I'm often asked about the difference between the underground and the official churches in communist countries. There are conflicting reports in the West as to the amount of freedom among Christians in Eastern Europe. Some say the churches are full, and there is freedom of worship. Other reports are of torture, imprisonment and persecution of Christians.

The fact is that freedom of religion is restricted in every communist country, even though the constitutions of most of those countries guarantee such freedom. Communism is an ideology. Christianity is much more than that, but an ideology is contained within Christianity. The ideologies of Communism and Christianity will always conflict. There will always be some form of persecution of Christians by communist states.

Poland, Yugoslavia and Hungary have more freedom than the other Eastern European countries. East Germany doesn't have as much, but freedom there isn't as restricted as in Bulgaria and Czechoslovakia. Romania is very repressive, whereas the Soviet Union is even worse. Most repressive in all of Eastern Europe is the tiny nation of Albania. The amount of freedom in any of these countries can change drastically at any moment with a change of direction of the political winds.

The greatest issue isn't church attendance. Many churches are filled. Three major issues concern the persecution of the church: evangelism and church growth, literature distribution and leadership training. All three enhance a powerful, growing church and the Communists don't want that. They believe Christianity is a disease. They allow people to have the disease, but they forbid them to spread it.