Word: atheism
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...regimes that refuse to let the people be the "sovereign of their own destiny," they produce only "oppression, intimidation, violence and terrorism." In an implicit reference to his experience in Communist Poland, John Paul pleads for freedom of conscience. "It is difficult to accept ... a position that gives only atheism the right of citizenship in public and social life, while believers are ... barely tolerated or ... deprived of the rights of citizenship." In a dramatic appeal to rulers, he demands respect for religious liberty: "No privilege is asked for, but only respect for an elementary right...
Einstein soon found himself embroiled in controversy. Some churchmen perceived his theory, which did not rely on the old Newtonian absolutes, as an attack on religion. Boston's Cardinal O'Connell charged that relativity was "cloaked in the ghastly apparition of atheism." For a rabbi who asked him frankly if he believed in God, Einstein recalled a famous Jewish apostate: "I believe in Spinoza's God, who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of all that exists, not in the God who concerns himself with fates and actions of human beings...
Loyal to Marx and Lenin, Communist Poland officially promotes atheism. In his most famous observation on religion, Karl Marx argued: "It is the opium of the people. The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is required for their real happiness." Lenin and Stalin systematically sought to suppress and eventually eliminate religion from their Communist society...
...Bible would hardly have been noticed. But when Hungary's state-owned printing house announced that the title would be one of 135 works introduced during the country's annual book week, the news was sensational. Like every other Communist regime, after all, Hungary's propagates atheism; and while in practice it tolerates religious observance by its 5.8 million Catholics and 2.6 million Protestants, the Bible itself is available in only a single church bookstore in the country. It is frequently out of stock...
...that remains in the minds of most readers is some pictures, histories-and the imperishable memoirs of Isaac Bashevis Singer. In this brief, exalted account of his youth and his country's decline, the author summons memories of Warsaw when intellectuals argued the merits of Marxism, Zionism, atheism and love-above and below all, love. The preternaturally shy Isaac had his difficulties with older women and young ones. But Sabina, Stefa, Gina were as much a part of his education as the volumes he held like a lover. ("I realized," he recalls of one liaison, "that in moments...