Along with the other big contributions of the Black Panther Party, one thing that definitely should be pointed out is that they were "godless atheists." They broke with and took on this whole thing about how you couldn't appeal to Black people without putting some religion in your message. Oh, it is probably possible to find a few "nods" to religion in this or that thing the Panthers said or wrote, and they did--quite correctly--try to unite with and influence people who were religious. But basically, you have to say the Panthers were not into all that god nonsense!
This basic "godless atheism" was an expression--in fact one of the most outstanding expressions--of the real radicalism of the Panthers. It was an expression of their most revolutionary side. The more revolutionary they were, the more they were free of religion. And this was especially the case during those times when the Panthers were most into Marxism-Leninism and the Thought of Chairman Mao (as we called it at that time).
Our Party, which is firmly based in Marxism-Leninism-Maoism (as we call it today), is consistent in our atheistic viewpoint. Why does MLM insist on atheism, why does it insist that there is no god? I have answered this at more length in other things I have written on religion (including "Liberation Without Gods" in RW 435, 436, 437, "The Morality We Need, and the Morality We Don't Need" in RW 516, and "Religion: Who Needs It...and Who Doesn't" in RW 538.) But the basic answer is this: MLM rejects belief in god because there is no god, and believing in things that don't exist, and even more, counting on those things that don't exist to do for you what you have to do for yourself--that can only bring harm and hold back things that have to be done.
Some people who believe in religion say that we communists lack a "spiritual side" because our ideology rejects belief in god. Well, we communists definitely have spirit, in our own way. Our spirit comes from our beliefs--the same as those people who believe in religion. But the difference is that our beliefs are grounded in reality--they are based on taking life as it actually is. Religious beliefs are not grounded in reality--they are based on fantasy, on the belief in things which in reality do not exist.
But it is more than that. As I have said before, "Religion is the doctrine of submission--blind obedience. Marxism [is the doctrine] of rebellion--ever more conscious rebellion." (Bullets, p. 206) MLM is an all-conquering ideology: it shows how the masses of people, through struggle, can consciously understand reality and change reality--and how people can consciously change themselves in the process of changing the world. But this requires, as a starting point, facing life as it really is, and on that basis grasping how it can be changed and moving to change it.
To do this means breaking with the religious indoctrination that the powers-that-be instill in the people through many different means. How sharp a break this can be--and how crucial it is to make this break--was driven home to me in a story I was told about a woman who all her life had felt the need for religion but was also coming to understand the need for a radical change in society. At one point she was reading over a speech of mine, and when she got to the point where it started to talk about the scientific basis of our ideology, dialectical materialism, she put the pamphlet down and said, "I can't keep reading this." When someone asked why, she said, "If I keep reading on this dialectical materialism then I won't be able to keep believing in god, and I need my belief in god to keep me going."
Well, she was half-right, and half-wrong. She correctly understood that if she really got into dialectics and materialism and the whole outlook of MLM she would come to cast off religion. But she was wrong in thinking that she had to keep on clinging to religion. Holding onto religion means holding onto a refusal to face life as it actually is--and that means you cannot fully devote yourself to radically changing things.
If you are afraid of the truth--if you stop pursuing the truth because you are afraid of where it might lead you--then you cannot be free. And that is what religion will cause you to do, sooner or later. The Christian Bible may say "You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free," but in reality that Bible cannot stand up to the truth, nor can it really, fully set people free.
Only communist ideology can do that. Only Marxism-Leninism-Maoism can lead the masses of people to complete liberation, exactly because MLM is a scientific outlook representing the most revolutionary class in history, the proletariat. For this reason, people armed with the ideology of MLM have no reason to fear the truth, no interest in stopping half-way or turning back from the pursuit of truth. They have every interest in continuing to go after the truth, in the deepest, fullest way, and every interest in acting on the truth to free not just themselves but all humanity.