Eastern European Baptist History: New Perspectives, 2007

of atheism, which was described as “a worldview of a person encapsulated into oneself”.** Typewritten semi-illegal and illegal literature circulated in these fellowships. In a society that often depicted believers as uneducated and unintelligent, these educational efforts had the character of non-violent protest against this distorted picture.” All these efforts peacefully challenged the restrictive atheistic system. Usually avoiding public criticism of the socialist atheistic system, Esto- nian ECB churches persistently, even stubbornly, worked at going around restrictive laws and attempted to maintain their identity, of which pastoral training was a part. Theological education, even if informal, had a hidden message: although ECB life was in many different ways restricted outwardly, compared to the pre-communist period, thinking and ideas were not as easily limited by the communist mindset. Maintaining and Reviving Identity through Literature and Music There is no documentary evidence that Estonia was used by the Soviet government as an experimental zone with a more relaxed approach to religion, as one former ECB presbyter suggested.”” However, in reality, the 71 In Tallinn one of these groups was called “Club Areopagus” [Areopaagi klubi]; in Parnu it was named “Haraka Institute” [Haraka instituut], after Haraka Street, where the group usually met. 22 See Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Christianity and Evolution (London: Collins, 1971); Hans Kiing, Does God Exist? An Answer for Today (New York: Vintage Books, 1981). > Notes of Ermo Jiirma, Metsakiila (7 February 1985). T. Pilli personal archive. ** For Baptist theological education in Estonia see T. Pilli, “Finding a Balance between Church and Academia: Baptist Theological Educatiom in Estonia’, Religion in Eastern Europe, vol. 26, no. 3 (August 2006), pp. 29-37. > This was suggested by Jiiri Puusaag, oral communication (8 May 2003). 148 Commissioner of the CRA turned a blind eye to some aspects of Union of Evangelical Christians-Baptists in Estonia (UECBE) activity. One area of traditional Baptist work revived during the 1970s was literature: translation of books and articles as well as original Estonian works, typed on mechan- ical typewriters, producing six to eight copies at a time. Church music also developed during these years. On a wider front, so-called samizdat, or self-published, literature was not limited to religious themes alone. In the Soviet Union, during Khrushchevs years of relaxed censorship, some heterodox material relating to general cultural values began to appear in the press and in book form. When the Soviet approach to literature was made stricter again, attempts to achieve freedom in thinking and literary expression continued to live in the wide- spread efforts of samizdat literature. In 1966-1967 samizdat-type under- ground publications were published more freely than ever before.”° This had its influence also on