The video of the Christian apologist verbally sparring with the atheist professor at Princeton is finally available. Here is D'Souza's March column, "Staring into the Abyss," for Christianity Today, based in part on their debate.

Posted by Stan Guthrie at April 16, 2009 | Comments (1)

On Saturday I had the opportunity to moderate a panel discussion at the inaugural Christian Book Expo in Dallas involving outspoken atheist pundit Christopher Hitchens and four Christian apologists: William Lane Craig, Douglas Wilson, Lee Strobel, and Jim Denison. The topic: "Does the God of Christianity Exist, and What Difference Does It Make?" drew good coverage in the local media.

Here are some responses from a couple of participants at the panel discussions:

? Mary DeMuth;

? Douglas Wilson.

I'm guessing that close to half of all the consumers at the Expo, which was poorly attended, were at our session. It was a spirited, substantive discussion. Reporting on the panel, sponsored the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association and Christianity Today, the Dallas Morning News had this to say:

Hitchens challenged Christianity on a number of fronts, including questioning how a loving God could allow so much suffering in the world and be "capricious" enough to delay sending Jesus as savior for thousands of years.

The Rev. Jim Denison, theologian-in-residence for the Baptist General Convention of Texas, said God grieves for the suffering of humans, but gives them free will.

"So you know the mind of God?" Hitchens asked Denison.

"I know what God has revealed of his mind," Denison answered.

Christopher's position on religion in general and Christianity in particular can be summed up in the title of his book, God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. In the discussion he called God's rule posited by Christians "tyrannical," those who believe it to be wicked idiots, and said there was no amount of evidence that would cause him to jettison his supposedly reason-based evolutionary "anti-theism." Other than that, he was very cordial! (Actually, despite his bias against Christianity, Christopher Hitchens is personable, funny, and highly intelligent, as well as a great writer.)

As the moderator, I wanted to make sure that the discussion - with heady examinations of the anthropic principle, epistemology, and other issues - didn't get too ivory-towerish. I wanted to keep it practical and personal. And I hoped to give Christopher Hitchens something new to think about. So I asked the first question, which went something like this condensed summary:

"Christopher, in my rush to catch my ride to the airport so that I could get to this conference, I fell down at my office. I quickly got up, hoping that no one saw me. Because of my disability, such incidents are part of my life, something I have learned to deal with. I have not fallen since, but there is no guarantee that I will not fall again, even right off this platform.

"Now I love these kinds of discussions about the existence of God, and I've read your book with Doug Wilson, Is Christianity Good for the World?

"Besides all the arguments for God's existence, one reason I like Christianity is because it provides dignity and hope for people like me: dignity, because it teaches that we are all created in God's image and because Jesus took all our suffering on himself; and hope, because he was resurrected and promises that one day we will be resurrected, too, with new bodies in a new heaven and a new earth.

"But your philosophy of anti-theism seems designed only for the young, intelligent, and well-connected. So my question to you is: What basis does your philosophy provide for promoting human dignity and hope for people like me, and frankly, people who are much worse off?"

Hitchens' answer, such as it was, was interesting. After thanking me for the question, he attacked my premise, railing against Christianity as a religion of the powerful. While that has certainly been true at times in history, the fact remains that Jesus was loved by the poor, the weak, the blind, the outcast, the disabled, and the despised - and still is. After Christopher subsided, I pointed out that he had not answered my question about how his philosophy provides for dignity and hope to the forgotten of the world.

I can't recall his exact response, but I have the distinct impression he began mumbling, saying something about how he couldn't lie about people who were "unlucky" in life. (Eventually a video of all the panel discussions will be released, so you can double-check my admittedly imperfect recall of the discussion.)

So there you have it. Hitchens' anti-God philosophy offers no hope or dignity to the disabled and others who are "unlucky" in life. What difference does Christianity make? All the difference in the world. I suspect that this is why atheist pundits will continue to have limited influence in matters of religion, no matter how many debates they attend and how many best-sellers they write.

Posted by Stan Guthrie at March 24, 2009 | Comments (9)

MTV music video director Darren Doane and his team stalked Christopher Hitchens and Douglas Wilson during their debates tour last week.

Here's the recently released trailer:

Hitchens and Wilson are promoting their book, Is Christianity Good for the World?, which began as a debate on Christianity Today's website.

Wilson's son, Nate Wilson, wrote a three pieces for Christianity Today about the tour. The first day's dispatch focused on enemies, the second on the marvels of reality, and the third about a bar.

David Sessions and Alisa Harris, editors for the online Patrol magazine, interviewed Hitchens and Wilson on their tour.

PatrolTV: Christopher Hitchens & Douglas Wilson from Patrol Magazine on Vimeo.

Peter King took these photos on the tour.

Posted by Sarah Pulliam Bailey at November 12, 2008 | Comments (0)

Will Higgins's report on attendance levels at Holy Week services at a military base in northern Iraq is intriguing on several levels. First, although there are some 4,000 soldiers stationed at the base, the chaplains deemed 150 chairs and 3 Easter services more than sufficient to accommodate the number of soldiers inclined to attend. A Good Friday screening of Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ drew only four soldiers, two of whom snoozed their way through it.

While such anecdotal evidence from a solitary military base is by no means enough to establish statistical significance, it does at the very least challenge conventional wisdom that there are no atheists in foxholes. Looking around for other media coverage of Easter services among American military in Iraq, I found little of interest save a small collection of photos that revealed services most notable for their sparse attendance (Be sure to click on the third photo to see if you can identify the gun at the foot of the praying soldier's feet). Sergeant Christopher McFadden of Indiana National Guard’s 76th Infantry Brigade Combat Team finds the low attendance "dumbfounding." "If you saw the possibility of dying in front of you," he continues, "now would be the time to open the door and at least look inside."

Although I tend to share McFaddens' surprise, low attendance levels at Easter services is not the only aspect of the article I find intriguing. For one, the article points out that McFadden, an ardent Christian, carries around a metal-bound Bible printed during World War II for distribution to American soldiers, a Bible whose carrier in three previous tours of duty--in WWII, Vietnam, and Iraq--has returned home safely. McFadden had hoped this Bible and its 3-0 record would provide an entry point for evangelizing his comrades. Instead, he sincerely laments that for them this Bible is "more of an artifact, a good-luck charm, than a symbol of God's power." McFadden's comments raise interesting questions about the locus of God's power, and how we associate that power with particular material objects. Where does the power of Bibles--metal-bound or otherwise--reside? Is it in the "thing" itself and indifferent to the disposition of its carrier, or do its readers, hearers, and heed-ers know the power of God to save from death via receiving the Living Word that is not limited to any one particular copy of the Bible?

Second, the article contains a sidebar indicating that Franklin Delano Roosevelt included a foreword to the special-issue Bible "commending the reading of the Bible to all who serve in the armed forces of the United States." Operating in a cultural climate sensitive to questions of church and state, such words at first sounded odd to me--from another time with different sensibilities. But when I read the words of McFadden's pastor just a few lines down, I was reminded that these sensibilities are still with us. Apparently, just before McFadden departed on his tour of duty, his pastor told the congregation to think of McFadden as any other missionary, "except this one's paid for by the government."

Most intriguing of all, however, is the cryptic quote from "missionary" McFadden that closes the article. In an attempt to make sense of the war and his place in it, McFadden employs an oft-used interpretive lens in reflecting on the mysteries of divine providence: "We're in the desert for a reason. God has put us here to find ourselves." McFadden's quote shows us that for at least one soldier, making sense of the war is a "bottom-up" affair that begins with personal experience and plays out in the terrain of the heart rather than the combat zone of northern Iraq or the landscape of contemporary geopolitics.

Sgt. McFadden leaves me wondering which is more notable--the apparent lack of faith among the military, or the theological ruminations of one of the faithful.

Posted by Derek Keefe at March 24, 2008 | Comments (14)

While Bruce Gierson’s article, "An Atheist in the Pulpit," in the most recent issue of Psychology Today often devolves into a spiritual travelogue of clergy de-conversion, it does alert us to some of the personal and practical dilemmas raised when persons involved in professional ministry come to realize they doubt their beliefs.

Given that Gierson is writing for Psychology Today, it should come as no surprise that the story focuses on the "deeply inauthentic" feelings and accompanying "psychic stress" that results from a disconnect between a minister's public preaching, pastoral care, or performance of the liturgy, and his or her private doubts or disbelief. His clergy characters are often cast as heroes who live by Shakespeare's line--"to thine own self be true"--and uphold the "inviolability of the individual conscience." Better to be true to self than keep one's commitments, however far removed they now seem.

To be fair, I have sometimes wondered, in my contemplation of ordained ministry, but what would I do when those desert seasons of doubt and despair come, as they regularly have, in my own life? Would it be OK for me to hide in and behind the liturgy, in and behind the text, in and behind the prayers of the saints gathered around me, at least for a time? I'm not sure I ever came up with good answers to those questions, or the basic question behind them: Is there room for doubt in the life of a minister of the Church? I'm not talking about settled or aggressive disbelief, but those dark periods that befall many Christians. In short, I'm sympathetic to the plight of ministers who find themselves unable to be for their flock what that flock often want them to be--a paragon of faith and hope.

It's a shame that Gierson never addresses this question from the other side of the pulpit, except through the perceptions of the clergy he interviewed. If a minister is bold enough to share his or her doubts with a congregation, what should the congregation do? Should they come alongside and pray for their minister? The answer to that seems obvious enough. Should they help him or her organize a sabbatical or leave of absence? If the minister is willing to continue, would the congregation mind knowing that their pastor was, for a time, working from obligation or a desire to keep a commitment, rather than from a living, burning, hearth of faith? (Would any marriage last were not a similar commitment in place?) And, if the minister did eventually come to a place of settled disbelief, how should that be handled?

These are by no means easy questions. It's good that Gierson is raising them, if only indirectly.

Posted by Derek Keefe at February 22, 2008 | Comments (13)

Nearly two weeks before its arrival to American cinemas, one film has managed to draw cries of complaint from both the Catholic League and the National Secular Society in recent weeks. The Golden Compass, which premieres in the U.S. on December 7 and is based on Philip Pullman's fantasy trilogy of the same name, has been accused of being both anti-God and not anti-God enough.

The Catholic League, a conservative U.S. anti-defamation group, launched an official boycott of the film in early October, citing the books' negative depiction of the church (what Pullman names "the Authority"). League president Bill Donohue says Pullman, who is an outspoken atheist, wrote the stories "to promote atheism and denigrate Christianity, especially Roman Catholicism." Donohue is concerned that though it is toned down in its anti-God rhetoric, the upcoming movie will nonetheless act as "bait for the books."

Meanwhile, the U.K.-based National Secular Society is disappointed that the movie doesn't feature more explicit attacks on the church. According to the BBC, the society's president, Terry Sanderson, said, "We knew from the beginning that the producers of this film intended to leave out the anti-religious references. We think that is a great shame. The fight against the Magisterium (Pullman's thinly disguised version of the Catholic church) is the whole point of the book."

The Golden Compass premiered last night in the U.K. at London's Leicester Square, and received a lukewarm review from The Times - not for any real or perceived anti-God themes, of course, but for apparently sloppy storytelling compared to the books, which won the esteemed Whitbread Literary Award in 2002.

The movie is expected to do well in the U.S. during the approaching holiday-movie rush. This week's Newsweek delves deeper into director Chris Weitz's struggle of framing the stories' controversial subject matter, while the December issue of Christianity Today features the thoughtful critiques of some Christian writers who notice some surprising "Christian-y" themes in Pullman's books.

In a couple weeks, we'll see how the movie fares with the American audience, most of which doesn't fit easily into the extremes of today's religious culture wars that the Catholic League and the National Secular Society epitomize.

See Also:
Christianity Today Movies has been following the controversy surrounding the film. CT Movies' readers shared some initial thoughts on The Golden Compass's release.

Posted by Katelyn Beaty at November 28, 2007 | Comments (7)

Novelist and New Journalist Norman Mailer died Saturday morning of renal failure at age 84. A controversial but highly recognized writer, Mailer pushed the boundaries of content and style, even tackling the subject of God and religion in his last work, "On God: An Uncommon Conversation."

ABC said,

"In probing, amusing, and uncommon dialogues conducted over three years but whose topics he has considered for decades, Mailer establishes his own system of belief, one that rejects both organized religion and atheism," according to a statement issued Monday [September 24, 2007] by Random House.

"He presents instead an artistic God who often succeeds but can also fail in the face of contrary powers in the universe, with whom war is waged for the souls of humans."

For more on this writer who helped changed the landscape of both fiction and non-fiction while garnering great praise and criticism, visit these links.

BBC: Obituary

New York Times: "Towering Writer with a Matching Ego Dies at Age 84"

CNN: "The Death of the Literary Lion"

The Guardian: "Mailer's Talent Never as Big as his Ego"

National Post: "The Failed Career of Norman Mailer"

Publisher's Weekly: "On God"

Posted by Kristen Scharold at November 12, 2007 | Comments (2)

The same week the New York Times magazine featured Mark Oppenheimer's skeptical commentary on Antony Flew's late-in-life journey from atheism to theism (which CT editor in chief David Neff responded to here), another NYT columnist, Stanley Fish, offered a thoughtful and generous survey of two recent books that add to the ever-continuing discussion of God, his attributes, and the presence of evil. In his review, Fish displays a keen understanding of classic Christian writers, from Milton to Epicurus to St. Paul, and opens a larger discussion on evil and the meaning of suffering--a discussion worth having by believers and nonbelievers alike.

The first book Fish surveys is from Bart D. Ehrman, who, since his young adulthood, has moved from theism to agnosticism, partially due to an inability to get past the terrific amount of seemingly meaningless suffering in the world. His new book is titled God's Problem: How the Bible Fails to Answer Our Most Important Question-Why We Suffer. The other book Fish surveys, There Is a God, is from the aforementioned philosophy professor Antony Flew, and documents his famous "conversion" to theism in 2004.

As Fish notes, these two writers are approaching questions of God's (and evil's) existence from opposite frames of mind. From beginning to end, Ehrman writes with emotionally charged indignation and a frustrated inability to reconcile the pervasiveness of suffering with the supposed benevolence of God. Contrarily, Flew writes with the detached (some would say "cold") demeanor typical of much philosophical literature.

Here, Flew epitomizes Ehrman's frustration with people who make statements about God and don't seem to take into account "real life." As Fish observes,

"Will Ehrman be moved to reconsider his present position and reconvert if he reads Flew’s book? Not likely, because Flew remains throughout in the intellectual posture Ehrman finds so arid. Flew assures his readers that he 'has had no connection with any of the revealed religions,' and no 'personal experience of God or any experience that may be called supernatural or religious.' Nor does he tells us in this book of any experience of the pain and suffering that haunts Ehrman’s every sentence."

What Fish rightly points out is that while both books arrive at different locations on the belief spectrum, each book attests to the continuing importance and vitality of such questions--even in a time when screeds from atheists who want to throw out the conversation all-together are now nearly clichéd.

Posted by Katelyn Beaty at November 12, 2007 | Comments (7)

Over the weekend, the New York Times magazine was busy sowing the seeds of doubt about a potentially bestselling book by philosopher Antony Flew. Flew's books aren't normally bestsellers, but There Is a God is different:

? It's published by HarperOne, a publisher with marketing muscle.
? It is "written in simple language for a mass audience."
? It tells the story of the famous atheist's late in life turn toward belief in God (first reported in 2004).

That's a winning formula for creating a wide readership.

In "The Turning of an Atheist," Mark Oppenheimer raises questions galore without actually proving any of his points. He questions the degree of Flew's involvement in writing the book, the credibility of scientists whose perspective Flew adopted, and even Flew's mental competence at the advanced age of 84. (Oppenheimer suggests that Flew may be "a senescent scholar possibly being exploited by his associates" and raises the possibility that his "memory [is] failing" and that "his powers [are] in decline.")

If Oppenheimer's piece creates enough of a furore, I'm sure HarperOne will see it as publicity they couldn't have purchased at any price.

It would be nearly impossible to answer all of Oppenheimer's questions, especially since direct conversation with Flew (in Oppenheimer's terms) "confuses more than it clarifies."

You'll probably have to bracket Oppenheimer's questions until God's kingdom comes, but in the meantime here are two other articles you may want to read:

"Thinking Straighter" (CT, April 2005). James A. Beverley interviews Antony Flew for Christianity Today.

"Victorian Skeptics on the Road to Damascus" (Christian History and Biography newsletter, 2005). Timothy Larsen recounts other famous atheists who returned to faith late in life.

Posted by David Neff at November 5, 2007 | Comments (18)

Last week, Opinion Journal's Naomi Schaefer Riley attended a public debate between Darwinian biologist Richard Dawkins, most (in)famous for his recent work, The God Delusion, and mathematician?Christian apologist John Lennox. The debate focused on the question, Does God exist?

What's newsworthy is not so much that the debate occurred or that it received so much press; it only takes a monthly glance at the New York Times bestseller list to see that this question, and the atheistic rants that often ensue, get our attention. According to Riley, the debate between the two Oxford scientists, which took place at the Alys Stephens Center in Birmingham, Alabama, on October 3, had been sold out for weeks prior, and received more buzz than Alabama football, which apparently is saying something.

What may be surprising to some about the debate, not least of all Richard Dawkins himself, is that many believers are eager to attend such events and to heartily engage the intellectual conclusions of each side. To watch two brilliant scientists construct arguments, and, in good English fashion, throw in some rhetorical punches along the way, is both entertaining and instructive. Dawkins and other atheist-apologists might envision Christians running away from such challenges, afraid and dejected. What they may be horrified to find out is that such debates actually spur many Christians to ask big questions, examine their beliefs, and arrive at even more robust reasoning for accepting the gospel as "gospel truth." As Riley quotes apologist Jonalyn Fincher as saying, "If our God is the God of truth, what are we afraid of?"

As a counterproposal, would Dawkins and the rest of the New Atheist league be willing to sit in for a session at next month's Apologetics Conference, featuring J. P. Moreland, William Lane Craig, and Gary Habermas? Just a thought.

*Look for our review of fellow Oxford scholar Alister McGrath's response to Dawkins in the November issue of Christianity Today.

Posted by Katelyn Beaty at October 15, 2007 | Comments (8)

A critique of Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris and the rest of the new atheists makes the key point that these authors, in attempting to tear down all religious belief as toxic, have failed to distinguish the good from the bad. And they haven't even come up with any new and particularly compelling arguments. For a movement that provides itself on its supposed intellectual superiority, that's quite an indictment.

According to reviewer Peter Berkowitz in today's Wall Street Journal:

"In making his case that reason must regard faith as an enemy to be wiped out, Mr. Hitchens declares Socrates's teaching that knowledge consists in knowing one's ignorance to be 'the definition of an educated person.' And yet Mr. Hitchens shows no awareness that his atheism, far from resulting from skeptical inquiry, is the rigidly dogmatic premise from which his inquiries proceed, and that it colors all his observations and determines his conclusions.

"Mr. Hitchens is by far the most erudite and entertaining of the new new atheists. But his errors and his excesses are shared by the whole lot. And these errors and excesses have pernicious political consequences, amplifying invidious distinctions among fellow citizens and obscuring crucial differences among believers world wide.

"Playing into the anger and enmities that debase our politics today, the new new atheism blurs the deep commitment to the freedom and equality of individuals that binds atheists and believers in America. At the same time, by treating all religion as one great evil pathology, today's bestselling atheists suppress crucial distinctions between the forms of faith embraced by the vast majority of American citizens and the militant Islam that at this very moment is pledged to America's destruction."

Memo to the angry atheists (and I know many atheists are calm and reasonable): Not all religion is alike.

Posted by Stan Guthrie at July 16, 2007 | Comments (31)

While tens of thousands of kids head out to Christian camps, Camp Quest is offering an alternative for those who take their summer recreation without God. About 150 young people attend Camp Quest programs in Ohio, Michigan, Minnesota, California, and Ontario, according to an article in the Chicago Tribune.

The founder, Edwin Kagin, is legal director for the group American Atheists. He said the atheist camp was founded after the Boy Scouts barred atheists and gays from leadership roles during the 1990s. "We wanted a camp not to preach there is no God," said Kagin, "but as a place where children could learn it's OK not to believe in God."

The Tribune interviewed several young campers in Ohio about their beliefs, or lack thereof. I don't think Christians have a lot to worry about. Here is a sampling:

"[Sophia] Riehemann notes that a secular perspective takes away childhood joys other kids have, such as Christmas. But that doesn't bother her. 'They have Santa Claus,' she said, 'and we have Isaac Newton.'"

Actually, Sophia, I hate to break this to you, but you have Santa Claus, and we have Isaac Newton.

Then there is Allison Page, who is described as a 9-year-old only child. Reflecting on the biblical story of Cain and Abel, Allison opines, "It just doesn't make sense. A brother wouldn't kill his brother."

Ah, the innocence of children. Just wait until you have siblings, Allison.

Posted by Stan Guthrie at June 29, 2007 | Comments (70)

If the debate on this website between Doug Wilson, a a pastor and educator, and atheist pundit Christopher Hitchens has whetted your appetite for more, you'll want to check out "Nightline" tonight. Evangelist Ray Comfort and actor Kirk Cameron will debate two members of the so-called "Rational Response Squad."

The RRS, as you may know, has organized the Web-based "Blasphemy Challenge" to encourage people to blaspheme the Holy Spirit as a way to declare their freedom from and lack of fear over all religious beliefs. The founder of the movement, Brian Sapient, equates theism with belief in the tooth fairy, saying, "There isn't any good reason to believe in God."

This debate, which will be available online at 1 p.m. Central today on ABC News Now, promises to be interesting. I've heard Comfort, a bold street evangelist, speak, and I expect him to do well. I am concerned, however, over the parameters of this debate. Comfort promises to "prove" God's existence scientifically and without reference to the Bible or faith. First, while faith in God is eminently reasonable (the world's greatest minds, including everyone from C.S. Lewis to Isaac Newton to Francis Collins, have affirmed Christian faith), faith is still required, for "without faith it is impossible to please God." Second, while Christian faith made scientific discovery possible and many of the world's first and greatest scientists have been Christians, restricting the debate to things scientific unfortunately plays into the current prejudice that the only "facts" that are real or valiid are based in science. But there are many fields of inquiry that are not open to the scientific method (history being one of them). Thus, the terms of the debate will only take us so far.

I remember the time my wife and I sat down with a friend who had lots of questions about Christianity. At the onset I asked him if he would become a Christian if we answered all his questions. He said yes. Then we talked and we answered his questions, one by one. But he still declined to become a Christian. It was not for a lack of facts. It was a lack of will. As the Bible says, "The fool has said in his heart, 'There is no God.'" I don't think a debate restricted to scientific facts, however it goes, will change that.

Posted by Stan Guthrie at May 9, 2007 | Comments (19)

The New York Times has an extended piece on Barack Obama's faith, his church, and his relationship with his pastor, Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. Wright has become known for his liberation theology, which, as Wright has applied it, some have called reverse racism.
Obama describes the differences in outlook he has with his pastor.

"Reverend Wright is a child of the 60s, and he often expresses himself in that language of concern with institutional racism and the struggles the African-American community has gone through," Mr. Obama said. "He analyzes public events in the context of race. I tend to look at them through the context of social justice and inequality."

The article's emphasis on Obama's relationship with his outspoken pastor is due to its potential political effect on Obama's presidential campaign. But the article does describe Obama's personal conversion: "He comes from a very secular, skeptical family," said Jim Wallis, a Christian antipoverty activist and longtime friend of Mr. Obama. "His faith is really a personal and an adult choice. His is a conversion story."

The article has less of Obama speaking about himself than David Brooks's column does. In the column, perhaps, we see Obama's faith at work better than we do in the much longer piece about Obama and his pastor. Brooks says he got Obama to open up when he asked, "Have you ever read Reinhold Niebuhr?" Obama, it turns out, is a big fan. "What do you take away from him?" Brooks asked.

"I take away," Obama answered in a rush of words, "the compelling idea that there's serious evil in the world, and hardship and pain. And we should be humble and modest in our belief we can eliminate those things. But we shouldn't use that as an excuse for cynicism and inaction. I take away ... the sense we have to make these efforts knowing they are hard, and not swinging from na?ve idealism to bitter realism."

Posted by Rob Moll at April 30, 2007 | Comments (11)

AFP goes with "Russia bids farewell to flamboyant Yeltsin." For Reuters, it's "Russians pay respects to flawed hero Yeltsin." The Associated Press (probably wisely) decided not to use an adjective. And it's the Associated Press that hits the religion angle the hardest:

Yeltsin, who died Monday at age 76, sometimes appeared at church services but was not seen as overtly pious. Nevertheless, the Russian Orthodox Church credits him as a key figure in its changed fortunes after decades of the Communist-era's official atheism.

"By his strength, he helped the restoration of the proper role of the Russian Orthodox Church in the life of the country and its people," church spokesman Metropolitan Kirill said in a statement.

That "proper role" is quite a loaded statement. The religion watchdog news service Forum18 and the Russian press agency Interfax have markedly different articles on Yeltsin's legacy on religious freedom. Forum18 summarizes the former president's mixed legacy: "While Yeltsin lifted some state controls over churches following the collapse of the Soviet Union, he eventually signed a controversial Law on Freedom of Conscience and Religious Associations."

For more on religious freedom in Russia, see our full coverage area.

Posted by Ted Olsen at April 24, 2007 | Comments (0)