'It’s Just Like Mission Impossible': The Politics, Economics, and Culture of Smuggling Bibles into the Soviet Bloc

• In Event: American Advocates on Behalf of Soviet Christians

Abstract

In the 1970s and 1980s, smuggling Bibles into the Communist bloc became a multimillion dollar enterprise for dozens of US organizations, replete with controversy and big personalities. This paper will investigate the intersection of U.S. evangelism efforts, celebrity culture, and the Cold War, focusing on the debates about the practice of smuggling and suggesting reasons for the public fascination with those who carried it out.

Author

• Julie K. deGraffenried, Baylor U