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The Emerging Church grew in prominence in the United States in the 1990’s as a reaction to seeker-sensitive approaches of nondenominational evangelical megachurches. These megachurches are known for the commodification of religion and the conception of church members as consumers, and are thus prime examples of the neoliberalization of the American religious landscape. In contrast, the Emerging Church opposes institutionalized and neoliberalized religious practices and structures, instead emphasizing local and contextual organization and practice as a basis for more “authentically Christian” lives. Nevertheless, the Emerging Church itself displays characteristics of neoliberalization, which I disclose using Wendy Brown’s definition of neoliberal rationality. This raises the question whether a lived critique of neoliberalization is possible in the late modern era.
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This paper offers a review of religion and politics in the United Kingdom shortly after the Scottish Referendum in September 2014 and the UK General Election in May 2015. It first provides a brief historical outline of the emergence of the four separate parts of the current United Kingdom, their different experiences of Anglo-Saxon and Viking invasions and responses to the Reformation in the fifteenth century after a millennium of Roman Catholicism. It then briefly reviews data from recent censuses and social attitude surveys about religious identities, beliefs and commitment and political party preferences which generally indicate a preference for Conservative Party support by Anglicans and Labour by Roman Catholics. Recent Church of England leaders have suggested that religion is now a major player on the public stage. This is strongly rejected. Firstly, census and survey data point unambiguously to the declining salience of religion and the public’s strong belief that religion is a private and personal matter and that religious leaders should not meddle in politics. Secondly, three examples are given where it is argued that critical interventions by religious leaders in recent years have not led to any serious changes in government policies.
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It is common practice to defend the idea that by separating, in 1880s-1905, the State from the Churches, in particular from the Roman Catholic Church, the French Republic has opened the way to the feminine emancipation. The return to the history tilts us to propose a more diffentiating interpretation. The influence of the laicity is, in France, by no means unambiguous: according to periods, the Republic adopted varied public policies towards women. This article presents a diachronic modelling, envisaged from the dialectic of the equality and the difference, of these policies. It spots a first period, 1880 till 1960, during which remains a hierarchical formula maintaining women in a status of inferiority ; between 1960 and 1990, the equality spouses with the religious difference; from 1990, under the influence of the controversy around the “ Muslim question “, France enter a more universalist model, in which the assertion of women’s rights comes along with a relative denial of the religious difference.
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This article shall analyse the attitude of the Catholic Church towards the process of Europeanization of Polish policy of equality and non-discrimination. It shall be an analysis of a single case, i.e. the debate around Poland’s adoption of the CAHVIO Convention of the Council of Europe. These analyses shall seek the answer to the question of how the Catholic Church sees the process of Europeanization of equality and anti-discrimination policy in Poland. Whether it supports it or opposes it. What role does it want to play in this process? How is the Church and its attitude towards Europeanization perceived by other participants of the public debate and how does this affect the ability of the Church to control the process of Europeanization? The theoretical approach used in the research shall be the paradigm of the public sphere and Europeanization. Methods and techniques of discourse analysis shall be applied as well.
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The historical process of modernisation of western European countries culminates in a specific form of relationship between collective identity and political legitimacy. This article is an attempt to analyse the particularities of the Spanish case. The author uses the analytical instruments provided by the social differentiation theory and historical sociology, which allows removing any teleological pretence from the secularisation theory. In relation to the Spanish case, the author shows: the late but swift character of the population’s subjective secularisation; the unfinished character of the separation between Church and State; and finally, the contemporary coincidence of the last process with the loss of the cultural religious roots of the autochthonous population and with the arrival of population whose religion is not so differentiated from their culture.
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Ex abrupto the little known and closed Yazidi community has become a symbol of the atrocities of the Islamic State against minorities and of the risk deriving from extremism. The strong impact of IS on the Yazidi and other communities in the Middle East – Christians and others - has also provoked a migration wave towards Europe. The A. has worked on field in Iraq and Iraqi-Kurdistan since 2012, and had researched on and with the Yazidi long before the IS, realizing studies and documentaries. She sustains that the roots of the crisis were apparent before the crisis and the physical-psychological effects on minorities are much deeper, as they mine the structure and the evolution of their communities. Yet, the inner resources of the Yazidi community and the new global scenario have created also opportunities. Migration of minorities is a crucial issue: although constant in the last decades, it is now seriously endangering the rich social composition of the region and the stability of the communities when they scatter in diasporas. Europe must help the Middle Eastern countries to protect their minorities as they are a fundamental element for the balance of power and for the social dynamics.
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While the Nordic countries have a history of many similarities in core values and institutional arrangements, a number of differences have developed in recent years in relation to religion, due to political reasons. In this article, findings from four empirical studies on religion in Nordic parliamentary politics are analysed in terms of weak or strong politicisation for the purpose of homogeneity or in diversity. From an analytical model, different patterns of the use of religion in politics in the five countries are identified, due to the relationships between church and state, the level of religious diversity and the presence of right-wing populist parties. The conclusion is that religion once again has become a means to societal cohesion in Denmark, but also to some degree in Norway and Sweden in a search for a core authority in society. The main reason behind this change is the impact of globalisation.
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The paper looks at the historical and contemporary role of Catholic Church in Italian politics. Over the last sixty years Catholicism has played an important role in Italian society. The paper identify three ways in which Catholicism interacts with Italian public life: as a peculiar version of “civil religion”, through Catholic inspirited political parties and the Church intervening directly in specific public debates. After identifies the change of political role of the Catholic Church in the last decades the paper recognize the main challenges for this particular relationship in the next future.
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