N and I are settling down to watch a recently released Russian movie. The opening credits say, “Sponsored by the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation.”
“Ah!” N says. “This will be another piece of religious propaganda with crosses, prayers and priests in every scene.”
He was absolutely right. Religious imagery was spilling out of every scene in a very jarring way. This happens in every other Russian film that gets released nowadays. It is especially funny to see movies where Communist leaders and party apparatchiks all wear crosses and pray every fifteen minutes in the breaks between party meetings. I’m still waiting for a flick that will show Lenin as a crypto-Christian but I won’t be surprised when it comes out. Why not if Stalin’s supposed religiosity has become a commonplace in every recent biography of his.
It is very curious that the Russian government sponsors this endless religious propaganda in a country where only 2% of people actively practice Christianity.
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