Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Islam And The Environment, Jon Armajani

The Journal of Social Encounters

This is a transcript of a presentation at the Thirty-Fourth Annual Peace Studies Conference at the College of St. Benedict and St. John’s University on September 18, 2023. The presentation provides (1) some background information about Islam; (2) related ideas about Christianity; (3) a discussion of some verses in the Quran, which relate to the environment, and some Islamic interpretations of them; (4) an analysis of Ibrahim Abdul-Matin’s ideas on Islam and the environment; and (5) a tribute to Father Rene McGraw, OSB.

Religion And Atheism In Everyday Day Life Of The Ukrainian Educators In The 1920s-1930s, Oleksandr Lukyanenko, Vitaly Dmytrenko, Vita Dmytrenko

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article illustrates the process of formation of the atheist worldview of Soviet citizens under the pressure of Bolshevik propaganda in the context of student-teaching communities of higher educational institutions of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. The study shows two poles of the life of teachers: the limit of involvement in the work in the societies of militant God-fighters and the marginal position of the believers with all the resulting negative consequences for the personality, which the atheistic totalitarian state tried to create for a person. Along with highlighting the state-wide patterns of the anti-religious struggle in the Ukrainian socialist …

Peace In The Middle Of The Storm, Ronald Washignton Dr, Sandra L. Guzman-Foster Ph.D.

The Journal of Faith, Education, and Community

The march towards biblical Revelation and restoration began at Calvary and continues today. A comforter and Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth (BIBLE) are given to sustain believers in these times. As educators and more so as followers of Jesus the Christ, there are certain truths we hold. Among them is that we are just passing through this life. In our traversing of this life, we accept the command to spread the good news, utilize our gifts, and do all unto the glory of God. So as educators, the main question throughout the COVID pandemic, with political and social unrest in …

Review Of Imagining Persecution: Why American Christians Believe There Is A Global War Against Their Faith, Revd Helen Paynter

The Journal of Social Encounters

No abstract provided.

Philanthropic Traditions In Religions; A Comparative Study Of Jews, Islam, And Christianity, Ahmad Sobiyanto, Nurwahidin Nurwahidin

Journal Of Middle East and Islamic Studies

The philanthropic tradition is one of the recommended acts of worship in Islam which is part of the pillar of Islam, zakat. However, it turns out that this tradition also developed in other religions and became interesting to learn. The purpose of this study is to describe qualitatively about philanthropic traditions in the teachings of major religions in the middle east, namely Judaism, Islam, and Christianity. Descriptive qualitative method (using content analysis techniques) is a type of literature research through books, journals and other relevant sources used in this research. That the religions of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity each have …

The Czech Republic: From The Center Of Christendom To The Most Atheist Nation Of The 21st Century. Part 1. The Persecuted Church: The Clandestine Catholic Church (Ecclesia Silentii) In Czechoslovakia During Communism 1948-1991, Scott Vitkovic

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

This research examines the most important historical, political, economic, social, cultural, and religious factors before, during, and after the reign of Communism in Czechoslovakia from 1918 to 2021 and their effect on the extreme increase in atheism and decrease in Christianity, particularly Roman Catholicism, in the present-day Czech Republic. It devotes special attention to the role of the Clandestine Catholic Church (Ecclesia Silentii) and the changing policies of the Holy See vis-à-vis this Church, examining these policies' impact on the continuing decline of Roman Catholicism in the Czech Republic after the collapse of Communism. The article also deals with Pope …

Strategy And Tactics Of Soviet Security Bodies In The Fight Against Religion And Religious Communities On The Territory Of Ukraine, Olha Shakurova, Oksana Vysoven, Yuriy Figurnyi, Natalia Varodi

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article analyzes the strategy and tactics of state security agencies in the fight against religion and religious Protestant communities on the territory of Soviet Ukraine. It was revealed that the communist totalitarian system, in order to maintain its dominant position in society and master fully the consciousness of its population and influence its spiritual life (strategic task), shortly after the end of the Second World War, in 1946 in the system of the newly formed Ministry of State Security of the Soviet Union of the Socialist Republics and its republican departments created new special operational departments endowed with extraordinary …

The Nature And Motives Of Religiosity In An Atheistic State (On The Example Of Scientific Research Conducted In Soviet Ukraine), Tetiana Havryliuk, Vladyslav Diatlov

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

This article analyzes methods for studying the nature and motives of religiosity of the population in the context of ideologically tinged academic science. The academic scientific approach to the studied branch, in this case, the religiosity of the population, ensured a large array of empirical material and the possibility to classify and structure it. This enriched the science of religion with new facts. The idea that religiosity could be overcome with the help of fundamental educational and scientific propaganda was refuted by data on the development of religiosity in the territory of Soviet Ukraine. The shortcoming of dominance of ideology …

Congregational Music As Phatic Communication: Affect, Atmosphere, And Relational Ways Of Listening And Being, Anna E. Nekola

Yale Journal of Music & Religion

Much of the scholarship of congregational music focuses on participatory music in organized corporate worship. This article draws on theories of communication and affect to examine the secondary, background music that happens alongside other events in a worship service or in places other than the space of the sanctuary. Instead of understanding affects as an individual emotion, this article argues that music is made meaningful through a socio-cultural and relational affective process. This in turn enables one to understand how musics, particularly secondary non-participatory musics, work beyond language and representation in phatic ways that can engender powerful feelings of human …

Review Of Lead, Kindly Light: Gandhi On Christianity, Charles R. Disalvo

The Journal of Social Encounters

No abstract provided.

Editor's Introduction, Mathew N. Schmalz

Journal of Global Catholicism

No abstract provided.

Sacrality In Modern Ukrainian Poetics: Metamorphoses Of Values, Iryna Lazorevych

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

This is a study of the influence of religious sacrality on modern Ukrainian literature, particularly poetry, analyzing those sacred meanings that the current Ukrainian mentality actively uses. So far, it eclectically synthesizes the ideological impulses of traditional Christian religiosity (which even in the times of Communism retained its natural strength, especially in the Western regions of Ukraine), and elements of Soviet ideologemes and pragmatism of the modern transitional period. At the same time, it uses certain inclinations to new communication with sacred, which is felt by some of the important creators of modern Ukrainian culture. In this article, the author …

Chaplaincy For The Prisoners And The Penitentiary System In Ukraine (1991-2021), Valentyna Kuryliak, Ivan Ostashchuk, Mariia Ovchar

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

This article examines the quality of work of religious organizations in places of deprivation of liberty, as well as their interaction with the penitentiary service of Ukraine. It was revealed that the chaplaincy ministry occupies an important place in the Christian churches of Ukraine. In the early 1990s, ministry in Ukrainian prisons was allowed, but most of the churches were at the stage of survival, so they were not able to carry out active work in prisons. At the legislative level, prisoners have ensured freedom of religion, and the penitentiary service was obliged to provide access to representatives of each …

Eudaimonic Happiness As A Convergence Point For Religion And Medicine: The Ukrainian Context, Uliana Lushch-Purii

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The paper is aimed to present arguments for consideration of eudaimonic happiness as a convergence point between religion (Christian denominations) and medicine in the contemporary world in general and Ukraine in particular. Similarities between eudaimonic definition of happiness and traditional interpretation of happiness as a virtuous good life in historic Christianity are shown. The present tendency of modernized Christian denominations in Ukraine to elaborate a secular context of happiness concept is traced. Based on analysis of contemporary religious information resources and documents, it is shown that nowadays the majority of Christian denominations in Ukraine concur in considering happiness with others, …

Actual Development Trends Of Religious Studies In Uzbekistan, Makhfuza Alimova

The Light of Islam

The paper highlights actual problems, major directions and development trends of the field of Religious Studies in Uzbekistan. It is clear that the youths have become the main target of different destructive ideas in the period of globalization. The paper focuses on the prevention of these threats and formation of a spiritual immunity against them as well as on the improvement of healthy lifestyle and respect towards national and universal values in souls and minds of the youths in order to prevent a gap to be appeared in their spiritual world.

National and religious values have developed for better in …

Loving Thyself And Well-Being: What Does God Have To Do With It?, Derek De La Peña Ph.D.

The Journal of Faith, Education, and Community

The current study is both exploratory and conceptual in nature and considers the controversial topic of “self-love” from both Christian and positive psychology viewpoints. Adaptive and maladaptive concepts of self-love are considered with Christian participants (n = 467) who listed God as the most important factor to happiness (Type I, n = 133) and a second group (Type II, n = 334) who considered some other factor as more important. Statistical significance was evident between groups with Type I participants scoring higher for meaning in life, engagement, and life-satisfaction measures in addition to a number of biblically-based character qualities (e.g. …

The Journey Of A Spiritual Migrant: An Autoethnography On Leaving American Evangelicalism, Joel Mcreynolds

The Journal of Faith, Education, and Community

The support of Donald Trump by many evangelical Christian voters during the 2016 election was seen as a betrayal of core beliefs by the author, who grew up in a non-denominational evangelical church during the 1990s and 2000s. The cognitive dissonance experienced by the author after the 2016 election plunged him into a whirlwind reconsideration of his Christian upbringing. Using autoethnography, a research method that employs self-reflection and personal experience as a qualitative research tool, the author analyzes his own social media posts, journal entries, and creative writing to trace his exit from American Evangelicalism in this deeply personal account. …

Evangelical Protestant Churches In The Republic Of Macedonia After World War Ii (1947-2017), Jovan Jonovski

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The first Evangelical Protestant church in the territory of the present-day Republic of Macedonia was established in Bitola (Monastir) in 1873, which became the Methodist Church in 1922. The second one is the Baptist Church established in 1928 in Skopje. After WWII, both Churches (denominations) faced difficulties from the socialist government, and the activities of the Church became restricted to the church building. The general situation changed at the end of the 1980s when, in 1987, a new wave arrived with the beginning of activities with two other churches: Christ’s Pentecostal (later Evangelical) Church and the Congregational Church. In the …

An Overview Of Four Traditions On War And Peace In Christian History, Joseph J. Fahey

The Journal of Social Encounters

This essay examines four traditions on war and peace that have developed in Christian history. They are: Pacifism, Just War, Total War, and World Community.Pacifism characterized the earliest Christians; Just War appeared in the late fourth and fifth centuries; Total War in the eleventh century; and World Community began in the sixteenth century. All four positions continue today and are held by people who sincerely call themselves Christian.

African Christian Leadership: Realities, Opportunities, And Impact, David K. Penno

Journal of Adventist Mission Studies

"African Christian Leadership is a well-organized, well-written report on some very significant research about leaders and the practice of leadership in the African church. The methodology allowed the researcher to hear from a broad spectrum of African Christians. One criticism of the study could be that a sample of church leaders and members in majority Muslim countries of North Africa were not included in the study, but this might be understandable due to the already vast scope of the project. I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in leadership in the Christian context, and especially as practiced …

Mediating Gospel Singing: Audiovisual Recording And The Transformation Of Voice Among The Christian Lisu In Post-2000 Nujiang, China, Ying Diao

Yale Journal of Music & Religion

The contemporary gospel singing of the Nujiang Lisu in China’s southwestern Yunnan province seems to have been predominated by new media technologies and recorded popular mutgguat ssat music. The prevalence of Christian audiovisual recordings reflects more than a shift in the materiality of Lisu religious practices. Moreover, it speaks to the transformative ways that the Christian Lisu have engaged with technologies for their gospel singing as a practice of religious mediation. New musical styles and expressive forms have been disseminated through recordings and further institutionalized in the worship service and other religious settings. Drawing on a material approach from the …

The Devil Of The Missionary Church: The White Fathers And Catholic Evangelization In Zambia, Bernhard Udelhoven

Journal of Global Catholicism

This article examines how Western Catholic missionaries in Zambia dealt with claims of witchcraft and Satanism. Within an analytic frame that draws upon cultural history, theology, and anthropology the article also considers how African Christians appropriated missionary notions of the devil.

Christianity And Sport Psychology: One Aspect Of Cultural Competence, Trevor J. Egli, Leslee A. Fisher

Movement and Being: The Journal of the Christian Society for Kinesiology, Leisure and Sports Studies

There is currently a dearth of literature relating to how applied sport psychology practitioners might work with a Christian sportsperson (Czech et al., 2004, Egli et al., 2014). Therefore, the purpose of this article is to provide practical suggestions for sport psychology practitioners based on relevant research related to Christianity and sport psychology as well as personal and professional experience. We first explain the various sport psychology roles before providing a brief review of literature. Studies related to Christian athletes, Christian coaches, Christian prayer within sport, and sport psychology consultants’ experiences of spirituality are presented. Lastly, the authors include four …

Monastic Traditions And Practices In Macedonia And Their Implications In Modern Times, Maja Angelovska-Panova

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The purpose of this paper is to present several fundamental aspects in the reconstruction of the issue related to the monasticism in Macedonia. In that sense, taken into consideration is the historical and spiritual continuity of the monasticism beginning from the ninth century to modern times, as well as the monastic practices established in the existing typicons, and the implications of the revival of the modern monasticism in Macedonia in the 1990s.

Research at digressive methodological level points to the fact that in monasticism, the same traditional Christian values are cherished as they have been cherished in the previous period. …

Recollections Of S. D. Rodholm, Peter D. Thomsen

The Bridge

In both pulpit and classroom, S. D. Rodholm was a great teacher and a true servant of the church. His capacity for learning and discernment was enormous, yet he never used big words nor in any way intimidated anyone. To me, he was always the wise, old seer. He made it very clear that his purpose in teaching was not to make cut and dried theologians out of us. His purpose, rather, was to help us, his students, become servants of THE WORD. He said many times, “Simple Christianity has been my life’s goal.” He hoped it would also be …

Politics Of Feminist Revision In Di Prima's Loba, Polina Mackay

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In her article "Politics of Feminist Revision in di Prima's Loba" Polina Mackay explores Diane di Prima's two-volume epic Loba (1998) and, through a comparison of di Prima to the work of Adrienne Rich, argues that Loba practices a politics of feminist revision. Further, Mackay examines the ways in which di Prima starts to move away from the recovery project of female voices in patriarchal culture, associated with late twentieth-century Feminism, towards a women's literature which need not be defined entirely through its resistance to patriarchal narratives of gender in men's literature. Here it focuses on di Prima's revisionist …

Vasco Da Gama, The Explorer: Motivations And Myths, S. Ghazanfar

Journal of Global Initiatives: Policy, Pedagogy, Perspective

The Portuguese explorer, Vasco da Gama (1460-1524), was the first European to sail from Portugal to India. The “da Gama epoch” refers to the era of European commercial and imperial expansion in Asia. The primary motivation for the 1498 voyage, however, was messianic, to ‘vanquish and subdue all Saracens (Muslims) and pagans and other enemies of Christ, to reduce their persons to perpetual slavery, and to convert to Christianity,’ as declared in various Papal Bulls, together called “the Doctrine of Discovery.” The Church divided the world into Spanish and Portuguese zones, both to be part of the Papal Empire. Over …

The God Dimension In Leadership, Erich Baumgartner

Journal of Applied Christian Leadership

One of the most challenging insights of the servant leadership approach for christian leaders is the fact that god himself chose to approach humanity that way. Christian theology has long maintained that who god is determines how he acts. Jesus dying on the cross for humanity reminds us of the inexhaustible mystery that by his very nature god is a servant. the nature of god—more specifically his Trinitarian nature—is the central paradigm of thought in this issue of JACL. Does God’s Trinitarian nature have anything to say to Christian leaders about leadership? Get ready for some meaty reading.

Proof Of Heaven?: Controversy Over Near-Death Experiences In American Christianity, Joel Sanford

The Hilltop Review

Testimonies claiming firsthand experience of Life after Death have been circulating in many cultures since antiquity. Among these experiences are those occurring at, near, or beyond the point of death or apparent death. Testimonies of this kind of experience, now widely referred to as a Near-death Experience (NDE), were popularized by Raymond Moody's publication of Life after Life in 1975. In the last 10 years, it seems there has been a growing American public interest in these experiences, resulting in a slew of New York Times best-sellers. With such provocative titles as Proof of Heaven and Heaven is for Real …

Religious Discourse And Interdisciplinarity In Sport Studies, Zachary T. Smith

The Hilltop Review

Religious and theological explorations of leisure have remained few and far between, as religious studies perceive sport and game related studies as trivial, and as leisure theorists find social scientific methods more compelling. And yet, religious traditions and thinkers have been offering accounts and ethics of leisure activities for thousands of years, and anthropological evidence suggests the origination of sport and game play arose in the context of religious cult activity (Huizinga, 1949; Guttmann, 2007). Further, contemporary research has indicated that religion plays an important role in structuring the thought and behavior of religious persons towards their leisure (Waller, 2009) …