REVISITING JAVANESE ISLAM

This article tends to revisiting Javanese Islamic studies. This study began from the European travelers’ period who noted some aspects of society such as the religious life. Those notes show the negative label that is addressed to the Javanese religious practices. These negative labels are often reproduced in Javanese Islam studies to this day. This article argues that the negative labels in Javanese Islamic studies tend to be misrepresentative. These kinds of results cannot be separated from certain paradigms in religious studies. There are two paradigms in the study of religion which are discussed in this article. First, the world religion paradigm. This paradigm, consciously or not, is often used in Javanese Islamic studies. The implication is Javanese religious practices are often portrayed as animist, syncretic, and so on. Second, the indigenous religion paradigm. This article elaborates this paradigm because of its potential in understanding Javanese Islamic religious practice more properly. The basis of this paradigm is intersubjective relation with ethical commitment, responsibility, and reciprocity.

The Traditional Use of “Incensi” among the Annang People: Liturgical Opportunities and Challenges in Ikot Ekpene Catholic Diocese, Nigeria

Almost every major world religion and tribal spiritualities light plant parts in worship to seek greater connection to the divine. Incense is defined as a material that is burned to produce an odour which is also referred to as the perfume itself that is produced from the burning of plant. Many people light incense sticks in their homes just for the sweet smell and the ability it has to transform space. Others too in our world today may have a stigma connecting incense sticks and illegal drug use. Many of us who have been Catholics may have witnessed the swinging of censers, filling the Church with sweet-smelling resins. The tradition of using incense in the liturgy goes back to ancient Hebrew worship, as recorded in the Psalms: “Let my prayer be set forth in Thy sight as the incense” (Ps 141:2). Incense as often used as part of a purification ritual seems to have lost its symbolisms and proper use of it in the Church as well as the decline of its use. The real problem here is that many faithful hardly know the real reason and purpose why incense is an important part of the Catholic Mass. Do people fully understand the use and symbolism of incense during the liturgical celebrations? Do the traditional use of incense offers some opportunities or challenges in the Church liturgical rites? The purpose of this study is to investigate, stimulate and sensitize the Church and all the Christian faithful of the symbolism of incense which have become optional or none use and to take effective action in reclaiming the lost symbolism and proper use of incense. Perhaps a better understanding of the traditional use of incense may help or enhance the use and importance of the symbolism of incense in our liturgical celebrations. Maybe some elements found in the traditional use of incense, the Sacred Scripture and the Church’s practice may enrich and recover the lost symbolism of incense. And may be by organizing Liturgical Seminars/workshops to seminarians and young religious in formation houses it may address the essential elements in the way incense is use.

The World by Religion

The following tables represent the results of analysis of data on religion for all of the countries of the world which appear in the World Religion Database (Johnson and Grim 2008). These data are collected at the national level from a number of sources including censuses, surveys, polls, religious communities, scholars, and others.

Modern African Missionaries. A Reassessment of Their Impact in Uganda 1890s–1920s

Using examples from Anglican missions in the Great Lakes region of Africa this article explores the roles of African Protestant missionaries in the modern era. It argues that many committed African Christians understood themselves to be missionaries and examines the nature of their missionary activity. Those who called themselves missionaries evangelised outside their own ethnic group. They were engaged in regional and transnational developments. The article attends to local and regional historical processes to show how African missionary activities were infused with transnational notions of belonging to a world religion.

European Security – Islamist terrorist network in Bosnia and Herzegovina (original research)

Radical Islamic ideas, individuals, movements, organizations, but also states that have greatly contributed to the radicalization of the existing Muslim population of the Balkans and Bosnia and Herzegovina are not new. Ever since the Middle Ages, with the aggression and genocide committed by the Ottomans, the ideas of jihad have been present in various forms, especially in environments that interpret Islam as a great world religion in such a radical way. There is a noticeable connection between the bearers of jihadist ideas from World War II until today. This article not only provides a historical analysis of the preconditions for the widespread jihadist network that today produces jihad warriors who threaten the entire world but also provides an authentic overview of the preconditions of this global terrorist network to better understand elements such as this network – it’s functions, how it recruits new terrorists and how it uses the ideology of radical Islamists as a motive for committing serious crimes around the world. The schematic structure of the mujahedeen unit with command staff is shown, as well as the fact that the terrorists welcomed the authorities of Bosnia and Herzegovina who tried to hide their presence and to relativize all the worst crimes committed by the mujahedin.

Religionizing Christianity: Towards a Poststructuralist Notion of Global Religious History

By relying on poststructural theory, this article will demonstrate how a consistent historicization can help us increase our understanding of how religious contexts changed in light of colonialism and globalization during the nineteenth century. While it is well known that such changes took place in non-Western regions, the article will show – by example of German liberal theology – that it was also in the so-called West that common systems of knowledge were transformed against the backdrop of global entanglement. On the basis of some prominent protagonists of so-called Culture Protestantism (Kulturprotestantismus), I will demonstrate how global debates led to a certain re-conceptualization of Christianity as a world religion in the late nineteenth century. By identifying different traditions such as Christianity or Buddhism as equivalent, those theologians supported the emerging global awareness of religion as a universal aspect of human life and a category sui generis.

What's faith got to do with it?

“What’s faith got to do with it?” In this paper we explore the multilayered role of faith in two food banks in Toronto. We are drawing on a larger study of five partnerships between faithbased organizations and others for the common good, a study that unpacks the interesting dynamics of collaborations involving at least one faith partner. In the selection we have made for our present paper, the reader can expect to find a description and analysis of those dynamics as they pertain to individuals, groups, religious and secular organizations, new immigrants and long time residents, a rich variety of faith groups—all around the issues of having enough to eat, human dignity and the formation of community. When we use the word “faith” we are aware of the multiplicity of meanings carried by the term. There is a basic distinction, famously formulated by Wilfred Cantwell Smith, between the faith that animates and is held by an individual and ‘a faith’ in the sense of a world religion, which has a history, traditions, sacred texts, liturgy, normative practices, teachings, creeds, buildings, authorized leaders— in short all the characteristics of a religion established over many centuries. Of course, there is a symbiotic relationship between the personal and the institutional. Each enlarges and enriches the other; neither can exist without the other. Keywords: CVSS, Centre for Voluntary Sector Studies, Working Paper Series,TRSM, Ted Rogers School of Management Citation:

What's faith got to do with it?

“What’s faith got to do with it?” In this paper we explore the multilayered role of faith in two food banks in Toronto. We are drawing on a larger study of five partnerships between faithbased organizations and others for the common good, a study that unpacks the interesting dynamics of collaborations involving at least one faith partner. In the selection we have made for our present paper, the reader can expect to find a description and analysis of those dynamics as they pertain to individuals, groups, religious and secular organizations, new immigrants and long time residents, a rich variety of faith groups—all around the issues of having enough to eat, human dignity and the formation of community. When we use the word “faith” we are aware of the multiplicity of meanings carried by the term. There is a basic distinction, famously formulated by Wilfred Cantwell Smith, between the faith that animates and is held by an individual and ‘a faith’ in the sense of a world religion, which has a history, traditions, sacred texts, liturgy, normative practices, teachings, creeds, buildings, authorized leaders— in short all the characteristics of a religion established over many centuries. Of course, there is a symbiotic relationship between the personal and the institutional. Each enlarges and enriches the other; neither can exist without the other. Keywords: CVSS, Centre for Voluntary Sector Studies, Working Paper Series,TRSM, Ted Rogers School of Management Citation: