Kategoria BISAC: Religion >> Religion, Politics & State

What is the exact nature of the link between religion and social cohesion? This book describes how fluctuations in socioeconomic environment can create a process where ritual behavior works to alleviate uncertainties in social commitment. A case study of Finland's 19th-century Christian revivals illustrates this process. This volume is particularly relevant to those interested in the role of religion in human evolution and in organizing society.

Prompted by the shattering of the bonds between religion and the political order brought about by the Enlightenment, Jean-Jacques Rousseau devised a "new" religion (civil religion) to be used by the state as a way of enforcing civic unity. Emile Durkheim, by contrast, conceived civil religion to be a spontaneous phenomenon arising from society itself -- a non-coercive force expressing the self-identify or self-definition of a people. In 1967, the American sociologist Robert Bellah rediscovered the concept and applied it to American society in its Durkheimian form.

Ever since...

Religion, Language and Power shows that the language of 'religion' is far from neutral, and that the packaging and naming of what English speakers call 'religious' groups or identities is imbued with the play of power. Religious Studies has all too often served to amplify voices from other centers of power, whether scripturalist or otherwise normative and dominant. This book's de-centering of English classifications goes beyond the remit of most postcolonial studies in that it explores the classifications used in a range of languages - including Arabic, Sanskrit, Chinese, Greek...

Provides a new understanding of the relationship between Church and State in 20th-century Costa Rica.

Understanding the relationship between religion and social justice in Costa Rica involves piecing together the complex interrelationships between Church and State -- between priests, popes, politics, and the people. This book does just that.

Dana Sawchuk chronicles the fortunes of the country's two competing forms of labour organizations during the 1980s and demonstrates how different factions within the Church came to support either the union movement or Costa Rica's...

Catholic political identity and engagement defy categorization. The complexities of political realities and the human nature of such institutions as church and government often produce a more fractured reality than the pure unity depicted in doctrine. Yet, in 2003 under the leadership of then-prefect Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI), the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a "Doctrinal Note on Some Questions Regarding the Participation of Catholics in Political Life." The note explicitly asserts, "The Christian faith is an integral unity, and thus it is...

Is the "private" experience of religion counterproductive to engagement in public life? Does the "public" experience of religion contribute anything distinctive to civic engagement? Pews, Prayers, and Participation offers a fresh approach to key questions about what role religion plays in fostering civic responsibility in contemporary American society. Written by five prominent scholars of religion and politics, led by Calvin College's Corwin Smidt, the book brilliantly articulates how religion shapes participation in a range of civic activities--from behaviors (such as membership...