MEMORY AND REMEMBERING IN THE POST-COMMUNIST CONTEXT

This article offers an analysis of negative as well as positive examples of how Christians have dealt with the memories of the past against the background of their churches and societies in post-communist countries. It concentrates on the victim mechanisms that survived the fall of communism and prevented people from forgiveness and from accepting responsibility for their life choices, and shows that this not letting go of the past is often paradoxically combined with an intentional as well as non-intentional suppression of memory or a replacement of memory by a fiction. What is claimed as holding on to the past, then, may in fact be holding on to images that substitute past events-but also a moving beyond, towards a reconciled and responsible life. Possible ways of remembering the past that help a more truthful understanding of the present as well as presenting hope for the future are sketched in the conclusion.