"Our program necessarily includes the propaganda of atheism"
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Lenin makes a programmatic claim, not a private confession. For him and for Marxists more broadly, atheism was not merely a personal worldview but a necessary component of revolutionary politics. Religion, in the Marxist diagnosis he embraced, functioned as an ideological support for class rule, consoling the oppressed while legitimizing the existing order. If socialism demanded a scientific, materialist understanding of society and nature, then the movement had to spread that understanding actively. The term propaganda, in early 20th-century usage, meant systematic dissemination of ideas, and Lenin insisted that the workers party had a duty to combat religious belief through education, argument, and the promotion of science.
The context was Russia, where the Orthodox Church was deeply intertwined with the tsarist state. Clergy blessed wars, sanctified hierarchy, and taught obedience. To break that alliance, Lenin argued for the strict separation of church and state and for freedom of conscience, yet he made a careful distinction: religion should be a private matter for the state, but not for the party. The party, as the vanguard, must fight superstition intellectually while avoiding crude insults that would alienate religious workers. That balance between legal neutrality and ideological struggle defined his stance in essays like Socialism and Religion (1905) and The Attitude of the Workers Party to Religion (1909).
After 1917, these principles translated into policy: the 1918 decree on the separation of church and state, confiscation of church property, atheist schooling, and later mass campaigns like the League of the Militant Godless. The line between persuasion and coercion often blurred, especially during the fierce conflicts over church valuables in 1922. Yet the underlying aim remained consistent with Lenin’s formulation: to build a socialist culture grounded in materialism and science by eroding the social power of religion. The phrase captures the conviction that transforming consciousness was as essential to revolution as seizing factories and ministries.
The context was Russia, where the Orthodox Church was deeply intertwined with the tsarist state. Clergy blessed wars, sanctified hierarchy, and taught obedience. To break that alliance, Lenin argued for the strict separation of church and state and for freedom of conscience, yet he made a careful distinction: religion should be a private matter for the state, but not for the party. The party, as the vanguard, must fight superstition intellectually while avoiding crude insults that would alienate religious workers. That balance between legal neutrality and ideological struggle defined his stance in essays like Socialism and Religion (1905) and The Attitude of the Workers Party to Religion (1909).
After 1917, these principles translated into policy: the 1918 decree on the separation of church and state, confiscation of church property, atheist schooling, and later mass campaigns like the League of the Militant Godless. The line between persuasion and coercion often blurred, especially during the fierce conflicts over church valuables in 1922. Yet the underlying aim remained consistent with Lenin’s formulation: to build a socialist culture grounded in materialism and science by eroding the social power of religion. The phrase captures the conviction that transforming consciousness was as essential to revolution as seizing factories and ministries.
Quote Details
| Topic | Faith |
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