Moluccan people arrived in the Netherlands in 1951, as a result of the complicated process of the decolonization of Indonesia. A situation of permanent waiting and political disappointment resulted in this growing Moluccan community remaining. The Moluccan Protestant church reflects the migration experience and generational developments. The Moluccan churches face a decrease in membership and a lack of youth. The Malay language, the adherence to strict, liturgical rules and the unchanging, ‘old-fashioned’ character are possible causes. The challenges result in transformations (...) of the Moluccan Protestant landscape. Moluccan Christians move to evangelical denominations. Here, they appreciate another style of worship against the background of traditional religious roots that cross into the ethnic-cultural domain. In turn, Moluccan Protestant churches experiment with bi- or tri-lingual services and hymns, with a broader range of instruments that accompany congregational singing (including trad-itional Moluccan instruments) and with different styles of song and service. This article discusses the appropriation or borrowing of practices within the Moluccan Protestant landscape. I aim to shed light on generational differences, relations and conflicts. I argue that both inter- and intra-religious borrowing as appropriation is a helpful perspective for analysing religious transformation and embodied religiosity. (shrink)

Ethical reasoning is an integral part of the work of a clinical ethics consultant. Ethical reasoning has a close relationship with an individual’s beliefs and values, which, for religious adherents, are likely to be tightly connected with their spiritual perspectives. As a result, for individuals who identify with a religious tradition, the process of thinking through ethical questions is likely to be influenced by their religious worldview. The connection between ethical reasoning and one’s spiritual perspective raises questions (...) about the role that CECs’ personal religious worldviews should play in their professional lives and their consultative work. This paper offers numerous arguments critiquing the inclusion of a consultant’s own spiritual perspective in her work and has identified only limited circumstances under which such inclusion might be permissible. In particular, these arguments lead to the conclusion that a CEC’s personal beliefs should never influence her ethical analysis or development of a recommendation. Further, religious appeals should not be used in communication during decision-making conversations other than to describe the patient or surrogate’s stated perspective. There may be limited cases in which a CEC may share her spiritual worldview with a patient with the intent of building a collaborative relationship, but such situations should be approached with extreme caution. (shrink)

Jake Greenblum and Ryan K Hubbard argue that physicians, nurses, clinical ethicists and ethics committee members should not cite religious considerations when helping patients (or their proxies) make medical decisions. They provide two arguments for this position: The Public Reason Argument and the Fiduciary Argument. In this essay, I show that the Public Reason Argument fails. Greenblum and Hubbard may provide good reason to think that physicians should not invoke their own religious commitments as reasons for a particular (...) medical decision. But they fail to show that it is wrong for physicians to cite the patient’s own religious commitments as reasons for a particular decision. As such, if Greenblum and Hubbard’s thesis is to survive, the Fiduciary Argument (or some unmentioned argument) will have to do the bulk of the work. (shrink)

Concluding remarks for the special issue of Approaching Religion, ‘Appropriation as a Perspective and Topic in the Study of Religion and Spirituality’.

Despite the fact that Islam is the second largest religion in the world, empirical studies on Muslim religiosity have been very rare. The reason for this is seen in the lack of measurements applicable to Muslim samples. Nonetheless, the few empirical studies about Muslims, the role of Islam in terms of physical and psychological well-being, and comparative studies give rise to hope. The problems of application, adaptation and translation of religiosity and spirituality scales developed for Christian traditions is an issue (...) that the psychology of religion in Turkey is facing but has not yet solved. This article shall provide an overview of the religious landscape in Turkey that has to be considered when applying Turkish or Western measures of religiosity to Turkish samples. Further problems in cross-cultural/religious studies due to inappropriate measures are illustrated. Finally religiosity scales developed and/or applied within the psychology of religion research in Turkey are listed. (shrink)

SPECIAL INTRODUCTORY PRICE! No collection of this sort has yet been conceived of, let alone accomplished, in this field. In part that may well be due to the extraordinarily nascent character of the field of comparative religious ethics, described as that. Yet the aim is not simply to gather together a number of pieces, but -- with the appropriate modesty and tentativeness -- to offer one picture of how the field ought to understand itself: its past, present, and perhaps (...) its future. A critical mass of scholars has now emerged in this area, and the institutional dynamics of religious studies departments, which are increasingly seeing the attractions of classes in "comparative ethics," are favorable as well. By gathering together both "classic" statements, exemplifying paradigmatic approaches in the field, and recent, ground-breaking and innovative works, the ambition is to make this collection the gold standard for anyone working on the field of comparative religious ethics in coming decades. (shrink)

Cultural appropriation is a timely topic that has been taking up a lot of space in public discussions. The concept is often applied in heated debates aimed at calling out’ different actors and actions as appropriation, or on the other hand to defend against such accusations. This thematic issue seeks to look at the topic from a broader and more nuanced perspective, asking what different expressions of appropriation appear in the field of and in relation to religion (...) and spirituality. What discourses and discussions emerge around instances of religious and spiritual appropriation? And how is appropriation understood, negotiated or problematized within, across and around different religious and spiritual groups? The publication is part of the research project ‘Learning from Religion and Spirituality’ (Academy of Finland 2019-2023) [325148]. (shrink)

The enlarging domain of psychiatric intervention is frequently associated with the undue medicalization of unusual experiences. In such a climate, it becomes of utmost importance to carefully choose appropriate candidates for the psychiatric gaze. This suggests a need to draw a distinction between religious experiences (with psychotic form) and pathological psychotic experiences. As Jackson and Fulford (1997) maintain, “spiritual experiences, whether welcome or unwelcome, and whether or not they are psychotic in form, have nothing (directly) to do with medicine. (...) It would be quite wrong, then, to “treat” spiritual psychotic experiences with neuroleptic drugs, just as it is quite wrong to “treat” political .. (shrink)

Can religious premises ever be cited legitimately in explanations of matters of fact? Scientific practice is generally regarded as the source of our explanatory paradigms and the final arbiter of matters of fact, and is so constituted that it could never endorse such explanations. Neither would they be sanctioned by the non-cognitive reconstructions of religious discourse currently fashionable. I argue: Some scientific constraints on explanations, such as consistency, testability, and corrigibility, are generally legitimate in non-scientific contexts. Other cognitive (...) values, such as clarity and simplicity, though not constraints, still have adequate credentials to serve globally in the evaluation of theories and explanations. In addition to these, science employs overtly ideological constraints on explanation, plus a number of parochial values, including control, replicability, and skepticism. These serve to circumscribe the range of acceptable explanations more narrowly than reasonable standards of rationality would necessitate. In particular, they are responsible for precluding religious explanations unnecessarily. ;Finally, one can reconstruct from religious contexts a system of cognitive values with broad application that takes exception to scientific norms pertaining to the status of teleological explanations, the ranking of outstanding problem areas in importance, the usefulness of anecdotal material, and the appropriateness of pragmatic conceptions of truth. The additional explanations this value structure sanctions will be less secure than scientific explanations generally, and somewhat idiosyncratic. They may be appropriate when no scientific explanations are possible or available, or if the religious explanation is teleological and the scientific explanation is not. Near-death experiences represent a major potential source of religious explanations, although one in great need of development. More generally, our ability to give religious explanations is hampered by inadequate theoretical articulations of the concept of God. (shrink)

Religious epistemology is the study of how subjects' religious beliefs can have, or fail to have, some form of positive epistemic status and whether they even need such status appropriate to their kind. The current debate is focused most centrally upon the kind of basis upon which a religious believer can be rationally justified in holding certain beliefs about God and whether it is necessary to be so justified to believe as a religious believer ought. Engaging (...) these issues are primarily three groups of people who call themselves ‘fideists’, ‘Reformed epistemologists’, and ‘evidentialists’. Each group has a position, but the positions are not mutually exclusive in every case, and in the debate, the names better describe the groups' emphases than mutually exclusive positions in the debate. In this article, we will first give a brief historical survey of evidentialism, fideism, and reformed epistemology. Second, we will give the fideist's position. Third, we will give the evidentialist's position. Fourth, we will give the reformed epistemologist's position, and last, we will include some comments on the current state of the debate, where we will show that the groups' positions are not mutually exclusive. (shrink)

The article by Iryna Horokholinska «Value challenges of the present: reflections about morally appropriate and religious faith» is aimed to the analysis of the moral and religious portrait of a modern person – in the conditions of globalization and secularization. Should we talk about the total secularization? Did the renaissance of religiosity really come to be? And what's important: what is the mission and strategy of the Church's actions in influencing the axiological self-determination of the modern person? As (...) a Christian can be to a Christian, but not to be preserved in a culturally and mentally obsolete system of priorities for the regulation of personal life? These questions are precisely the markers in the search for the answer to the urgent question addressed to representatives of the Western Civilization - Quo Vadis? (shrink)

The reductionist conclusions of some evolutionary theorists are countered by appealing to the transformation of feeling-traces from our evolutionary origins. Presupposed to the science of evolutionary biology is the capacity to get at the truth of things, and to live by values, which Rahner terms “spirit”; its appropriation comes about through the process of moral and intellectual “conversion” (Lonergan), extended into the realm of feelings and the psyche (Doran). This allows a non-supernaturalistic way of understanding the saving interpersonal transaction (...) at the heart of Christian belief; framed as a personal journey, it implies a less conceptual and more imaginal approach to faith. (shrink)

Justifying religious exemptions is a complicated matter. Citizens ask to not be subject to laws that everyone else must follow, raising worries about equal treatment. They ask to be exempted on a religious basis, a basis that secular citizens do not share, raising worries about the equal treatment of secular and religious citizens. And they ask governmental structures to create exceptions in the government’s own laws, raising worries about procedural fairness and stability. We nonetheless think some (...) class='Hi'>religious exemptions are appropriate, and in some cases, that exemptions are morally required. So how are we to determine when religious exemptions are justified? This article employs a public reason framework to provide an answer. I show how to publicly justify religious exemptions. My thesis is that a citizen merits a religious exemption under four conditions: if she has sufficient intelligible reason to oppose the law, if the law imposes unique and substantial burdens on the integrity of those exempted that are not off-set by comparable benefits, if the large majority of citizens have sufficient reason to endorse the law, and if the exempted group does not impose significant costs on other parties that require redress. If these conditions are met, then legislative and/or judicial bodies should carve out an exemption for those requesting them. (shrink)

Characteristically religious ethical systems consist of much more than a morality: that is, much more than judgments marked by serious societal pressure and the appropriateness in offenders of a sense of moral guilt. Religious ethics characteristically demands also control and modification of thoughts and desires. This supra-moral element is prominent in Buddhism, where it flourishes primarily in the "Samgha". The ethics of Buddhism can be understood only by means of a concept of the supra-moral.

Mindfulness has gained increasing popularity across Western societies over the past couple of decades, although mainly in forms that have been stripped of all religious content. During this period, the practice has also attracted the interest of mainstream Christian churches, which has precipitated the development of distinctively ‘Christian’ forms of mindfulness. Based on a critical discussion of the concept of appropriation in the sphere of religion, this article explores the particular logic whereby mindfulness has been appropriated within the (...) particular ecclesiastical context of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland (ELCF) in light of debates in church-connected media and the content of two Finnish BA theses on pastoral care that argue for the adoption of the practice. In light of this data, the article illustrates how ELCF discourse on mindfulness has been marked by four closely interlinked requirements for the appropriation of the practice: 1. that the practice has already been thoroughly stripped of any overt religious content; 2. that it has become sufficiently scientifically validated; 3. that there is wider social and cultural interest in the practice; 4. and that the practice does not stand in opposition to the teachings of the church. (shrink)

A new edition of this bestseller, the only book to cover this range of ethical issues with attention both to the roundedness and individual integrity of each religious tradition and to focused issues which are of contemporary interest. The format of the book has not changed. It provides for parallel study of the values held by different communities, exploring the ethical foundations of Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Each section introduces a different religion and sets the wider (...) context within which more specific questions can be asked. Individual topics can be accessed and understood not only within a tradition as a whole but also across traditions through careful indexing. The following topics are then addressed as appropriate to the given traditions: Religious Identity and Authority Personal and Private? Marriage and Family Influence on and Use of Time and Money Quality and Value of Life Questions of Right and Wrong Equality and Difference National Divisions, War and Peace Global Issues Key features * Each section is written by a specialist in that religious tradition, who in some cases is also an 'insider' and in the other cases has worked closely and in a respected and respectful way with members of that tradition. * Individual topics can be accessed and understood not only within a tradition as a whole but also across traditions through careful indexing * Additions to the text include subsections on reproduction, vegetarianism, just war and terrorism; and new material on weapons of mass destruction and pre-emptive strikes and genetic modification. (shrink)

Business ethicists should examine ethical issues that impinge on the perimeters of their specialized studies (Byrne 2011 ). This article addresses one peripheral issue that cries out for such consideration: the international resource privilege (IRP). After explaining briefly what the IRP involves I argue that it is unethical and should not be supported in international law. My argument is based on others’ findings as to the consequences of current IRP transactions and of their ethically indefensible historical precedents. In particular I (...) examine arguments from political philosophy for more equitable distribution of resources and appeals to property rights as a means of achieving this; business ethicists’ critiques of contemporary resource appropriations; and legal historians’ accounts of despoliation of aboriginal peoples, especially in what is now the United States, involving acquisition via conquest, asserted jurisdiction, and religious and racial preeminence. I also consider relevant human rights’ standards; supportive views of some theorists, especially early modern realists and current supporters of group rights and multidimensional rectification; some de facto incidences of substantive restitution; and proposals for effecting further rectification. (shrink)

Religious moderation has been popular and widely promoted to students as a countermeasure to radicalism. However, it runs across several challenges. Not to mention that radicalism has extended its influence within Islamic universities in Indonesia. Many research organisations have found that Indonesian students tend to be radical. Hence, the discussion around religious moderation among students highlights its urgency. With emphasis on the reception of Islamic university students to religious texts, this study proposed the appropriate approach to (...) class='Hi'>religious moderation in the context of plural Indonesian society with the reception of Qur’anic verses and hadiths that promoted moderation. It employed a qualitative approach with a purposive sampling technique involving 81 students of Islamic Religious Education of UIN Maulana Malik Ibrahim Malang as the research subjects. They were students from four semester IV and VI classes. This study revealed several key findings: firstly, the majority of students equate religious moderation with religious tolerance; secondly, students draw from a range of verses and hadiths that emphasise religious moderation, primarily on tolerance promotion; and thirdly, students’ application of religious moderation based on religious texts manifests through verbal, written and practical approaches. This study presents a model for developing religious moderation rooted in students’ comprehension of religious texts advocating moderation. This study implies using religious texts to promote moderate thought to lessen radicalism and intolerance in the world. Contribution: This study introduces a religious text-oriented approach to enhance the development of religious moderation, thereby refining strategies and methods that have predominantly emphasised aspects of social reality. The religious texts that advocate for moderation are accepted and applied by students in their lives. This contribution is crucial to lessening radicalism and intolerance in Indonesia. (shrink)

The topic of the thesis is the challenge that religious diversity poses to religious belief. A key issue to be resolved is whether a reasonable person may believe in the epistemic superiority of any one religious ideology in the light of religious diversity. -/- After introducing the issues, I examine Richard Swinburne’s, and then Alvin Plantinga’s, view on religious diversity. These two philosophers both advocate religious epistemic exclusivism, the view that only one religious (...) ideology is true to the exclusion of all others. I argue that the positions of Swinburne and Plantinga are unsatisfactory. -/- In Chapter ‎4 I list a number of objections to religious epistemic exclusivism. One of these objections, namely the religious ambiguity objection, will be important in this thesis. I explain what religious ambiguity is in more detail and distinguish between temporary religious ambiguity and permanent religious ambiguity. -/- Chapters ‎5 & 6 deal with responses to religious diversity in the light of permanent religious ambiguity. William Alston advocates that religious epistemic exclusivism is still reasonable given religious ambiguity. Alston appeals to faith to justify exclusivist belief but this gives rise to the objection that tentative belief is more appropriate. Conversely, John Hick rejects exclusivism in favour of another position altogether, called religious epistemic pluralism. In Chapter ‎7 I assess the impact of Hick’s response to religious diversity on the ideology of a traditionally minded Muslim. I argue that the Muslim is not obliged to accept Hick’s solution in full. (shrink)

Bioregionalism is an environmental movement that attempts to create decentralized, self‐determined communities connected to landscape and ecological features. Activists and scholars have used the phrase “becoming native” to describe the process of belonging to place. Despite its cultural appropriation, not only do bioregional writers still use the metaphor, but it has also been defended within religious studies. Instead of relying on these arguments to address ethical issues, claims to place need a decolonial framework. Looking at various voices within (...) bioregionalism through Indigenous critiques displays both the movement’s issues as well as decolonial processes for local adaptation. Wendell Berry exemplifies the problems of bioregional ethics but also shows bioregionalism's capacity for decolonization. (shrink)

Religious Experience and the Knowledge of God is concerned with questions about the degree to which and the ways in which religious experiences, especially theistic experiences, can provide epistemic support for Christian beliefs. I adopt a critical trust approach to religious experiences and argue that, with appropriate qualifications, it can be reasonable for someone to believe that he or she has had a veridical experience of God and that this can provide some evidential support for certain Christian (...) claims. (shrink)

The focus of Through Your Eyes: Religious Alterity and the Early Modern Western Imaginations is the (mostly Western) understanding, representation and self-critical appropriation of the "religious other" between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries. Mutually constitutive processes of selfing/othering are observed through the lenses of creedal Jews, a bhakti Brahmin, a widely translated Morisco historian, a collector of Western and Eastern singularia, Christian missionaries in Asia, critical converts, toleration theorists, and freethinkers: in other words, people dwelling in an (...) 'in-between' space which undermines any binary conception of the Self and the Other. The genesis of the volume was in exchanges between eight international scholars and the two editors, intellectual historian Giovanni Tarantino and anthropologist Paola von Wyss-Giacosa, who share an interest in comparatism, debates over toleration, and history of emotions. (shrink)

This paper defends the view that, in certain actual circumstances that aren’t uncommon for educated westerners, an awareness of the facts of religious disagreement doesn’t make theistic belief irrational. The first section makes some general remarks about when discovering disagreement (on any topic) makes it rational to give up your beliefs: it discusses the two main possible outcomes of disagreement (i.e., defeat of one’s disputed belief and demotion of one’s disputant), the main kinds of evidence that are relevant to (...) demoting one’s disputant, and the kinds of epistemic assessment involved in demoting a disputant. The second section argues that in cases of disagreement about theism, the theist’s evidence for theism and for the reliability of her theistic belief is often strong enough to support steadfastness in the face of disagreement. The third section argues that the theist’s evidence for the reliability of her disputant’s atheistic beliefs is often weak enough to allow her to rationally demote her atheist interlocutor and it explains how this demotion can occur in a sensible and appropriate way. The final section focuses on theists whose disagreement-based doubts about theism persist, despite the defenses offered on behalf of theism against such doubts. It concludes that these persistent doubts could in some cases result in defeaters for theistic belief, even if the doubts are irrational, but that the gift of faith can compensate for this. (shrink)

Considering the play written by Daniel Berrigan about his own civil disobedience (burning hundreds of draft files in Catonsville, Maryland), the author asks whether Catholics have adopted the American dream at the expense of Christianity. How should we live and philosophize in an age of American empire? Philosophy must be both practical and transformative. We need to question our political situation since 2001, and arrive at a liberatory philosophy and social theory “from below” so as to meet Berrigan’s liberatory, prophetic (...) theology “from above,” resulting in a philosophy and theology of liberation of and from the seductive imperialist center. The author further stresses individual self-appropriation and the critique of imperialism through a Marxist understanding of surplus value (as arising from labor time for which workers are not paid). There is a link between capitalistic imperialism and militarism, and President Bush has made illegitimate use of religion in the attempt to legitimate empire. Liberation is the good and the happiness that together result from doing the work of justice, free from capitalist corruption. In challenging capitalist empire, we ought to aim for the “downward mobility” of a simpler lifestyle, where self-appropriation leads to moral, religious, and practical conversion. An inhumane, capitalist society is fundamentally at odds with us as human beings, as philosophers, and as Christians. (shrink)

In this book, Marianne Moyaert develops a new interreligious appropriation of Paul Ricoeur’s hermeneutical philosophy. Viewed in context of his philosophical, anthropological, and ethical work, Ricoeur’s fragmentary reflections on the encounters between religions provide insights on global cooperation practices and religious identity concerns.

This volume for the first time brings the scholarly discipline of comparative religious ethics into constructive collaboration with the community of interreligious dialogue. Its design is premised on two important insights. First, interreligious dialogue offers to comparative religious ethics a new, more persuasive rationale, agenda of issues, and practical orientation. Second, comparative religious ethics offers to interreligious dialogue an arsenal of critical tools and methods which will enhance the sophistication of its practical work. In this way, both (...) theory (a dominant concern and strength of comparative religious ethics) and praxis (a dominant concern and strength of interreligious moral dialogue) are joined together in mutual effort, each contributing to the benefit of the other.The volume’s contributors share this vision of collaboration, drawing explicitly from both communities of discourse in a manner that crosses disciplinary and professional boundaries to deal creatively and constructively with important methodological and global moral issue. Although theory and practice cannot easily be separated in such a collaborative project, for the purpose of clarity, the volume is divided into two main parts. The first specifically engages questions of method, theory, and the social role of the public intellectual; the second, on substantive moral themes and issues, many of which were raised at the 1993 Parliament. Taken together, the volume’s essays articulate and illustrate new ways of approaching contemporary moral concerns cross-culturally yet with a rigor appropriate to our complex and pluralistic world. (shrink)

It is commonly supposed that a certain kind of belief is necessary for religious experience. Yet it is not clear that this must be so. In this article, I defend the possibility that a subject could have a genuine emotional religious experience without thereby necessarily believing that the purported object of her experience corresponds to reality and/or is the cause of her experience. Imaginative engagement, I argue, may evoke emotional religious experiences that may be said to be (...) both genuine and appropriate, despite not necessarily including beliefs of the aforementioned kind.I go on to maintain that such religious engagement is compatible not only with non-belief but also with disbelief. (shrink)

Religion is a trap and a snare for states in the modern world. People fervently believe in religious doctrines, which they take to be central for the guidance of their own lives and pivotal for determining morally appropriate and just laws and public policies. The religious beliefs of members of modern societies tend to be wildly diverse. They conflict with each other in ways that resist sensible compromise. Jesus is either the Son of God, the Savior whose teachings (...) will lead us to eternal salvation, or he is not. (shrink)

The administration or recognition of religious courts is a form of religious accommodation present in many constitutional states today commonly analysed in legal pluralism terms. This article contributes to the further analysis of the relationship between legal pluralism and rights in religiously diverse societies by examining the status of state religious courts and their interaction with state non-religious courts. In particular, I examine what Cover calls “jurisdictional redundancies” between the courts and conceptualize the allocation of power (...) between religious and non-religious courts as a potentially productive site of interlegality. In doing so, I support concurrent jurisdictional allocations, arguing that exclusive jurisdiction could result in what I call an interlegal gap, whereby instead of inter-penetration of norms and production of reconciliatory principles, there is a justice gap whereby litigants may find themselves unable to obtain appropriate legal recourse including when neither court is willing to assume jurisdiction over the matter. This requires us to see the relationship between religious courts and non-religious courts through the more mundane but more practical lens of jurisdictional overlaps and competition, rather than through the more abstract framing of normative or even civilizational clashes. Accordingly, I argue that concurrent jurisdiction and interlegality have greater potential to strike a balance between individual and group rights and could be more protective of religious diversity. In other words, I argue for a closer, rather than a more separate, relationship between religious and non-religious courts, while denying that a hierarchical relationship where religious courts are subordinated to non-religious courts is the only way to protect rights. (shrink)

Items were generated to explore the factorial structure of a construct of fundamentalism worded appropriately for Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Results suggested three underlying dimensions: External versus Internal Authority, Fixed versus Malleable Religion, and Worldly Rejection versus Worldly Affirmation. The three dimensions indicate that religious fundamentalism is a personal orientation that asserts a supra-human locus of moral authority, context unbound truth, and the appreciation of the sacred over the worldly components of experience. The 15-item, 3-dimension solution was evaluated across (...) Mexican and American samples. Fit indexes point out the viability of the new inventory across these two samples henceforward referred to as the Multi-Dimensional Fundamentalism Inventory. Additional validity tests supported that the new inventory was negatively correlated with participants’ integrative complexity in a religious domain–specific way. (shrink)

To study and to do religious ethics is to be engaged in a three-tieres task which is likened to the process of climbing a three-step ladder. The climber is free to move both up and down depending on the need at hand, depending upon what it is that is to be reached for. The first step refers to the concrete-experiential level where we address conflicting value claims and engage in decision-making procedures; the second refers to the theological-philosophical level where (...) we examine the interpretive framework brought to bear at level one, and the third calls for examination and justification of the epistemological roots of that interpretive framework. The paper argues that concern with reason and the rational processes of justifying actions dominates ethical discussion today, and that although this concern is appropriate, it is also insufficient. The author thus lingers over the often-neglected role of feeling in ethical analysis and argues that feeling as well as reason has epistemological value in the search for ethical insight. (shrink)

Items were generated to explore the factorial structure of a construct of fundamentalism worded appropriately for Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Results suggested three underlying dimensions: (a) External versus Internal Authority, (b) Fixed versus Malleable Religion, and (c) Worldly Rejection versus Worldly Affirmation. The three dimensions indicate that religious fundamentalism is a personal orientation that asserts a supra-human locus of moral authority, context unbound truth, and the appreciation of the sacred over the worldly components of experience. The 15-item, 3-dimension solution (...) was evaluated across Mexican ( n = 455) and American ( n = 449) samples. Fit indexes point out the viability of the new inventory across these two samples henceforward referred to as the Multi-Dimensional Fundamentalism Inventory (MDFI). Additional validity tests supported that the new inventory was negatively correlated with participants’ integrative complexity in a religious domain–specific way. (shrink)

Giorgio Agamben’s philosophy has been influenced by Michel Foucault’s thoughts in various aspects. This influence can be seen especially in methodology and political philosophy to a certain extent. Agamben’s political project, Homo Sacer, culminates in the publication of The Use of Bodies, where he proposes ‘form-of-life’ as a way to overcome the contemporary biopolitics. While the concept of form-of-life has often been considered in connection with the issue of sovereignty and law, this article argues that it (and Agamben’s coming politics) (...) can also be understood as a response to Foucault’s biopower. This is possible by considering several conceptual oppositions raised by Agamben against Foucault’s ideas, concepts such as “intimacy”, “community”, and “zoe/bios”. And this is, finally, an effort to re-appropriate human freedom. (shrink)

Leaders’ morality in the context of principals in Christian school is of great significance in the education environment. However, there are gaps between religious insights, western education and principal’s leadership in Christian schools in Indonesia. Anthropological, social, cultural and other differences can pose hindrances to the effective implementation of external ideas. Therefore, this research emphasises the importance of embracing moral religious leadership values from local cultural heritage that are appropriate to the Indonesian context. Tonaas and Walian leadership in (...) Minahasa are promising alternatives that can contribute to the discourse on principals’ morality in Christian school. This research adopts a descriptive qualitative methodology, critical analysis and argumentation to explore the intersection of moral leadership, local cultural heritage and educational leadership in Christian schools in Indonesia. As a result, the morality values of Tonaas and Walian religious leaders in Minahasa demonstrate the significance of responsibility towards the Christian school environment.Contribution: The results of this study contribute to the conversation about morality among leaders in the Christian school environment. Specifically, the religious leadership of Tonaas and Walian in Minahasa provides valuable local insights that are relevant to the context of education and principals in Indonesia. (shrink)

Religion, which is a historical and cultural phenomenon of social life, has a special influence on the development of the spiritual culture of mankind. It arose and developed together with society, created in it the appropriate forms of consciousness and ideological culture. The emergence and functioning of religious views, ideas, ideas and ideals - a phenomenon of objective reality, the fact of history and culture. Becoming a status of cultural values, religion continues to affect the consciousness and behavior of (...) people. (shrink)

This book surveys the thesis that all religions are alike in referring and relating to a single, common transcendent and sacred reality. It treats this thesis as one in the philosophy of religion. In the first chapter pluralism is defined and its core is distinguished from its particular character and defence in the writings of John Hick and others. The underpinnings of pluralism are held to lie in an understanding of reference in religion, the definition of religion, the nature of (...) salvation, the character of religious language, an appropriate epistemology for the philosophy of religion, and, crucially, the nature of a realist perspective on the religions. A notion of referential realism is set out which when applied to religion makes the pluralist thesis plausible. A chapter is devoted to each of these main themes. The conclusion offers a brief survey of the implications of pluralism for our general view of religion. (shrink)

Historical analysis confirms the home-grown character of Nigeria’s conflicts and the complexity of their peaceful resolution. Religious leaders have traditionally contested political space with other actors and continue to do so. But the religiosity of popular culture is such that Nigerian religious leaders can make a substantive contribution to peace building and countering religious extremism if given the time, space and tools to do so. Elections have been critical moments in the evolution of religious tensions and (...) conflicts owing to the country’s geographical demographic and history, and the popular hope of correcting injustice that they evoke. There is a need to distinguish between genuine religious conflicts and conflicts that are essentially socio-economic or about competition for political power which become “religionised.” The evolution of the terrorist organisation, Boko Haram, can be traced back to intra-Muslim conflicts and anti-Sufi movements. But it reflects no less the underdevelopment and poverty of the Northeast and the impact of corruption on the perception of state and national government. The crude and violent narrative of Abubakar Shekau, its leader, shows a deterioration beyond that of its founder Malam Yusuf, who was able to offer financial and economic inducements over and above a rejection of most aspects of modernity and Western education. Increasingly, efforts are being made by religious leaders at both national, and local levels through formal, and grassroots networks to build better understanding and awareness between faiths to change and challenge narratives. With the appropriate support, these networks have great potential for improving communal relations and overcoming Boko Haram’s narratives of hate. (shrink)

B a c k g r o u n d. Genre-wise the article is a form of publication of analytical conclusions resulting from researching religious symbolism within the movie. The material for interpretation was derived from mass media, in particular cinematography. The article describes religious symbolism within the movie "Barbie" (2023). It is made apparent that the wide array of religious symbols in modern cinema requires a new approach. M e t h o d s. Issues with (...) defining religious symbolism in cinema have inspired a search of appropriate methods and research methodology. The article utilizes analytical approach based on religious symbolism found in the artistic source material – in this case a movie. R e s u l t s. With that considered the goal of the scientific research was to track down instances of religious symbolism in "Barbie" movie; such was confirmed to be abundant within otherwise mundane work. Barbieland symbolises paradise withiin the movie's fictional universe: it's a perfect place with no diseases or suffering, populated by perfect people ignorant of sorrow, problems, and worries. Naturally, the exile from paradise is a theme that is also predent. C o n c l u s i o n s. Brief research concludes that the "Barbie" movie features disguised religious symbolism – a common trope for many works within modern cinema. (shrink)

Through an analysis of key themes in Heidegger's work, the book challenges the traditional theological appropriation of Heidegger and the usual characterizations of religious thinking in terms of faith or belief in, or experience of, some ultimate reality. Heidegger, it is argued, offers a unique approach to a variety of issues and problems in contemporary religious thought and philosophy of religion that results in understanding religious thinking as a resolute openness to the holiness and meaningfulness of (...) the world. (shrink)

In a recent essay, Tasos Kazepides has used the later Wittgenstein’s account of religious beliefs as either ‘superstitions’ or non-rational to condemn such beliefs as ‘doctrines’. By this term he means teachings which close minds to alternative truth-claims. In this paper we criticise his interpretation and use of Wittgenstein and argue that, far from closing minds, an appropriate education in religious beliefs can open minds to possible realms of existence unconsidered in other subjects of the curriculum.

In this essay, I survey the different uses of the concept of the symbol at play in the philosophy of religion. Considering that historically theories of the symbol have frequently had significant religious presuppositions and implications, I suggest that one might expect that the symbol would play a significant role in current research. This is not the case, however, since the very specific metaphysical, linguistic and theological premises that have traditionally informed much theorisation of the symbol tend to be (...) unpopular today. The main exception is Peircean symbolics which has recently been re-appropriated by a variety of philosophical fields, including philosophy of religion. To open up further contexts for contemporary deployments of the symbol, I look to contemporary public and legal debates concerning the right to wear religious symbols as an area of research unjustly neglected by philosophers of religion: much of the inchoate conceptual work being done in the legal cases themselves would naturally feed into academic philosophical discussion of the symbol. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Buddhist-Christian Studies 23 (2003) 43-49 [Access article in PDF] Double Religious Belonging:Aspects and Questions Catherine Cornille College of Holy Cross at Worcester, Massachusetts The idea of double or multiple religious belonging seems to have become an integral feature of the religious culture of our times. It is no longer surprising to hear people refer to themselves as partly or fully Christian and Buddhist, and the hybridizing (...) of Jewish and Buddhist religious identities has even led to a new terminology (Jubu). While this phenomenon has been part of Asian religious cultures for centuries, it is relatively new to the West, where a combination of political and religious forces have shaped religious identities around comparatively rigid and exclusive boundaries. With the gradual dissolution of traditional geographical and spiritual monopolies by particular religions, the religious field has become wide open and religious belonging increasingly a matter of choice and degree. The phenomenon of multiple religious belonging may be found in any combination of any number of religions. There are the Jews for Jesus; Christians who have become deeply involved in Muslim (mostly Sufi) religious practices; and Hindus who also consider themselves partly Christian or—more often—vice versa. But by far the most common phenomenon in the West is that of Christians or Jews who also profess to be Buddhist, hence the importance of discussing this phenomenon in this meeting on Buddhist-Christian dialogue.In this paper, I wish to outline the different contexts in which double or multiple religious belonging seems to manifest itself so as to reflect on the possibilities and limits of the very concept or category. While different religions may have various ways of defining or circumscribing the issue of religious identity and generally allow for different degrees of belonging, I will discuss the possibility of double religious belonging on the basis of a strong—and for most religions, ideal—understanding of religious belonging. Double Religious Belonging and New Age One of the contexts in which the phenomenon of double or multiple religious belonging may seem to present itself most readily is that of the late modern or postmodern form of religiosity called "New Age." Whereas New Age religion is essentially elusive, one of the most prominent scholars of New Age, Wouter Hanegraaf, defines it as a "popular Western culture criticism expressed in terms of a secularized [End Page 43] esotericism" and refers to general characteristics such as this-worldliness, holism, evolutionism, psychologizing of religion and spiritualizing of psychology, and, of course, the belief in the advent of a New Age. 1 In addition to these characteristics, one of the most noted features of New Age religiosity is its openness toward all religious traditions and the freedom with which it combines beliefs and practices from mainly the Asian religions, the mystical strands of the monotheistic traditions, and various forms of Shamanism. This has led to the image of New Age as a form of religious bricolage or a religion of the supermarket. Often underlying New Age religiosity is the belief that all religions derive from or meet in the same ultimate religious experience, and that one may thus belong to all religions at the same time.While New Age religion may therefore be regarded as a form of multiple religious belonging, it might be more appropriate to speak here of a complete absence of religious belonging. As scholars of religion such as Joachim Wach have pointed out, religious belonging is taken to involve a "total response of the total being (feeling, will and intellect) to Ultimate Reality." 2 It involves abandonment to a transcendent reality mediated through the concrete symbols and rituals of a particular religion. Surrender is thus not to the ultimate as such, but through—and in the end—to the teachings and practices embedded in a concrete religious tradition. Religious belonging in this strong sense of the term implies the acceptance, on faith, of a particular truth revealed and transmitted outside of the immediate experience of the individual and expressed in a particular body of teachings and practices. It also generally has a certain social dimension in which individuals celebrate... (shrink)

The article presents the main trends in the analytical epistemology of religious belief. Their interrelations and mutual influences are shown. The author argues that epistemology of religious belief has risen as one of the possible answers to the Gettier- problems. Therefore different trends in religious epistemology are bounded not only with each other, but also with trends in general epistemology. As a result of the analysis of all major trends in epistemology of religious belief (reformed epistemology, (...) social epistemology, virtue epistemology, problem of the epistemic authority) the author concludes that the core of each trend is an attempt of defining the phenomenon of religion itself. Hence it is possible to consider epistemology of religious belief as the next step in the history of such attempts. Since finding appropriate definition of the phenomenon of religion is a special task of philosophy of religion (both in analytic and continental traditions), the author argues that epistemology of religious belief is the essential part of philosophy of religion as a scholar discipline. (shrink)

Is Thomas Kuhn’s model of scientific revolutions in terms of paradigm shifts appropriately applied to cases of radical changes in religious outlook, and in particular conversion to faith, or loss of faith? Since this question cannot be addressed in purely a priori terms, three case studies of philosophers who have described significant changes in their own perspectives are examined. Part of the justification for such an approach is to see how changes in view seem from the first-person perspective. Although (...) what is offered here is a very limited group of studies, each of them perforce brief, a key theme emerges: that the incommensurability between paradigms which is part of the Kuhnian model is mirrored by the shift away from atheist or humanistic perspectives, though not necessarily by loss of faith. (shrink)

The essays in Part III of the book, on liberal constraints and traditionalist education, argue for a more regulatory conception of liberal education and emphasize the need for some controls over cultural and religious educational authority. Walter Feinberg’s essay, on religious education in liberal–democratic societies in relation to the question of accountability and autonomy, takes up the issue of educational constraints with respect to religious schools in such societies. While he allows that religious education need not (...) be inconsistent with liberal goals, and can find reasons why some liberal societies feel it appropriate to provide public support for religious schools, he argues that certain conditions can render such support tyrannical and unwise. He concludes that if the conditions are appropriate for public support of religious schools, then there should also be significant public control. After an introduction in Section 14.1, the chapter has six further sections: Section 14.2 discusses some of the potential lines of conflict between religious liberal education and public education; Section 14.3 examines a number of arguments that have been advanced in support of public funding for religious schools; Section 14.4 looks at a potentially fundamental reason for denying public funding for religious schools – that it would be tyrannical to take tax funds from one believer in order to advance the beliefs of another – and the implications as regards the First Amendment to the United States Constitution; both Sections 14.4 and 14.5 suggest some of the conditions that need to be satisfied in order to supply this funding – primarily that it must be predicated on the school advancing individual and social autonomy; Section 14.6 briefly suggests what such an arrangement might entail for the traditional way in which the public/private divide is conceived; Section 14.7 concludes. (shrink)

This paper will examine two strategies by which religious believers might attempt to defend the rationality of religious belief. The first strategy is a “fine tuning argument.” The main shortcoming of that strategy is that it ignores the crucial issue of the appropriate prior probabilities. The second strategy is what might be called a “trust” strategy. According to this strategy, a belief that is based on trusting someone who knows something is thereby also an instance of knowledge. This (...) strategy might suffice in some respects, but it involves reliance on a mechanism that is doubtful as a prototype for all of our beliefs. (shrink)

Toleration is perhaps the core commitment of liberalism, but this seemingly simple feature of liberal societies creates tension for liberal perfectionists, who are committed to justifying religious toleration primarily in terms of the goods and flourishing it promotes. Perfectionists, so it seems, should recommend restricting harmful religious practices when feasible. If such restrictions would promote liberal perfectionist values like autonomy, it is unclear how the perfectionist can object. A contemporary liberal perfectionist, Steven Wall, has advanced defense of (...) class='Hi'>religious toleration that grounds perfectionist toleration in an innovative account of reasons of respect. He thus defends perfectionist toleration on two grounds: (i) the appropriate manner of responding to perfectionist goods like autonomy and membership is to respect the religious choices of others; (ii) citizens can acquire reasons to respect the religious choices of others through internalizing a value-promoting moral and political code. I argue that both defenses fail. The cornerstone of both arguments is the connection Wall draws between reasons to promote value and reasons to respect it. I claim that Wall’s conception of the relationship between promoting and respecting value is inadequate. I conclude that the failure of Wall’s defense of perfectionist toleration should motivate liberal perfectionists to develop more sophisticated accounts of normative reasons. The viability of a truly liberal perfectionism depends upon such developments. (shrink)