PUB - Publikationen an der Universität Bielefeld

The article is an analytical review of a conference dedicated to the study of non-state sources of everyday life of Catholics in various parts of the USSR. The conference is organized within the project “Entangled Histories: Russia and the Vatican, 1917—1958”, initiated by the Center for the Study of History of Religion and the Church at the Russian Academy of Sciences. Reflecting the influence of religious beliefs and faith on people’s life is especially important in the context of global secularization and privatization of religion. The article identifies the new sources of non-state origin which give a new insight on the social events witnessed by catholic clergy and believers in the USSR. The documents and stories presented by the conference participants from the history of the Catholics of the USSR pave the way of going beyond the institutional history of the Church and demonstrate the prospects of analyzing everyday religiosity from different angles.