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Religion in Diverse Societies: Crossing the Boundaries of Prejudice and Distrust contributes to existing cutting-edge research on the constructive way in which religion can support the promotion of respect, dignity, and justice for all people, considered as essential features in shaping sustainable, diverse, and peaceful societies. Through a combination of theoretical perspectives and theological analysis, applied to'real-life'contexts, the diverse contributions examine the role of religion in helping to achieve this and thereby challenge the attitudes and practices that create walls of prejudice and distrust.This timely volume provides a critical discussion of the complex role of religions in the public and political spheres in a range of global contexts and furthers the inter-religious, international, and interdisciplinary understanding of how religion can contribute to promoting and helping create inclusive and diverse societies.

In the The Middle East, Sixteenth Edition, Ellen Lust brings important new coverage to this comprehensive, balanced, and superbly researched text. In clear prose, Lust and her outstanding contributors explain the landscape of this changing region by examining both regional trends and individual countries. The Sixteenth Edition adds a chapter on Sudan, and other country chapters have been streamlined and fully updated to reflect domestic, regional, and international changes of the past three years. This best-selling text offers a wealth of information to help readers not only comprehend more fully the world around them, but also recognize and formulate policies that can more successfully engage the vitally important Middle East.

Like any other subject, the study of religion is a child of its time. Shaped and forged over the course of the twentieth century, it has reflected the interests and political situation of the world at the time. As the twenty-first century unfolds, it is undergoing a major transition along with religion itself. This volume showcases new work and new approaches to religion which work across boundaries of religious tradition, academic discipline and region.The influence of globalizing processes has been evident in social and cultural networking by way of new media like the internet, in the extensive power of global capitalism and in the increasing influence of international bodies and legal instruments. Religion has been changing and adapting too. This handbook offers fresh insights on the dynamic reality of religion in global societies today by underscoring transformations in eight key areas: Market and Branding; Contemporary Ethics and Virtues; Intimate Identities; Transnational Movements; Diasporic Communities; Responses to Diversity; National Tensions; and Reflections on ‘Religion'. These themes demonstrate the handbook's new topics and approaches that move beyond existing agendas. Bringing together scholars of all ages and stages of career from around the world, the handbook showcases the dynamism of religion in global societies. It is an accessible introduction to new ways of approaching the study of religion practically, theoretically and geographically.

'I can't imagine a college student—skeptic, doubter, Christian, struggler—who wouldn't benefit from this book.'—Kevin DeYoung For many young adults, the college years are an exciting period of selfdiscovery full of new relationships, new independence, and new experiences. Yet college can also be a time of personal testing and intense questioning— especially for Christian students confronted with various challenges to Christianity and the Bible for the first time. Drawing on years of experience as a biblical scholar, Michael Kruger addresses common objections to the Christian faith—the exclusivity of Christianity, Christian intolerance, homosexuality, hell, the problem of evil, science, miracles, and the reliability of the Bible. If you're a student dealing with doubt or wrestling with objections to Christianity from fellow students and professors alike, this book will equip you to engage secular challenges with intellectual honesty, compassion, and confidence—and ultimately graduate college with your faith intact.

Is the world better off without Christianity?Combining narrative with keen critique of contemporary debates, author and historian John Dickson gives an honest account of 2,000 years of Christian history that helps us understand what Christianity is and what it's meant to be.To say that the Christian Church has an'image problem'doesn't quite capture it. From the Crusades and the Inquisition to the racism and abuse present in today's Church--both in Catholic and Protestant traditions--the institution that Christ established on earth has a lot to answer for. But the Church has also had moments throughout history when it has been in tune with Jesus'teachings--from the rise of charity to the invention of hospitals.For defenders of the faith, it's important to be able to recognize the good and bad in the church's history and be inspired to live aligned with Christ. For skeptics, this book is a thought-provoking introduction to the idea that Christianity is, despite all, an essential foundation of our civilization.Bullies and Saints will take you on a big-picture journey from the Sermon on the Mount to the modern church:Giving contextual accounts of infamous chapters of Christian history, such as the Crusades, and acknowledging their darkness.Outlining the great movements of the faith and defending its heroes and saints, some of whom are not commonly recognized.Examining the Church beside the teachings and life of Jesus and how it has succeeded in its mission to imitate Christ.

First scholarly treatment of Uganda's first elected ruler; offers new insights into the religious and political history of modern Uganda.Assassinated by Idi Amin and a democratic ally of J.F. Kennedy during the Cold War, Benedicto Kiwanuka was Uganda's most controversial and disruptive politician, and his legacy is still divisive. On the eve of independence, he ledthe Democratic Party (DP), a national movement of predominantly Catholic activists, to end political inequalities and religious discrimination. Along the way, he became Uganda's first prime minister and first Ugandan chief justice. Earle and Carney show how Kiwanuka and Catholic activists struggled to create an inclusive vision of the state, a vision that resulted in relentless intimidation and extra-judicial killings. Focusing closely on the competing Catholic projects that circulated throughout Uganda, this book offers new ways of thinking about the history of democratic thought, while pushing the study of Catholicism in Africa outside of the church and beyond the gaze of missionaries. Drawing on never before seen sources from Kiwanuka's personal papers, the authors upend many of the assumptions that have framed Uganda's political and religious history for over sixty years, as well as repositioning Uganda's politics within the global arena.Uganda: Fountain Jonathon Earle is Associate Professor of African History, Centre College, where he holds the Marlene and David Grissom Professorship of Social Studies, and author of Colonial Buganda and the End of Empire: Political Thought and Historical Imagination in Africa (2017), which was a finalist for the African Studies Association's Bethwell A. Ogot award. J.J. Carney is Associate Professor of Theology, Creighton University, and author of Rwanda before the Genocide: Catholic Politics and Ethnic Discourse in the Late Colonial Era (2014), which won the Ogot award.

Exploring the viability of new perspectives on secularisation and the idea of postsecularism, this book reflects on their relevance when considered in the context of different societies within and outside the West.The topic of secularisation has been recently reconsidered by prominent theorists, such as Jürgen Habermas, Talal Asad, Charles Taylor, and José Casanova. Offering a comparative critique of postsecularism, the contributors extend the discourse on postsecularism to include non-Western experiences, providing comprehensive perspectives on the role of religion in the public sphere and considering the validity of the concept of postsecularism. Drawn from a variety of disciplines, the contributors articulate a coherent analysis of the role of religion in the public sphere from a perspective that engages in the envisaged dialogue.This insightful book will be important for those researching secularism and postsecularism, especially from a non-Western perspective, and it will also be of interest to scholars working on politics and religion in general, political philosophy, and African studies.

After the Berlin Wall fell, a group of Christian colleges in the U.S. seized the opportunity to begin strategic faculty and student exchanges with universities inside the Soviet Union. They could not have foreseen the doors that would open next. During a 1990 visit to Russia, John Bernbaum and his colleagues received a surprising invitation from a Russian government official: come help build a faith-based university in Moscow. Thus, after seventy years of fierce religious persecution under communism, the Russian-American Christian University (RACU) was born.In Opening the Red Door, Bernbaum presents an insider's account of the rise and fall of a Russian-American partnership. As a founder and later president of RACU, Bernbaum offers a ground-level perspective on Russia's post-communist transition and the construction of a cultural-educational bridge between the two superpowers. He describes how American RACU staff worked to understand Russian history and culture—including the nation's rich spiritual heritage—so they could support their new Russian friends in rebuilding an educational system and a society. He documents the story of the first private Christian liberal arts university to be accredited in Russia's history, from its first steps, through its major successes, to its facing increasing opposition during the Putin era.Opening the Red Door offers unique insight not only into Russian culture and post–Cold War history but also traces the dynamics within international educational institutions and partnerships. When he first traveled to Russia, Bernbaum writes, he thought of it as a nation of mystery. But after more than twenty-five years of work there, he believes Russia can be understood. His journey of understanding will prove instructive to educators, administrators, students, missionaries, and anyone interested in international relations.

Der Band nimmt eine umfassende Bestandsaufnahme der gegenwärtigen Lage der Kaukasus-Region vor. Er gibt einen breiten Überblick über die innenpolitische und gesellschaftliche Situation in Aserbaidschan, Armenien und Georgien, behandelt zugleich aber auch länderübergreifende Themen und nimmt die Politik der angrenzenden Staaten sowie der Europäischen Union in den Blick. Auf diese Weise entsteht ein komplexes Bild einer vielfältigen, jedoch politisch, sozial und militärisch instabilen Region. Deutsche und einheimische Wissenschaftler erarbeiten Zukunftsperspektiven für eine Region zwischen Tradition und Transformation.Der InhaltPolitik im Südkaukasus • Soziale Entwicklung und Minderheiten • Die Kaukasus-Region im außenpolitischen Fadenkreuz • AusblickDer HerausgeberDr. Olaf Leiße ist außerplanmäßiger Professor für Europäische Studien am Institut für Politikwissenschaft der Universität Jena.

The story of religion in America is one of unparalleled diversity and protection of the religious rights of individuals. But that story is a muddied one. This new and expanded edition of a classroom favorite tells a jolting history—illuminated by historical texts, pictures, songs, cartoons, letters, and even t-shirts—of how our society has been and continues to be replete with religious intolerance. It powerfully reveals the narrow gap between intolerance and violence in America. The second edition contains a new chapter on Islamophobia and adds fresh material on the Christian persecution complex, white supremacy and other race-related issues, sexuality, and the role played by social media.John Corrigan and Lynn S. Neal's overarching narrative weaves together a rich, compelling array of textual and visual materials. Arranged thematically, each chapter provides a broad historical background, and each document or cluster of related documents is entwined in context as a discussion of the issues unfolds. The need for this book has only increased in the midst of today's raging conflicts about immigration, terrorism, race, religious freedom, and patriotism.

Throughout West African societies, at times of social crises, postmenopausal women—the Mothers—make a ritual appeal to their innate moral authority. The seat of this power is the female genitalia. Wielding branches or pestles, they strip naked and slap their genitals and bare breasts to curse and expel the forces of evil. In An Intimate Rebuke Laura S. Grillo draws on fieldwork in Côte d'Ivoire that spans three decades to illustrate how these rituals of Female Genital Power (FGP) constitute religious and political responses to abuses of power. When deployed in secret, FGP operates as spiritual warfare against witchcraft; in public, it serves as a political activism. During Côte d'Ivoire's civil wars FGP challenged the immoral forces of both rebels and the state. Grillo shows how the ritual potency of the Mothers'nudity and the conjuration of their sex embodies a moral power that has been foundational to West African civilization. Highlighting the remarkable continuity of the practice across centuries while foregrounding the timeliness of FGP in contemporary political resistance, Grillo shifts perspectives on West African history, ethnography, comparative religious studies, and postcolonial studies.

The Bible is clear about God's love for the city, be it Babylon,Nineveh, or Jerusalem. Thousands of years later, His lovehasn't changed—and God still calls His people to speak truth to the cities of the world. In City Changers, Alan Platt shows how we need to be in the classrooms, boardrooms, and marketplaces of our communities, engaged with society and ready to offer hope to the broken. Alan gives practical answers and inspiration for influencing the spiritual, social, and cultural dimensions of where we live, as he tells his remarkable story of watching God's church deeply affect cities around the world. Generations of changed lives tell us that Christianity can radically transform society, beginning with spiritual transformation in the lives of individual people. As Alan writes, the church is called as a missional presence to instill the character and presence of Christ into the core of the community.

The Battle for China's Spirit is the first comprehensive analysis of its kind, focusing on seven major religious groups in China that together account for over 350 million believers: Chinese Buddhism, Taoism, Catholicism, Protestantism, Islam, Tibetan Buddhism, and Falun Gong. The study examines the evolution of the Communist Party's policies of religious control, how they are applied differently to diverse faith communities, and how citizens are responding to these policies. The study—which draws on hundreds of official documents and interviews with religious leaders, lay believers, and scholars—finds that Chinese government controls over religion have intensified since November 2012, seeping into new areas of daily life. Yet millions of religious believers defy official restrictions or engage in some form of direct protest, at times scoring significant victories. The report explores how these dynamics affect China's overall social, political, and economic environment, while offering recommendations to both the Chinese government and international actors for how to increase the space for peaceful religious practice in a country where spirituality has been deeply embedded in its culture for millennia.

Those who anticipated the demise of religion and the advent of a peaceful, secularized global village have seen the last two decades confound their predictions. René Girard's mimetic theory is a key to understanding the new challenges posed by our world of resurgent violence and pluralistic cultures and traditions. Girard sought to explain how the Judeo-Christian narrative exposes a founding murder at the origin of human civilization and demystifies the bloody sacrifices of archaic religions. Meanwhile, his book Sacrifice, a reading of conflict and sacrificial resolution in the Vedic Brahmanas, suggests that mimetic theory's insights also resonate with several non-Western religious and spiritual traditions. This volume collects engagements with Girard by scholars of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism and situates them within contemporary theology, philosophy, and religious studies.

From inside the Vatican, the book that became a modern classic on sainthood in the Catholic Church.Working from church documents, Kenneth Woodward shows how saint-makers decide who is worthy of the church's highest honor. He describes the investigations into lives of candidates, explains how claims for miracles are approved or rejected, and reveals the role politics -- papal and secular -- plays in the ultimate decision. From his examination of such controversial candidates as Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador and Edith Stein, a Jewish philosopher who became a nun and was gassed at Auschwitz, to his insights into the changes Pope John Paul II has instituted, Woodward opens the door on a 2,000-year-old tradition.

Qualifying post-Westphalian sovereign statehood as a ‘power'as argued for in Hendrik Berkhoff's political theology, this book addresses the decades-long theological-spiritual debate between Christian realism and Christian pacifism in U.S. foreign policy and global Christian circles. It approaches the debate by delving into the pacifist Anabaptist political theology and delineates empirically how sovereign statehood in post-colonial Africa and Asia has fallen into the hands of the devil Satan, as a ‘fallen power'in the Foucaultian terms of power structures, techniques and episteme. While the book offers intervention schemes and options, it holds that Christian statecraft remains the source of hope to effectively address a number of serious global issues. By extension, the book is thus an invitation to ignite debates on the suitability of Christian statecraft and the nexus between spirituality and world politics, making it especially interesting for scholars and students in the fields of International Politics, Politics of Asian and African States, Post-colonial Studies and Political Theology.

Evangelicalism is one of the strongest religious traditions in America today; 20 million Americans identify themselves with the evangelical movement. Given the modern pluralistic world we live in, why is evangelicalism so popular? Based on a national telephone survey and more than three hundred personal interviews with evangelicals and other churchgoing Protestants, this study provides a detailed analysis of the commitments, beliefs, concerns, and practices of this thriving group. Examining how evangelicals interact with and attempt to influence secular society, this book argues that traditional, orthodox evangelicalism endures not despite, but precisely because of, the challenges and structures of our modern pluralistic environment. This work also looks beyond evangelicalism to explore more broadly the problems of traditional religious belief and practice in the modern world. With its impressive empirical evidence, innovative theory, and substantive conclusions, American Evangelicalism will provoke lively debate over the state of religious practice in contemporary America.

David M. Craig traveled across the United States to assess health care access, delivery and finance in this country. He interviewed religious hospital administrators and interfaith activists, learning how they balance the values of economic efficiency and community accountability. He met with conservatives, liberals, and moderates, reviewing their ideas for market reform or support for the Affordable Care Act. He discovered that health care in the US is not a private good or a public good. Decades of public policy and philanthropic service have made health care a shared social good.Health Care as a Social Good: Religious Values and the American Democracy argues that as escalating health costs absorb more and more of family income and government budgets, we need to take stock of the full range of health care values to create a different and more affordable community-based health care system. Transformation of that system is a national priority but Americans have failed to find a way to work together that bypasses our differences. Craig insists that community engagement around the common religious conviction that healing is a shared responsibility can help us achieve this transformation—one that will not only help us realize a new and better system, but one that reflects the ideals of American democracy and the common good.

In A People Adrift, a prominent Catholic thinker states bluntly that the Catholic Church in the United States must transform itself or suffer irreversible decline. Peter Steinfels shows how even before the recent revelations about sexual abuse by priests, the explosive combination of generational change and the thinning ranks of priests and nuns was creating a grave crisis of leadership and identity. This groundbreaking book offers an analysis not just of the church's immediate troubles but of less visible, more powerful forces working below the surface of an institution that provides a spiritual identity for 65 million Americans and spans the nation with its parishes, schools, colleges and universities, hospitals, clinics, and social service agencies.In A People Adrift, Steinfels warns that entrenched liberals and conservatives are trapped in a'theo-logical gridlock'that often ignores what in fact goes on in families, parishes, classrooms, voting booths, and Catholic organizations of all types. Above all, he insists, the altered Catholic landscape demands a new agenda for leadership, from the selection of bishops and the rethinking of the priesthood to the thorough preparation and genuine incorporation of a lay leadership that is already taking over key responsibilities in Catholic institutions. Catholicism exerts an enormous cultural and political presence in American life. No one interested in the nation's moral, intellectual, and political future can be indifferent to the fate of what has been one of the world's most vigorous churches -- a church now severely challenged.

The only book on the market to bring together Unit 3 and Unit 8 from the Edexcel GCSE Religious Studies specification, ensuring that students have everything they need in one place.- Engages students with each area of the specification through quotes, summaries and questions for every topic- Helps students prepare for assessment with up-to-date guidance including exam-style questions, sample student answers and advice- Offers a full-course book from best-selling author Victor Watton drawing on his many years'experience writing textbooks and learning resources

'To take care of each other should be our primary concern in this 21st century and Father Dear is steady on this course.'--Thich Nhat HanhFor John Dear, a Jesuit priest and respected leader of the ecumenical peace movement, the spiritual life is a combination of contemplation and action, of maintaining inner peace and projecting that peace into the greater world. It is the spirituality exemplified by the lives of Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., Mother Teresa, the Dalai Lama, and others throughout history who remained true to the highest ideals while addressing the most difficult problems and conflicts of the real world.As a tireless advocate for social justice and human rights, Dear has followed that path in his own life, and in Living Peace he describes his journey. Breaking down the life of peace into three parts an inner journey, a public journey, and the journey of all humanity he shares the spiritual practices that have sustained him and teaches readers how to integrate these practices into their own lives.

This definitive guide explores all the faiths from around the world. Together with the five main religions of Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism, there is a diverse range of newer faiths to ensure a compelling and comprehensive read.From the key concepts of ancient beliefs to the ground-breaking ideas at the heart of modern faiths, religious history is chronicled in a universal timeline. This provides a global perspective on the origins and events contributing to the growth and spread of spirituality, and the position of religion in society today. Influential religious leaders, including Mahatma Gandhi, Saint Paul, and Al-Ghazali, are introduced in depth and detail, alongside important quotations. Modern alternative beliefs are investigated in the wider context of their political, social, and cultural climates.Part of DK's award-winning Big Ideas series that has sold in excess of seven million copies, The Religions Book explains the trickiest of subjects in the most easily accessible format, using inspiring infographics and illuminating images alongside simple and straightforward text.Compelling and accessible, this is the perfect guide for students of religious study, or anyone interested in the ideas of ancient and present-day faiths and religious philosophies.Series Overview: Big Ideas Simply Explained series uses creative design and innovative graphics, along with straightforward and engaging writing, to make complex subjects easier to understand. These award-winning books provide just the information needed for students, families, or anyone interested in concise, thought-provoking refreshers on a single subject.

The Complete Story of the Dalai Lamas His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama is known to the world for his efforts to preserve Tibetan culture and for his inspiring spiritual teachings. Often unnoticed, however, is the long, colorful history from which this most beloved of holy men has emerged. In Secret Lives of the Dalai Lama, Alexander Norman tells this story in full for the first time, from Tibetan Buddhism's foundational narratives to the present-day crisis faced by Tibet. And what a story it is. Along with dedicated monks selflessly serving the Tibetan people, among His Holiness's spiritual forebears there are a Dalai Lama who waged wars, a womanizing and inebriated poet, and several who wound up dead following disputes over temporal power. Also, while Western practitioners focus on Tibetan Buddhism's liberating vision of enlightenment, it simultaneously contains ritual practices of prophecy and magic, as well as a vivid pantheon of deities and demons. In the end, although Tibet falls short of the Western myths of a Himalayan utopia, by illuminating the historical struggle toward compassion and selflessness embodied in the Dalai Lama lineage, Secret Lives of the Dalai Lama ultimately reveals a reality that is vastly more compelling than any romance of “Shangri-La” and provides deeper reasons for admiring Tibetan tradition.

Part of the Jewish Encounter seriesTaking in everything from the Kingdom of David to the Oslo Accords, Ruth Wisse offers a radical new way to think about the Jewish relationship to power. Traditional Jews believed that upholding the covenant with God constituted a treaty with the most powerful force in the universe; this later transformed itself into a belief that, unburdened by a military, Jews could pursue their religious mission on a purely moral plain. Wisse, an eminent professor of comparative literature at Harvard, demonstrates how Jewish political weakness both increased Jewish vulnerability to scapegoating and violence, and unwittingly goaded power-seeking nations to cast Jews as perpetual targets.Although she sees hope in the State of Israel, Wisse questions the way the strategies of the Diaspora continue to drive the Jewish state, echoing Abba Eban's observation that Israel was the only nation to win a war and then sue for peace. And then she draws a persuasive parallel to the United States today, as it struggles to figure out how a liberal democracy can face off against enemies who view Western morality as weakness. This deeply provocative book is sure to stir debate both inside and outside the Jewish world. Wisse's narrative offers a compelling argument that is rich with history and bristling with contemporary urgency.