Diversification and Unification

2020 ◽  
pp. 105-132
Author(s):  
Xiaoxuan Wang
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Revolution ◽  
The Political ◽  
Religious Activities ◽  
Regional Networks ◽  
Territorial Expansion ◽  
Christian Churches ◽  
Protestant Christianity ◽  
Fundamental Transformation ◽  
Second Wave ◽  
The Church

During the early Cultural Revolution, Christian churches ran into a second wave of repression, more violent than the Great Leap, yet with less severe consequences for the church. Indeed, the political chaos of the time, particularly the factional conflicts crippling the state’s management and oversight capabilities, dramatically opened up space for religious activities. Faced with the state’s intense hostility toward religion, Christian preachers adopted tactics to evade the attention of the state. These tactics ensured not just the survival of the church, but its rapid and dramatic territorial expansion, leading to a fundamental transformation in the institutions of Protestant Christianity in Wenzhou, with the establishment of regional networks and the extensive paidan system for sharing pastoral resources. The Cultural Revolution saw both diversification and unification in the church. There was competition between different churches, even as new collaborative networks started to reduce the importance of denominational lines.

Convention and Conversion: Patterns in Late Medieval Piety

1998 ◽  
Vol 67 (1) ◽  
pp. 32-51 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Kieckhefer
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Studies ◽  
The Political ◽  
Cultural Materialism ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Christian Churches ◽  
Liberal Protestantism ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Teachings ◽  
Ernst Troeltsch ◽  
The Church

Ernst Troeltsch is known to church historians largely for his classic threefold distinction of church, sect, and mysticism. In The Social Teachings of the Christian Churches, Troeltsch describes the church as an institution enmeshed with society and making accommodations to the world's imperfections; the sects, driven by a quest for purity, refuse to make accommodations or compromises, while the mystics stand aside from this conflict and concern themselves with “a purely personal and inward experience” in which “the isolated individual, and psychological abstraction and analysis become everything.” Troeltsch sees mysticism not as a phenomenon naturally at home within the church but rather as one that leads away from the establishment, and it is perhaps this perception in particular that gives his work lasting relevance. The assumption that mysticism veers naturally in an antiecclesial direction, and that its more orthodox manifestations are anomalies requiring explanation, remains very much alive in the literature. Indeed, from the perspective of cultural materialism, it is the political, antiecclesial, subversive bite of mysticism that is its most interesting feature. On this point liberal Protestantism and postmodernism have come together, theology and cultural studies have embraced. Troeltsch's schema thus retains relevance well beyond the sphere of historiography.

The Contests for Communal Temples in the Early 1950s to the Mid-1970s

2020 ◽  
pp. 59-84
Author(s):  
Xiaoxuan Wang
Keyword(s):  
Communist Party ◽  
Cultural Revolution ◽  
Crucial Role ◽  
Local History ◽  
Political Campaigns ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Climate ◽  
Religious Activities ◽  
Minimal Level ◽  
The Stability

From collectivization to the Cultural Revolution, communal temples deprived of land routinely came under attack, from political campaigns and encroachments on their property and religious sites. By the early 1970s, the vast majority of communal temples in Rui’an were either shut down, occupied, or destroyed—a massive deterritorialization on a truly unprecedented scale in local history. Followers quickly learned to deal with the expropriation of traditional communal religious space through various tactics to carry on worship. The restoration of temples did not lack the support of Communist Party cadres, the new village leadership. However, since the political climate affected the stability of religious spaces, as well as the material foundations and leadership of communal religious activities, attempts to restore temples and temple practices could only persist at a minimal level. But this persistence had a crucial role in laying the groundwork for the post-Mao revival of communal temples.

Theology and Sustainability in Oil-Producing Norway

2013 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 265-281 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jens Bjelland Grønvold
Keyword(s):  
Western Country ◽  
Ecological Crisis ◽  
The Political ◽  
Oil Exploration ◽  
Political Debate ◽  
Environmental Commitment ◽  
Christian Churches ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Church

This article attempts to draft the constructive role religion can play in a rich, oil-producing Western country. The article presents a brief history of environmental commitment within the Church of Norway, and shows how this commitment is making an impact both theologically and politically. Theologically, the result is a reorientation of classic, anthropocentric theology toward a more biocentric theology in which all of creation is viewed as equally important. As a concretization of such a theology, this article looks to the circle of life advocated by the Sami theologian Tore Johnsen. Bridging theology and politics, this article also presents the commitment of Bishop Tor Berger Jørgensen in the political debate about oil exploration in certain areas off the coast of his diocese. Jørgensen's commitment and Johnsen's work are examples of how Christian churches can address the global ecological crisis using their best tool: theology.

scholarly journals The Caribbean and West Indies

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Natalie A. Zacek
Keyword(s):  
Church Of England ◽  
Spiritual Identity ◽  
The Political ◽  
Religious Activities ◽  
The West ◽  
Apparent Lack ◽  
Leeward Islands ◽  
Self Image ◽  
The Caribbean ◽  
The Church

This chapter examines the development of the Church of England in the West Indian colonies, notably Barbados, Jamaica, and the Leeward Islands of Antigua, Montserrat, Nevis, and St Kitts, in the era of ‘sugar and slavery’ (the mid-seventeenth through to late eighteenth centuries). In many instances, the Church’s mission was undermined by a critical lack of clergy, churches, and funds, and by an apparent lack of interest on the part of the planter elite in either attending or financially supporting religious activities. But it would be inaccurate to consider the Church to have played an insignificant role in these colonial societies; in reality, Anglicanism was a crucial element in the political and social, if not always the spiritual, identity of the islands’ white inhabitants, as it was an integral part of their individual and communal self-image as ‘Englishmen transplanted’.

scholarly journals Muslimer och postmuslimer i Svenska kyrkan

2022 ◽  
Vol 97 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
David Thurfjell ◽  
Erika Willander
Keyword(s):  
Religious Communities ◽  
Religious Activities ◽  
Church Of Sweden ◽  
Life After Death ◽  
Christian Churches ◽  
The One ◽  
Muslim Communities ◽  
Old Men ◽  
Religious Landscape ◽  
The Church

The demographical changes during the last decades have created a sit­uation where Sweden has become one of the most secular and one of the most multireligious countries at the same time. This situation stands in stark contrast to the country's modern history in which its population have been largely homogeneous, and its religious landscape almost completely dominated by state-church Lutheranism. The growth of Sweden's Muslim population is what has caused most debate. According to calculations made by the Pew Research Center, one fifth of the country's total population is likely to be Muslim by 2050. This change also has consequences for the former state church, which now finds that also Muslims take part in its activities. In this article we present and analyze a novel survey-investigation on Muslims who self-identify as members of the Church of Sweden. In our analysis we differentiate between Muslims and what we call post-Muslims. While the former of these categories refers to those who self-identify as Muslims, the latter refers to people who do not refer to themselves as Muslims but who come from a Muslim family. These categories are mirrored by the Christians and post-Christians, who are selected by equivalent criteria. We conclude that most Muslims and post-Muslims have no affiliation to organized religious communities in Sweden and that among those who do, Christian churches are as important as the Muslim congregations. Among the churches, the Church of Sweden is the one in which most Muslims and post-Muslims are members. The Muslim and post-Muslim members of this church, we find, differ from each other. The Muslims are mostly Swedish-born 50–65-year-old women. They do not take part in any religious activities, and they celebrate Christian, but not Muslim, holidays. In terms of beliefs, they believe in a life after death, but mostly not in God or hell. The post-Muslims are mostly 30–49-year-old men who have come relatively recently to Sweden from the Middle East. They take part in congregational activities and celebrate both Muslim and Christian holidays. They also largely believe in God, a life after death, and hell. In terms of representation, they feel represented, primarily, by Muslim communities.

The Personal is the Political

2010 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 125-148
Author(s):  
Mercilee M. Jenkins
Keyword(s):  
San Francisco ◽  
Women's Movement ◽  
Community Member ◽  
The Political ◽  
Oral Histories ◽  
Grass Roots ◽  
Feminist Organization ◽  
Second Wave

This paper explores the transformation of oral histories into a play about the founding of San Francisco Women's Building based on extensive interviews. My impetus for writing She Rises Like a Building to the Sky was to portray the kind of grass roots feminist organization primarily composed of lesbians that made up a large part of the second wave of the Women's Movement in the 1970's and early 1980's. The evolution of She Rises is discussed from three positionalities I occupied over an extensive period of time: oral historian, playwright and eventual community member. Excerpts from She Rises are used to illustrate the lessons I learned in the process of creating this work. I will discuss my self-collaboration in terms of the oral historian's concern for fidelity, the playwright's desire to bring such material to life whether by fact or fiction, and the community member's fears of how others will view this rendition of their stories. The behind the scenes dramas reveal as much as the play itself about the challenges and rewards of undertaking such projects.

A.I. Solzhenitsyn Apropos of Russia’s Future: Specific Outlook Features Depending on Different Historical Context

2019 ◽  
Vol 66 ◽  
pp. 327-334
Author(s):  
Inga V. Zheltikova ◽  
Elena I. Khokhlova
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Context ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
The Political ◽  
Social Stability ◽  
Political Situation ◽  
The Future ◽  
Pessimistic Attitude ◽  
Personal Qualities ◽  
Images Of The Future ◽  
The Church

The article considers the dependence of the images of future on the socio-cultural context of their formation. Comparison of the images of the future found in A.I. Solzhenitsyn’s works of various years reveals his generally pessimistic attitude to the future in the situation of social stability and moderate optimism in times of society destabilization. At the same time, the author's images of the future both in the seventies and the nineties of the last century demonstrate the mismatch of social expectations and reality that was generally typical for the images of the future. According to the authors of the present article, Solzhenitsyn’s ideas that the revival of spirituality could serve as the basis for the development of economy, that the influence of the Church on the process of socio-economic development would grow, and that the political situation strongly depends on the personal qualities of the leader, are unjustified. Nevertheless, such ideas are still present in many images of the future of Russia, including contemporary ones.

The critical theory of democracy in Western political thought

2020 ◽  
pp. 117
Author(s):  
Ruqaya Saeed Khalkhal
Keyword(s):  
Political Life ◽  
The Political ◽  
Democratic Process ◽  
The Social ◽  
Science And Politics ◽  
Political Realities ◽  
The Church ◽  
Theory Of Democracy ◽  
Or Applications ◽  
The Ideal

The darkness that Europe lived in the shadow of the Church obscured the light that was radiating in other parts, and even put forward the idea of democracy by birth, especially that it emerged from the tent of Greek civilization did not mature in later centuries, especially after the clergy and ideological orientation for Protestants and Catholics at the crossroads Political life, but when the Renaissance emerged and the intellectual movement began to interact both at the level of science and politics, the Europeans in democracy found refuge to get rid of the tyranny of the church, and the fruits of the application of democracy began to appear on the surface of most Western societies, which were at the forefront to be doubtful forms of governece.        Democracy, both in theory and in practice, did not always reflect Western political realities, and even since the Greek proposition, it has not lived up to the idealism that was expected to ensure continuity. Even if there is a perception of the success of the democratic process in Western societies, but it was repulsed unable to apply in Islamic societies, because of the social contradiction added to the nature of the ruling regimes, and it is neither scientific nor realistic to convey perceptions or applications that do not conflict only with our civilized reality The political realization created by certain historical circumstances, and then disguises the different reality that produced them for the purpose of resonance in the ideal application.

The Swiss and their Neighbours, 1460-1560

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tom Scott
Keyword(s):  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Turning Point ◽  
Buffer Zone ◽  
The Political ◽  
Territorial Expansion ◽  
The Reformation ◽  
Political Principle ◽  
Mutual Obligation ◽  
The Common ◽  
Common Identity

Renewed interest in Swiss history has sought to overcome the old stereotypes of peasant liberty and republican exceptionalism. The heroic age of the Confederation in the fifteenth century is now seen as a turning point as the Swiss polity achieved a measure of institutional consolidation and stability, and began to mark out clear frontiers. This book questions both assumptions. It argues that the administration of the common lordships by the cantons collectively gave rise to as much discord as cooperation, and remained a pragmatic device not a political principle. It argues that the Swiss War of 1499 was an avoidable catastrophe, from which developed a modus vivendi between the Swiss and the Empire as the Rhine became a buffer zone, not a boundary. It then investigates the background to Bern’s conquest of the Vaud in 1536, under the guise of relieving Geneva from beleaguerment, to suggest that Bern’s actions were driven not by predeterminate territorial expansion but by the need to halt French designs upon Geneva and Savoy. The geopolitical balance of the Confederation was fundamentally altered by Bern’s acquisition of the Vaud and adjacent lands. Nevertheless, the political fabric of the Confederation, which had been tested to the brink during the Reformation, proved itself flexible enough to absorb such a major reorientation, not least because what held the Confederation together was not so much institutions as a sense of common identity and mutual obligation forged during the Burgundian Wars of the 1470s.

East Germany

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Detlef Pollack ◽  
Gergely Rosta
Keyword(s):  
Structural Transformation ◽  
East Germany ◽  
External Factors ◽  
The Political ◽  
Long Term Effects ◽  
State Security ◽  
Security Service ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Church

The case of East Germany raises the question of why religion and church, which had fallen to an unprecedentedly low level after four decades of suppression, have not recovered since 1989. The repressive church politics of the SED were undoubtedly the decisive factor in the unique process of minoritizing churches in the GDR. However, other external factors such as increasing prosperity, socio-structural transformation, and the expansion of the leisure and entertainment sector played an important role, too. In addition, church activity itself probably also helped to weaken the social position of churches. The absence of a church renaissance after 1990 can be explained by several factors, such as the long-term effects of the break with tradition caused by the GDR system, the political and moral discrediting of the church by the state security service, and people’s dwindling confidence in the church, which was suddenly seen as a non-representative Western institution.

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