Download or read book Turning Prayers into Protests written by David Doellinger and published by Central European University Press. This book was released on 2013-11-30 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Turning Prayers into Protests is a comparative study of religious-based oppositional activity in Slovakia and East Germany prior to 1989. Religion was a central arena for culture, thought, and social organization in the societies that became communist after the Second World War. It was thus a primary concern for communist regimes. The author examines the various and divergent grass-roots activism of the secret Catholic Church in Slovakia and the Lutheran Church in East Germany that confronted state socialist rule and contributed to its eventual dismantling. He compares the two cases in terms of the political power, influence and affect that these Churches had in regard to state repression or cooptation, vividly demonstrating that religion could provide a space for independence beyond state control as well as a foundation for resistance.