Why, all of a sudden, would an officially atheistic confederation of republics like the USSR choose to celebrate, in full pomp and grandeur, a thousand years of Christianity on its soil?
The Soviet government reports that religion is definitely on the decline in the USSR. And given the persistent harassment of the state, one might expect that—but trustworthy sources say it isn't so.
About 200 A.D., under the reign of Roman emperor Septimius Severus, persecution broke out against the Christians. It was particularly severe in North Africa. In Carthage, a Christian woman of noble birth, Perpetua, was arrested. She was about 22 years old and was nursing an infant son. In what may be the earliest extant Christian document from a woman's pen, she wrote her own story. The account of her death was, of course, added later.
This article was a collaboration of Bernard Michel, and the editor, working from notes by Eve Bock and Josef Smolik, whose work appears elsewhere in this issue.
The voluntarist Anabaptists attacked the form of the 'Christian' social order which had dominated Europe ever since Constantine had legalized Christianity.
