ABSTRACT
Religion is a problem in Russia and in the modern world today. The Constitution of the RSFSR, or Russia proper, guarantees to all freedom of conscience and of worship. It is the aim of the Communist Party and of the Soviet Government to keep at least the letter of this law, to permit the remaining religious edifices to be open upon their day of worship. Religion presents a problem in Soviet Russia to the Soviets, to its own followers and to the world. Two streams have flowed from organized religion in general and from Christianity in particular, the one social, the other individualistic and at times anti-social. In its origins religion has been often social and at times even communal in form. Aversion to wealth, ideas of the simple life of sharing and even of voluntary communism remained in the church for centuries. Communes of monastic orders arose in protest against worldly accumulation, they multiplied and some continue in existence.
