms realised in the USSR Constitution.

p Under the Constitution, Soviet citizens may profess any religion or none at all. The right to profess any religion is assured by equality of all religions under law and the absence of privileges for any particular denomination. Believers are free to convert to any faith. They are given the right to form religious societies and groups for public worship provided these arc properly registered with the government authorities.

p Religious societies are allowed only to satisfy the religious 64 needs of their members. They do not have the right to set up mutual aid funds or impose levies on believers.

p Religious charities have nothing to do with worship and are alien to the socialist system. Soviet people have long been rid of poverty, hunger and unemployment—those incurable diseases of capitalist society. The Soviet state has taken all responsibility for social security, health and leisure of people on itself. Charity by individuals and church organisations in these conditions would offend the sense of pride and honour felt by all Soviet citizens.

p Religious organisations are forbidden to organise and hold special prayer or other meetings for children, teenagers and women as well as general Bible schools, literary, needlework, trade schools and groups to teach religion. They are also not allowed to arrange sightseeing tours, to build children’s playgrounds and to open libraries and reading rooms. Children and minors under the age of 18 cannot be members of religious societies. This rule is applied even to those religious associations where the canons provide for personal membership.

p Believers of all denominations are allowed to worship unimpeded and to perform religious rites, provided the latter do not involve violations of public order and are not accompanied by actions that infringe on individuals’ personal rights, honour and dignity. Soviet legislation on worship prohibits any coercive measures or the use of force in matters of faith.

p Religious societies employ choir singers, regents and other persons serving the religious needs of believers.

p Once a religious association has been registered in accordance with the established procedure, its members may gather in churches or other places of worship for public prayers without hindrance. Religious buildings and articles intended for divine service are the people’s property. The state has given the buildings, religious articles and church furniture to the communities of believers free of charge. Religious associations and centres may purchase vehicles, manufacture church-plate and buy buildings for the church’s needs in accordance with legal procedure.

p The founders of a religious society are given a public prayer building and other property by arrangement with the appropriate district or city Soviet of People’s Deputies and they are held responsible for the safety and integrity of the people’s property 65 entrusted to them, as well as for maintaining order at the place of worship. Inasmuch as the public prayer buildings and other property are given over to believers, representatives of the clergy cannot l>e among the founders and members of the executive body of a religious association. The believers who have accepted the religious property for their use pledge to take care of it, carry out repairs, and pay for obligatory insurance. They also promise to use this property solely for their religious needs. The founders are obliged to keep an inventory which includes all new articles—donated by believers or purchased with church funds—in order to ensure safety of the property and other valuables belonging to the state. The celebration of rituals and preaching as part of divine service are done freely in houses of prayer without any interference from the state authorities, provided they are entirely religious in content and are not aimed at inciting believers against law and order by the central or local authorities.

p The law stipulates the procedures for raising and spending funds by religious associations. The religious societies may open current accounts at the State Bank branches for their funds.

p The associations of believers and religious centres dispose of their funds raised by voluntary contributions of parishioners at their discretion; they set the salaries and pensions of votaries of the church and appoint or dismiss religious preachers themselves without interference from government authorities.

p Soviet laws provide guarantees for believers to freely celebrate religious rituals, but at the same time they establish procedures for setting up religious associations, outline the scope of their activities and their relationship with the authorities. Any religious society can begin functioning only after it has been registered with the proper state authorities, for which purpose at least 20 believers should present an application to the executive committee of their district or city Soviet of People’s Deputies.

p On presentation by the executive committee of a regional ( territorial) Soviet of People’s Deputies and by the Council of Ministers of the Autonomous republic in question, or by the Council of Ministers of the Union republic where there is no regional division, the final decision on whether to register the religious association or to prohibit it is taken by the Council for Religious 66 Affairs under the USSR Council of Ministers. It is an ail-Union body responsible for supervising observance of legislation on worship and for resolving other problems related to practical realisation of the Soviet state’s policy toward religion and the church.

p The believers elect executive bodies of their religious society from among themselves to manage its affairs, its property and funds. Such bodies comprise three members in a religious society and one member in a group of believers. An auditing commission can l)e elected to check the expenditures if the believers so desire. The elected bodies and persons are accountable to a general meeting of the believers.

p While no special permission from the authorities is required for divine services and celebration of rituals, any meeting of the members of a religious society or a group of believers to discuss economic and financial matters or management of religious property has to be permitted by the executive committee of the appropriate district or city Soviet of People’s Deputies. Just as any divine service, the business meetings of the believers are held openly and all matters are settled by open ballot.

p All the economic and financial needs of the religious association are met by voluntary contributions from believers and by fees from ceremonies. No levies or taxation for the benefit of religious societies or clergymen are permitted. No feature of any faith can justify collection of levies from members of the religious societies. The collection of so-called tithe practised by some societies of Seventh-Day Adventists in the past and the levies sometimes imposed in certain Moslem communities are against the law. Such levies are imposed, as a rule, in the interests of personal enrichment of the fanatic clergy and church activists and for missionary and charity activities rather than to satisfy the community’s real needs. But the law stipulates the procedure for raising and spending funds by religious societies. Money may be collected only to pay for maintenance of public prayer buildings and to pay the salaries of the religious association’s executive bodies and clergymen.

p To celebrate divine service and rituals, the believers invite or elect priests, ministers or religious preachers whose work is limited to the place of worship and residence of members of the given religious association registered by the authorities. The 67 clergymen perform rites and other ceremonies of worship as required by their faith. They have no right to interfere in the religious association’s management and financial or economic activities.

p With the permission of proper state authorities, the religious associations may convene their congresses or conferences to elect their religious centres and governing bodies. These are maintained by voluntary payments from the communities of believers. All major denominations functioning in the USSR have such centres and governing bodies. The Russian Orthodox Church, for example, is headed by the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia and by the Holy Synod, a collective body under his auspices. The Patriarch may convene a council of members of higher orders of clergy (bishops, archbishops and metropolitans) and a Local Council to discuss and settle the most important church matters. He maintains ties with the heads of autocephalous churches, directs the canonical activities of religious associations and confers titles and decorations upon priests. Religious educational institutions and other establishments are under his authority.

p The Russian Orthodox Church is divided into 76 dioceses headed by 13 metropolitans, 27 archbishops and 35 bishops. The dioceses are divided into blagochinic districts (deaneries) headed by deans. The deans control parish priests. Many parishes of the Russian Orthodox Church in other countries are also under the jurisdiction of the Moscow Patriarchate. There are such parishes in France, the United States, West Germany, Great Britain, Argentina, Canada and other countries. Exarchates, dioceses, deaneries and missions have been set up to govern these parishes.

p Four independent centres govern Moslem religious affairs in the USSR. Thus, the Moslem Religious Board for Central Asia and Kazakhstan directs religious life of Moslems living in Uzbekistan, Kirghizia, Turkmenia, Tajikistan and Kazakhstan. The Board has its seat in Tashkent.

p The Moslem Religious Board for Transcaucasia is in charge of religious affairs of the Sunnite and Shiite Moslems residing in Azerbaijan, Georgia and Armenia. Baku is the seat of this Board.

p The Moslem Religious Board for the European Part of the USSR and Siberia controls religious life of Moslems in the European part of the USSR, except the Northern Caucasus and 68 Daghestan, and in Siberia. The Board is situated in the city of Ufa.

p The Moslem Religious Board for the Northern Caucasus and Daghestan is located in the city of Makhachkala. The structures and jurisdictions of the Boards of Moslems are defined by the regulations and rules of their internal organisation, which are devised by theologians to be approved by Congresses of representatives from Moslem associations. The Congresses are the highest ecclesiastical bodies of believers’ associations in Moslem religion. As specified by their Regulations, the Boards of Moslems resolve issues of religion and dogma related to the creed and procedures for prayers. The decisions of the Boards on these issues are made known to the believers.

p The life of practising Buddhists residing mainly in the Buryat Autonomous Republic, Tuva Autonomous Republic and in the Irkutsk and Chita regions of the Russian Federation is governed by the Central Buddhist Board elected by a congress of representatives of Buddhists and lamas. The residence of the head of Buddhists is located in the vicinity of Ulan Ude. The Central Buddhist Board and its Chairman confer holy orders, admit priests or monks into the lamahood and see to it that the lamas keep religious vows and observe religious rules.

p Adherents of the Armenian Gregorian Church living both inside and outside of the USSR are united religiously by the Church of Armenia. Some of its communities combined into dioceses are located in foreign countries where Armenians had emigrated from Russia before the Revolution to escape from harassment and bloody pogroms launched repeatedly by Turkish invaders. The Armenian Church is headed by the Supreme Patriarch— Catholicos of All Armenians. He has his residence in Echmiadzin, an ancient church centre of Armenia, near Yerevan, the capital of the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic.

p The Union of Evangelical Christian Baptists has Rules of its own. They set forth the fundamentals of the creed, tasks and goals of the Union and the jurisdiction of its governing bodies. The highest authority of the Union of Evangelical Christian Baptists is the All-Union Congress of representatives of its churches. The Congress elects the All-Union Council to manage religious life of the communities.

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p Parishes of the Roman Catholic Church, that exist in 10 of the 15 Union Republics of the USSR, are combined under separate religious boards called curias. In the Lithuanian SSR, for instance, Catholic parishes are governed by 6 religious centres: the Vilnius archdiocese and the dioceses of Panevezys, Telshai, Kaunas, Kaisiadoris and Vilkaviskis. The Riga archdiocese of the Roman Catholic Church controls the Catholic parishes in the Latvian SSR. There is a Vicariate of the Roman Catholic Church in the Transcarpathian region of the Ukrainian SSR (the city of Uzhgorod).

p The curias direct rhurch life of the parishes, appoint and transfer priests, etc. The heads of the curias appointed by Vatican perform regularly canonical visits to the parishes to supervise their activities.

p There are three independent Lutheran religious centres (Augsburg denomination) functioning in the Soviet Union. Called consistories, these centres are headed by archbishops in Estonia and Latvia. The third consistory is headed by the President. The heads of the consistories are elected by General Synods—- conferences of ministers and laymen, which are periodically convened.

p The religious associations of Methodists residing mainly in the Estonian SSR, form the Council of the Church which elects the Superintendant of the Methodist Church.

p Persecuted in pre-revolutionary Russia, Old Believers were given full freedom to celebrate their religious rites under the Soviet government. The Old-Believer parishes are divided into three separate denominations. They include the Old-Believer Church of the Belaya Krinitsa Concord. It has parishes in many republics and regions of the USSR and is separate from the Old-Believer Church of the Fugitive-Priests Concord, i.e. the church which accepts priests converted from the Greek Orthodox Church.

p The Lithuanian SSR and some districts of the RSFSR have parishes of Priestless Old-Believers who do not recognise the church hierarchy. These do not have any single centre of management. Religious communities of this denomination are controlled by the Supreme Ecclesiastical Council in the Lithuanian SSR. But they are autonomous in other republics and regions.

p All the religious centres maintain ties with kindred religious associations in other countries, carry on correspondence with 70 them, send delegates to their congresses, conventions and conferences and invite foreign guests to their own events.

p State authorities do not interfere in church management, giving the communities and groups of believers a free hand in the choice of their church hierarchy. Any group of believers can proclaim itself an autonomous church community.

p As ensues from the demands of the law, religious ceremonies, rituals and prayers can be performed, as a rule, only in churches, mosques, synagogues and other houses of prayer. The legislation on worship does not prohibit believers to invite priests home to perform certain ceremonies, but they must have the permission of the executive committee of a local Soviet. A religious society also needs permission of the executive committee of the Soviet in whose territory it is situated for religious processions and ceremonies outside their public-prayer buildings. The only exceptions are such religious processions around church buildings which are an integral part of divine service, as are religious rituals in the apartments or houses of believers performed on the request of the dying or gravely ill and religious rites at cemeteries or crematoria.

p The prohibition of collective prayers and religious processions in the open is based on the fact that an overwhelming majority of people in the USSR are unbelievers. Therefore, it is only natural that religious ceremonies would have disrupted normal life and constrained the freedom of conscience of most of the population had they been performed outside prayer buildings. In the USSR, the law protects the rights of believers to freely worship in the prayer houses of any denomination, and those of atheists. The law protects unbelievers from forcible interference by church organisations in their lives.

p The absolute majority of the believers and priests enjoying freedom of worship approve of Soviet policy on religion and the church and strictly observe legal requirements concerning religion and the church, being fully aware of their civic duty. However, there are certain religious zealots and groups of believers who try to perform anti-social, illegal actions under religious guise. They incite their co-religionists to evade their civil obligations and to perform rites that damage their health.

p The Soviet state cannot be indifferent to any actions directed 71 against the Soviet way of life which encroach upon people’s rights, honour and dignity, even if under religious cover. The socialist state protects its citizens’ interests. This is the reason why it bans certain sects which grossly violate the accepted rules of social intercourse or perform cruel ceremonies. Such associations include Jehovah’s Witnesses, groups of Truly Orthodox Christians, Reform Adventists and Murashkov followers, among others. Under the guise of religious rites, the leaders of these associations instigate their members to anti-social actions, and encroach upon people’s personal and human rights, sometimes even commit criminal acts.

p The leaders of Jehovah’s Witnesses, for instance, receive slanderous publications full of malicious lies about the USSR and other socialist countries from abroad through reactionary anti- Soviet centres and try to spread them among their believers. They caM the socialist system “the devil’s tool" and “the world of Satan”, and threaten atheists and believers with annihilation in a “holy war" (Armageddon). These fanatic sectarians urge their co-religionists to evade civic obligations, refuse to vote in elections, or to participate in censuses under threat of “punishment from God”. Some Jehovah’s Witnesses prevent their children from attending school, forbid them to go to the cinema, to watch television and to read fiction, newspapers and magazines. Secretly gathering for collective prayers, members of another anti-social sect, so-called Truly Orthodox Christians, urge their members to refuse to work at factories, on collective farms, or in offices and tiy to inculcate hostility to socially useful labour. It is understandable that such activities by religious zealots are banned in the USSR.

p At the same time, one cannot but notice that a process of differentiation takes place under the impact of Soviet reality even in these sectarian groups led by anti-social elements. Many rankand-file adherents refuse to take part in cruel rites, show loyalty to the state and express their willingness to observe legislation on worship. The state authorities are considerate to th^se changes in the formerly banned sects and support those groups of believers who agree to worship in keeping with the existing laws. Such positive shifts are known to occur, for example, in the activities of some Pentecostal groups. In the regions of Odessa, Lvov, 72 Brest, Dnepropetrovsk, Chernovtsi, Rovno and some others, the Pentecostals brought their activities in line with the law and gave up cruel rites. They joined registered societies of Evangelical Christian Baptists and some have been registered by authorities on their own.

p While giving believers extensive opportunities to practise their religion and granting them the right to form religious societies, Soviet law prohibits religious organisations and individuals from using meetings of believers for political actions directed against the interests of Soviet society. It is also forbidden to incite believers to evade their civic duties, not to participate in life of the state and society, and to perform cruel rites.

p If, under pretext of preaching a religion, a group is set up to perform activities which are socially dangerous or which inflict damage on people’s health or in any other way encroach upon people’s rights or incite people to give up public activity or to evade their civic obligations such illegal actions are liable for punishment under Article 227 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR and under appropriate articles of the criminal codes of the other Union republics as is the leadership of such a group or involvement of minors into it. The law specifies severe sentences for these crimes.

p Soviet legislation protects citizens’ legal rights while guaranteeing freedom of conscience. Those who violate the law are to be punished. There never has been a case in Soviet court practice when a person was brought to trial for adherence to any faith or professing religion. Sanctions under criminal law or administrative reprimands are not imposed in connection with professing any faith, but on the persons who commit specific criminal acts under cover of religion.

p The enemies of socialism try to represent Soviet society’s wellgrounded and universally accepted regulations to restrict anarchic self-will as an example of violation of civil rights and constraint of freedom of conscience. Typical in this respect is a campaign launched recently in defence of Vins, a preacher. Having received higher education at the expense of the Soviet state, Vins had not worked for more than 10 years and lived as a parasite, deceiving and illegally collecting money from believers and dodging taxes on the unearned income. Vins turned down repeated requests 73 from the local authorities to get a job and to lead an honourable, dignified way of life. After many warnings, the people’s court of law decided to force him to seek employment in his field of training. But the job of an engineer in a factory laboratory proved to be burdensome for this young and healthy sectarian preacher, so he soon quit and tried to hide from justice. In early 1975, the case of Vins as a gross violator of Soviet law was put on open trial at the Kiev people’s court. He was proven guilty by the court and he was convicted for criminal actions that had nothing to do with his religious beliefs. The bourgeois press tried to use the Vins conviction to show that believers are persecuted and freedom of conscience violated in the USSR. Curiously, this unseemly and slanderous campaign was supported by official circles in the USA. US Congress even adopted a special resolution portraying Vins as a victim of persecution and repression for his faith. These actions by the US ruling circles were bound to arouse the Soviet people’s indignation. The arrogant claims by American Congress were condemned by both atheists and believers. A plenum of the Ail-Union Council of Evangelical Christian Baptists issued an official statement pointing out that the mercy displayed by the US Congressmen should have been shown not to the criminal Vins but to the innocent victims of American justice: the Rev. Ben Chavis, the civil rights fighters Assata Shakur and John Harris, the Wilmington Ten.

p Atheists and believers alike enjoy the same rights and have the same duties to their socialist homeland, the USSR. Soviet laws and the rules of the socialist community preclude persecution for religious convictions, as well as offence to their religious beliefs.

p The decisions of the 25th and 26th congresses of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the USSR Constitution have further developed socialist democracy and perfected the political system of advanced socialist society. These documents lay a great emphasis on further strengthening socialist legality and law and order. Protecting the interests of society as a whole and of every Soviet citizen, the state guards socialist principles and establishes strong guarantees to protect the individual’s rights and dignity. While providing broad opportunities for believers to worship, the laws of the socialist state recognise any 74 interference of church organisations in affairs of the state as utterly intolerable.

The Soviet Constitution and other statutes formulate the demands that any Soviet man considers his duty to meet. “Respect for legality and for the law must become part and parcel of the make-up of every person,"  [74•1  said Leonid Brezhnev. Any attempts to deviate from the law or disregard its demands, whatever the motives, cannot be tolerated. And violation of legislation on worship is also incompatible with the principles of socialist democracy. Nobody in the Soviet Union can refuse to do his civic duty or instigate others to neglect theirs under cover of his religious convictions. Every Soviet citizen, whether he believes in God or not, must obey the laws of the state, honourably carry out his social duty, and respect the rules of socialist community.