Description: In a world where almost all societies are multi-religious and multi-ethnic, we need to study how social cohesion can be achieved in different contexts. In some geographical areas, as in the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent, people of different religious belonging have, through the ages, lived side by side, sometimes in harmony and sometimes in dissonance. In other geographical regions, as in Scandinavia, societies have been quite religiously homogeneous but only recently challenged by immigration. The implication in both locations is that the relation between religious...

Synopsis: From a historical perspective, similarities among the Lutheran churches in Denmark, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden are easily understood. But these previously homogeneous northern societies, built on a Lutheran tradition with close ties between church and state, are now considered to be among the most secular in the world, as well as being impacted by a growing presence of other religions. These changes present a major challenge to the churches concerning how to relate to the state and how to be a "folk church." The goal of this volume is to explore how Lutheran identity presently...