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Eleven years ago, it seemed that the beast of communism, which had set its face against the church of Jesus Christ, was dead in Eastern Europe. I remember the 200,000 Bulgarians with raised hands and open souls standing in Sofia's downtown square in 1991. They gathered not to march in honor of the ruling party but to hear an overseas evangelist preach Christ and heal the sick. I was in the crowd, a graduating law student, a former anticommunist revolutionary, and a new Christian. I drank from the invigorating hope and joy that had descended from heaven on that warm summer night. A nation haunted by darkness for years was about to receive a new heart. But things did not go quite the way I hoped.

The beast of communism may have been mortally wounded, but it was not dead. In 1992 came significant reversals regarding religious liberty—the first sign that freedom had not fully arrived. Two years after the collapse of the regime, former communists emerged as socialist capitalists. Their former connections afforded them control of the economy and, with it, the most influential newspapers.

Reading the newspapers became torturous. I fumed at the sensationalistic articles, written like communist propaganda, and aimed at the new wave of American missionaries: Baptists were eating children; American missionaries were feeding drugs to youth in church meetings; Protestant pastors were signing up members of their congregations for ritual suicide ceremonies.

Such outrageous claims fed society's skepticism toward evangelical churches. American evangelicals have worked among Bulgarians since the mid-19th century, but the memory of these missionary contributions was lost during the reign of the Communist Party. Exploiting a historical perception that Eastern Orthodoxy was key to the Bulgarian national identity, the new socialist capitalists used anti-evangelical rhetoric to stir up passions. Unfortunately, many Orthodox voices joined hard-core atheists in decrying "Western sects." Bulgarians seemed to want a mix of Soviet spirituality and American prosperity.

I took this attitude personally. I had become a Christian thanks to the witness of American evangelical missionaries. The long history of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church, or its contribution to the national spirit, meant little to me—she never cared enough for my soul to let me know about salvation in Christ. I found liberty because of people who left their country, came to Bulgaria, and answered the questions that had tormented me for years. I heard the clearly articulated gospel for the first time in English. My first Bible was also in English: an NIV New Testament.

While defending the legal rights of U.S. missionaries and Bulgarian Christians, I gladly vented my frustration at the injustice done to my fellow evangelicals. I took some high-profile cases that other lawyers had dropped. I filed lawsuits on behalf of slandered and harassed evangelicals—against police departments, newspapers, individuals, and organizations. I delighted in the astonishment of police officials, used to bossing citizens around, at the subpoenas I served them. But most of the time, that was all the reward I got for seeking justice for evangelicals in the courts. I lost 90 percent of the cases.

It soon became obvious that even the Parliament would defy the constitutional freedom of conscience and faith. A law passed in 1994 indirectly required government approval for the registration of Protestant churches.

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October 22 2001, Vol. 45, No. 13