Bridges of Faith: How Christian Citizen Diplomats Challenged Images of Godless Soviet Communism in the 1980s

This article addresses how exchanges between American and Soviet Christians in the 1980s challenged images of the Soviet Union as a land of godless communism. Focusing on the New England-based group Bridges for Peace, which was organized in 1981 by members of the United Church of Christ, the article shows that, in the first half of the decade, highly publicized visits by Soviet Christians to US cities and towns both provoked intense confrontations and promoted sympathetic bonding. It argues that, after 1985, when President Ronald Reagan enthusiastically embraced people-to-people exchanges and his administration pledged to cooperate with Bridges for Peace, expanding tours by Christians in both countries contributed to dispelling negative stereotypes and overcoming hostility. The article thus encourages reconsideration and refinement of conventional ideas about the inept naivete of citizen diplomats and peace activists, the decline of liberal Protestant churches, the dominance of the anticommunist Christian Right, and the process for the ending of the Cold War. It is based primarily on the published writing of the Bridges for Peace founder, Clinton Gardner, the personal papers of the Bridges for Peace leader Mary Teachout, and hundreds of articles in local newspapers from Vermont to North Carolina that document the responses of communities to Christian visitors from the USSR.