The Challenge of Taliban Ideology for International Politics: Religious Competition, Counterterrorism, and the Search for Legitimacy

This paper examines the Taliban vision of an Islamic polity posing a challenge to neighboring Central and South Asian states as well as more distant ones in Eurasia and the Middle East. As a potential magnet for militants across these regions, Taliban Islam represents an alternative to forms of piety and legal practice in states that have signifi cant Muslim populations and where each government claims some degree of religious legitimation and control over Islamic authority and interpretation. Author claims the Taliban ideology poses a dilemma to regional actors, too, in that it makes all parties who might cooperate with the movement vulnerable to criticism based on human rights discourse. At the same time, the presence of the Islamic State – Khorasan Province (ISKP) has permitted the movement the opportunity to seek to reframe its international standing and its relationship to violence. The Taliban have adapted their critique of ISKP to the claim that they share a counterterrorism mission with other governments, an assertion that allows the movement and its partners to defl ect criticism from various quarters and normalize relations with other states. Author concludes that, seeking international support, the Taliban have adapted their ideological claims to position the movement simultaneously as a competitor to other visions of militant jihadist politics and as a counterterrorist force laying the groundwork for the legitimation of their place in a rapidly evolving global order.

Modern Practice, Archaic Ritual: Catholic Exorcism in America

The following ethnographic and folkloric analysis of American exorcism practices post-1998 centers on four Catholic priest-exorcists currently active in the United States. After a brief commentary regarding the place of Satanism within contemporary Catholic imagination, this article posits that the Catholic Church’s recent institutional support of its office of exorcist must not be viewed separately from its discursive fear of Satanic cults and larger narratives of religious declension. The current era of exorcism practice in America is chiefly characterized as a response to the media sensationalism surrounding not only prior cases of demonic possession but also of Satanic ritual abuse. Moreover, beyond these explicit issues of religious competition (e.g., Catholics versus Satanic conspirators), the current era of exorcism practice is also implicitly characterized by the changing belief systems of contemporary Catholics. Thus, this article ultimately concerns issues related to religious modernization, the apotropaic use of established religious tradition, popular entertainment and the mediatization of contemporary exorcism cases, institutionalized training curricula and the spaces allowing ritual improvisation, and the vernacular religious consumption of unregulated paranormal concepts that possess no clear analogues within official Church theology.

MONITORING THE ATTITUDE OF THE ORTHODOX CHURCH TO SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTISTS IN UKRAINE

Orthodox believers have been found to be prejudiced against Protestants, including Adventists. On the one hand, adherents of Orthodoxy see Adventism as a foreign (foreign) religious element, whose members level the millennial traditions of the dominant Church in Ukraine. On the other hand, it is believed that this denomination, combining in its doctrinal system certain elements of the teachings of the Baptist and Jewish religions, has become a religious platform for the spread of heretical ideas among Orthodox Christians. Moreover, religious antagonism on the part of Orthodoxy is also manifested in the terminology still used by Orthodox believers when referring to Protestants, including and Adventists by “sects” or “sectarians”. It is stated that mutual intolerance and religious antagonism can be explained by differences in worldviews and religious competition. Although in the context of world religious tolerance among scholars of the world's leading countries, such terminology to recognized Protestant denominations is unacceptable and discriminatory. However, the authors also cite positive references and responses in the media about Adventists from Orthodoxy. A positive aspect of Adventists is a thorough doctrinal system that is stable, systematic, and publicized. But the most positive response from Orthodoxy was given by Adventist teachings on the principles of a healthy lifestyle.

How Do We Explain the Quiet Demise of Graeco-Roman Religion? An Essay

Until now, the relatively quiet transition from traditional Graeco-Roman religion to Christianity has gone unexplained. In dialogue with James Rives and Jörg Rüpke, I argue that Christianity made better use than its religious competition of long-term trends in the Roman Empire, such as expanding literacy, the rejection of sacrifice, the movement toward monotheism, and the closing of the distance between gods and their faithful. The growing skepticism within the city elites regarding the credibility of its traditional religion, the decrease in investments in its material side, and the strength of the Christian organizations were additional factors together with contingent events, such as Constantine’s victory and his long rule.

Introduction: ‘Defending the Faith: Global Histories of Apologetics and Politics in the 20th Century’

This chapter gives an overview of the history of religious competition and secular-religious politics in the twentieth century. It introduces two key terms of this volume, secularism and apologetics. It proposes apologetics as a novel way to understand not only how religious but also secular actors defend their ideological positions. Following a history of the term apologetics in church use, this chapter proposes a model of apologetics neutralized of its narrowly Christian context that can be used for comparison across time and space. This introductory chapter then offers some general findings about the nature of religious competition in the twentieth century, before discussing in a comparative fashion the contributions to this volume.

The Secularization Debate

Well into the 20th century, leading social thinkers argued that religious beliefs reflected a prescientific worldview that would disappear as scientific rationality spread throughout the world. Though the creationism of traditional religion did give way to evolutionary worldviews, this failed to discredit religion among the general public. Religious markets theory argues that the key to flourishing religiosity is strong religious competition, but recent research found no relationship between religious pluralism and religious attendance. The individualization thesis claims that declining church attendance does not reflect declining religiosity; subjective forms of religion are simply replacing institutionalized ones. But empirical evidence indicates that individual religious belief is declining even more rapidly than church attendance. Secularization’s opponents hold that humans will always need religion. This claim seems true if it is broadened to hold that humans will always need a belief system. Norris and Inglehart argue that as survival becomes more secure, it reduces the demand for religion.

What Drives Religious Politicking? An Analysis of 24 Democratic Elections

Why do clergy talk with congregants about elections to a greater extent in Mozambique than Indonesia, or in the United States than Taiwan? Arguing that context shapes religious actors' micro-level incentives to discuss or avoid electoral politics, we seek to explain variation in religious politicking—religious leaders' and organizations' engagement in electoral campaigns. Our framework integrates individual-level and country-level approaches, as well as theories of modernization, secularism, and religious competition. Drawing on survey data from 24 elections in 18 democracies in the Comparative National Elections Project, we find that human development depresses religious politicking, while secularism and religious pluralism boost it. However, “civilizational” differences in levels of religious politicking are muted and inconsistent. Finally, at the individual level, across the globe, citizens with higher levels of education are consistently more likely to receive political messages. Our results suggest the insights obtained from an approach emphasizing individuals embedded in contexts.

(W)riting and (de)scribing martyrdom: The church’s construction of Manche Masemola

The purpose of this article is to describe how the Manche Masemola narrative crafts and constructs her as a martyr; dying in defence of her faith in the face of fierce religious competition between her Sepedi culture and Anglican faith. Manche is constructed as an extraordinary person who symbolises Virtue, battling with Vice. This article will examine Manche’s personality, and how the various commentators put her against unbearable conditions which only an extraordinary person can face. Tropes of torture, sacrifice and persecution will receive attention as instruments to construct martyrdom. This article will use primary and secondary data available to collect data. Data will be broken into themes and analysed using a narrative method.Contribution: This article continues a long debate of martyrdom and sainthood. It probes further the polysemous nature of martyrdom, its complexity, as well as the politics that go with it.