- Browse
- Bestsellers
-
Books
-
Popular
Sports
Fiction
Health
Creative
Home & Garden
- Agriculture & Veterinary
- Antiques
- Architecture & Interiors
- Cookery
- Crafts
- D.I.Y.
- Gardening
- Wine & Beverages
Leisure
Irish
- Irish Fiction
- Irish History
- Irish Interest
- Irish Plays & Poetry
- Learn Irish
- Books As Gaeilge
- Limerick & Clare Books
- Genealogy
Other Categories
Book Awards
- Booker Prize
- CBI Book Awards
- Dublin Literary Award
- Irish Book Awards
- Nero Book Awards
- Pulitzer Prize
- Women's Prize for Fiction
- New Adult Book Prize
Specials
Recommended
Gift Wrap Service
-
- Children's
-
Gifts & Stationery
-
Popular
Gift Ideas
Games & Jigsaws
Childrens
-
- Third Level
- School Supplies
The Baton and the Cross: Russia's Church from Pagans to Putin
by Lucy Ash
€ 13.75
ISBN: 9781837731855
*SHORTLISTED FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE 2025*
*SHORTLISTED FOR THE PUSHKIN HOUSE BOOK PRIZE 2025*
*ONE OF HISTORY TODAY'S BEST BOOKS OF 2024*
*'A TIMELY AND IMPORTANT BOOK' - ORLANDO FIGES*
*'SPELLBINDING' - ANDREI KURKOV*
For more than a millennium, the Russian Orthodox Church has shown astonishing survival skills - from the Mongol yoke to tsarist demagoguery and enlightenment, from Soviet atheism to the chaotic 1990s. Now again, it is at the right hand of power, sanctifying Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine.
In this provocative new book, Lucy Ash reveals how, under Putin, religion is being stripped of its spiritual content and used as a weapon to control the population. Orthodox clerics and their acolytes distort theology as they preach Slav Christian supremacy and drag Russia backwards into a new Middle Ages.
Combining historical research with vivid present-day reportage, The Baton and the Cross explores the impact the Church is having on millions of lives - from the tower blocks of big cities to far-flung villages in Siberia. Delving into the underbelly of politics, state security and big money, Ash shows how these forces have formed an unholy alliance with Orthodoxy in the dystopia of twenty-first century Russia.
384 pages.
Available from 06/11/25.
Usually despatched in 2-5 working days.
Date of Publication: 06/11/2025
PaperbackThe Baton and the Cross: Russia's Church from Pagans to Putin also appears in these Categories:
