The Roman Catholic Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Religion in Russia is diverse with Christianity, especially Orthodoxy, being the most widely professed faith, but with significant minorities of Irreligious people, Muslims and Pagans . A 1997 law on religion recognises the right to freedom of conscience and creed to all the citizenry, the spiritual contribution of Orthodox Christianity to the history of Russia, and respect to Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Judaism and other religions and creeds which constitute an inseparable part of the historical heritage of Russia's peoples, including ethnic religions or Paganism, either preserved or revived. According to the law, any religious organisation may be recognised as traditional if it was already in existence before 1982, and each newly founded religious group has to provide its credentials and re-register yearly for fifteen years, and, in the meantime until eventual recognition, stay without rights.The Russian Orthodox Church, though its influence is thin in Siberia and southern Russia, where there has been a remarkable revival of pre-Christian religion, acts as the de facto if not de jure privileged religion of the state, claiming the right to decide which other religions or denominations are to be granted the right of registration. Some Protestant churches which were already in existence before the Russian Revolution have been unable to re-register, and the Catholic Church has been forbidden to develop its own territorial jurisdictions. According to some Western observers, respect for freedom of religion by Russian authorities has declined since the late 1990s and early 2000s. Activities of the Jehovah's Witnesses are currently banned in Russia. Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 there has been a revival and spread of Siberian shamanism, and the emergence of Hindu and new religious movements throughout Russia. There has been an exponential increase in new religious groups and alternative spiritualities, Eastern religions and Neopaganism, even among self-defined Christians—a term which has become a loose descriptor for a variety of eclectic views and practices. Russia has been defined by the scholar Eliot Borenstein as the Southern California of Europe because of such a blossoming of new religious movements, and the latter are perceived by the Russian Orthodox Church as competitors in a war for souls.
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