Just A (Politically Hot-Button) Thought

OK, so I'm watching Reds with Warren Beatty and Diane Keaton. These two reporters (a man and his wife) are in Russia during the Bolshevik revolution of 1917. They are sympathetic to the cause and get very involved in all of the politics. You see Lenin and Trotsky all over the place and it is a pretty cool movie. Especially if you are sort of interested in Russian history and thought like I am.

Anyway, I just couldn't keep from wondering where the Russian Orthodox Church was in all of this. Obviously, the Church was against the atheism of Marxist thought, but was there more? Was the Orthodox Church tied in with the czarist government of the time? Was the Church as an institution concerned with the plight of the workers around the turn of the century or were they too ingrained in the power structure of the government?

From what I understand about Russian history, Fyodor Dostoevsky was beginning to advocate a Christian Socialism when he died. Sergei Bulgakov (an atheist who was deeply influenced by Dostoevsky and converted to Christianity) codified this Russian Christian political theology. So, it was there and available. Apparently is was rejected by both the church and the Marxists. Could it be that Christianity was seen by the everyman as a system those in power used to mollify the masses and keep them in line? Was it a form of Stoicism that meant nothing more than that?

Does that sound familiar in this day and age? Dean Zahl was talking the other day about how Democrats view Christians as cheerleaders for Republican politics. Is that truly what we have become? Chuck Colson wrote and op/ed to the New York Times saying how evangelical Christians were interested in such issues as AIDS, sex trafficking, and others of that sort. When I was in politics, all the Christian political activists wanted to talk about was cutting taxes, invading Iraq, and gays. Never a peep about those other issues.

Maybe Chrisitanity is about to face some backlash from the Democratic majority in Congress for being rubber stamps for Republican politics. Do we deserve it? Where is our Bulgakov?