International and Area Studies Commons^™

Book Review: The Victory Of The Cross: Salvation In Eastern Orthodoxy, Paul Crego

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The Victory of the Cross: Salvation in Eastern Orthodoxy is the latest book by James R. Payton, Jr., emeritus professor of history at Redeemer University College in Ancaster, Ontario, Canada. His previous books include Light from the Christian East: An Introduction to the Orthodox Tradition. He also edited A Patristic Treasure: Early Church Wisdom for Today.

Crimean Anti-Religious Persecution In 2018 And 2019, Felix Corley

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

In Russian-occupied Crimea in 2018, there were 23 prosecutions brought against individuals for ill-defined "missionary activity," of which 19 ended with punishment, Forum 18 has found. Many of those punished were prosecuted for sharing their faith on the street or for holding worship at unapproved venues. Cases against two more were due to be heard in mid-January 2019. This represents a doubling of such cases in the Crimean peninsula since the first year such punishments for "missionary activity" were imposed. July 2016 to July 2017 saw 13 known cases of which eight ended in punishment.

Eurasian And Eastern European Evangelicals: Tested Over Two Centuries, Walter Sawatsky

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The oppression of evangelicals has been a persistent legacy, but it has not applied to all of them. Therefore, we must begin by defining evangelicals and oppression. A further query to pursue is: what intensity of oppression has permitted creative survival?

Post-Soviet Transformation For Evangelicals, 1991-2018: Deepening Causes For Discord, Walter Sawatsky

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

During the great transformation between 1989 and 1991, the majority of American journalists were completely surprised by the transformations of 1989 in Eastern Europe and the collapse of the USSR in 1991, since it contradicted their stereotypes so profoundly. Several developments within the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe turned out to be signposts for those with the eyes to see. Literary figures and philosophers circulating their thinking in samizdat form, or through the emergence of dissenting movements, pointed to the disillusionment with the grand socialist promises. Solzhenitsyn had already drawn attention in his Nobel speech to the power of truth …

Women In The Serbian Orthodox Church: Historical Overview And Contemporary Situation, Aleksandra Djurić Milovanović, Radmila Radić

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

Research on the position of women in the Eastern Orthodox churches is still scarce. Some recent studies show differences among the various Orthodox Churches in Eastern Europe regarding women’s issues. The position of the women in the Serbian Orthodox Church (SOC) was addressed as late as in the 1990s, but this is still an insufficiently examined field. Eastern Orthodox theologians have rarely discussed the problem of the position and role of women in the SOC. During the socialist era, they did not engage this topic, except in studies related to female monasticism. On the other hand, sociological and anthropological studies …

Book Review: Church In A Divided World: The Encounter Of The Lutheran World Federation With The Cold War, Paul B. Mojzes

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

Research on the mutual impact of Christian churches and the Cold War is proceeding albeit slowly. One of the most important initiators of such research, the prominent church leader Risto Lehtonen of Finland, has now added his own study based on his personal experience in executive positions with the World Student Christian Federation and then more pertinently as Director of the Department of Church Cooperation of the Lutheran World Federation (LWF). With occasional direct references to his own role in the historical development of the churches’ role in the post-World War II rupture of the world into two hostile camps, …

Book Review: A Short History Of The Georgian Church [SakʻArtʻVelos Eklesiis Mokle Istoria], Paul Crego

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

Metropolitan Archbishop Anania Japaridze (1949-present) is a member of the Holy Synod of the Orthodox Church in Georgia and has served as a bishop in that church since 1991. He has published several books, mainly on the history of the Orthodox Church in Georgia, but also books on how Georgians have been converted to other Christian denominations or religions, and, thereby “converted” to other ethnicities. The thesis of one such book is that Georgian converts to Islam in the northwest part of historical Georgian territories lost their Georgian language and national identity and became Abkhazians. (Apʻxazetʻi: kʻartʻveltʻa "gaapʻxazeba" = Abkhazia: …

Frontmatter (Volume 39, Issue 6), Paul B. Mojzes

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

No abstract provided.

“The People Of Aram Shall Go Into Exile”: Practical And Theological Dilemmas Of Middle Eastern Churches Since The Beginning Of The Syrian War, Wilbert Van Saane

The Journal of Social Encounters

This paper discusses the way in which Christian churches in the Middle East have responded to the Syrian War. It signals some practical and theological dilemmas that these churches have faced since the conflict in Syria broke out. The description of these dilemmas is primarily based on interviews with a representative sample of church leaders. Analysis of these dilemmas sheds light on the way the churches of the Middle East have contributed to peaceful resolutions of the Syrian conflict, or failed to do so. Before going into the practical and theological dilemmas of the churches, the article provides a short …

Frontmatter (Volume 39, Issue 5), Paul B. Mojzes

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

No abstract provided.

The Intertwining Of Religion And Nation: The Russian Administration’S Approach To Religious Life And National Identity, Beth Admiraal

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

Excerpt: "The relationship between religion and nation that is promoted by a state will have tremendous effects on religious minority groups. For religious minorities in Russia, the forms that are most utilized by the state are exclusion and strong internalism. The former leads the state to cherry-pick troublesome religious groups for exclusion, for failing to be ‘Russian’ enough, leading to serious impairment for religious groups that are singled out by the state as threats to the nation. With regards to the latter formulation, the Russian Orthodox Church is the basis for a strong internalist mechanism, determining who is in and …

Is The East-West Political Bipolarity The Foundation Of The Ecumenical Movement? The Cold War As A Meta-Narrative Of The World Council Of Churches, Katharina Kunter

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

Excerpt: "...the following remarks provide an overview of the role of churches during the Cold War. Very often, the role of churches will be represented by developments and discussions within the WCC, which can be understood as a sort of role model, because it provided the "bell" for similar developments in the Western and Northern European countries. Three topics were prioritized. First was the dilemma of an ecumenism between the East and West in the early phase of the Cold War during the late 1940s and 1950s, which accompanied the founding of the World Council of Churches in 1948. Second, …

Nationalistic Smog Over Poland, Alfred Marek Wierzbicki

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

Excerpt: "Nationalism poisons Christianity. It strips its universalism and humanism. Using a slogan from a church hymn “We want God” on nationalists’ banners should rouse objection. God cannot be appropriated by one nation. Besides that, what is the reason for elevating this slogan in a setting conducive to religious freedom? If this supposed to be a response to secularization of modern culture, then combining it with racial slogans of white civilization and clearly anti-Islamic slogans, is a primitive action grown out from a fear of what is different and foreign. Religion assimilating social and national fears is a pathological phenomenon …

Recent Protestant Developments In Ukraine And Russia, William Yoder

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

Topics covered, with commentary, include:

Ukraine Baptist Union Breaks Its Ties with John MacArthur

Seminary Suspensions in Russia; Moscow’s Baptist Seminary is Back in Operation

New Inter-Confessional Body in Ukraine

Surviving Past–And Future–Blockades; A Russian Prayer Breakfast Met in St. Petersburg

Commentary: Franklin Graham in Moscow

A Bridgebuilder between East and West: Siegfried Springer Has Died

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 …

In Pursuit Of Healing And Memories: Cross-Border Ukrainian Pilgrimage To A Polish Shrine, Iuliia Buyskykh

Journal of Global Catholicism

I present an analysis of Roman Catholic, Greek Catholic and Orthodox pilgrimages to Kalwaria Pacławska in south-east Poland near the Polish-Ukrainian border. Before World War II, there were two pilgrimage sites in Kalwaria Pacławska, one Roman Catholic and the other Greek Catholic. Today, Ukrainian pilgrimage is quite a diverse phenomenon, consisting of people of both Ukrainian and Polish origin, and the three Christian denominations. The approach to pilgrimage as a palimpsest can broaden the research perspective of mobile religiosities and reconsider the interactions between religious motivations, sacred sites, memories, experiences, and storytelling through space and time. In my research case, …

"It Is Our Own Thing": The Expression Of And Limits To Enculturation At St. Joseph's Anglophone Parish, Kayleigh Kaminski

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Down a small side street in the heart of Yaoundé, Cameroon, St. Joseph’s Anglophone Parish houses worshippers from the Northwest and Southwest regions of the country. Its members bring their cultural traditions to the church in the process of enculturation, and mass is filled with clergy-sanctioned elements of traditional culture, but beyond its walls, people still carry out the traditional practices that are deemed as “non-Christian” by the Church. This study seeks to examine the ways that traditional culture manifests itself both inside and outside St. Joseph’s Anglophone Parish, exploring the ways in which tradition is translated in the church …

"La Llorona": Evolución, Ideología Y Uso En El Mundo Hispano, Raquel Sáenz-Llano

LSU Master's Theses

This thesis studies the evolution, ideology and use of the myth of La Llorona through time in the Hispanic World. Considering this myth as one of the most known traditional narratives of the American continent, I begin by providing visual, ethnohistorical and ethnographical insights of weeping in Mesoamerica and South America and the specific mention of a weeping woman in some Spanish chronicles to say how western values were stablished in “the new continent” through this legend. I suggest that during the postcolonialism the legend did not tell anymore about a mother that cries and search a place for their …

Frontmatter (Volume 39, Issue 2), Paul B. Mojzes

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

No abstract provided.

Moral Teachings In The Holy Books, The Bible And The Quran, About The Relationship Of The Human To Nature: A Macedonian Research Project, Ruzhica Cacanoska, Pande Lazarevski Phd, Margarita Matlievska Phd, Hanif Dauti, Vesna Zabijakin Chatleska, Phd, Gjoko Gjorgjevski Phd, Duca Zvrleska

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The subject matter of this manuscript is the separation and actualization of the thematic areas of the holy books, the Bible and the Quran, in which the human-nature relationship is elaborated, indicated or specified. The emphasis is on the moral teachings contained in the holy books, the Bible and the Quran, which, refer to the human–nature relationship and their influence on the development of ecological awareness in that context, are supported by or grounded in the holy books. The empirical research point to the conclusion is that religion is an important source or basis of morality, and it determines the …

Adam Reinhold Schiewe---A Cross-Border Man Of Faith: A Baptist Trailblazer In Estonia, Poland, Ukraine, Germany, And Russia, Üllas Linder

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

This study aimed at compiling a biography of the preacher Adam Reinhold Schiewe (1843–1930). Schiewe ministered in the territories of present-day Poland, Germany, Ukraine, Russia, and Estonia. His historical significance lies primarily in the formal founding of the first Baptist congregation in Estonia. Schiewe wrote memoirs of his life and is featured in a large number of fragmentary, at times even contradictory, sources. The author pointed out the inaccuracies found therein and reconstructed a plausible biography. The study was originally written in Estonian and was supported by a single scholarship from the ESF programme DoRa activity 8.

Azerbaijan: Religious Freedom Survey, 2018, Felix Corley, John Kinahan

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

Azerbaijan restricts freedom of religion and belief with interlinked freedoms of expression, association, and assembly. Forum 18’s survey analyzes violations including prisoners of conscience who were jailed and tortured for exercising freedom of religion and belief, strict state literature censorship, and regime claims of its “tolerance.” Forum 18's survey analysis documents Azerbaijan's violations of freedom of religion and belief, with interlinked freedoms of expression, association, and assembly. Serious violations include but are not limited to:

- a complex labyrinth of “legal” restrictions to prevent the exercise of freedom of religion, belief, and other fundamental freedoms;

-total state control of the …

Hundred Years Since Yugoslavia’S Birth: Lesson On Nationalism, Balkanization, And Religion In Europe’S Periphery, Vjekoslav Perica

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

In 2018, historians were marking the one hundredth anniversary of the foundation of a nation-state in southeastern Europe remembered as Yugoslavia–the country of Southern Slavs. The multi-ethnic nation used to connect several European ethnic groups of the shared Slavonic ancestry yet were divided by three major religions and mutually exclusive ethnic nationalist ideologies. The Yugoslav national project lasted seven decades under various regime types in a sensitive balance often disturbed by wars. In the 20th century alone, the territory of the former Yugoslavia saw six major wars, three cycles of ethnic cleansing and genocide, and about fifteen various states and …

Supporting A Canadian Proposal To Declare Srebrenica Genocide Denial Illegal, Rusmir Mahmutćehajić,

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

A letter written by the author, Dr. Rusmir Mahmutćehajić, at the request of Professor Ramić in support of a petition currently before the Canadian federal parliament to make denial of the genocide at Srebrenica illegal

Frontmatter (Volume 39, Issue 1), Paul B. Mojzes

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

No abstract provided.

The Theological Effort Of Hafiz Ali Of Korcha, Ismail Bardhi

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

Hafiz Ali Korcha's work and activities in the fields of theology, literature, and education can be viewed, from the historical-theological perspective, as a reflection of his theological effort. This is the central category, containing as it does all of Korcha's cognitive-theoretical, axiological, and cultural-theological speculations, as well as his views on science, literature, cultural policy, and religion. In his entire theological opus, one feels the fragrance of the Qur'an and of the life of Prophet Muhammad a.s. Theological effort, as understood by Korcha, differs from theology in that it is the source of theologizing and is a primordial tendency of …

Spanish California Missions: An Economic Success, Lynne Doti

Economics Faculty Articles and Research

Starting in 1769, the Spanish established missions in Alta California. A small band of soldiers, Franciscan priests and volunteers walked from Baja California to San Francisco Bay through semi-arid, scarcely populated land stopping occasionally to establish a location for a religious community. Usually two priests, a few soldiers and a few Indians from Baja California settled at the spot. Their only resources for starting an economy were themselves, a few animals and a nearby source of water. They attracted the local Indians to join the community and perform the work necessary to create a strong economy. After only a few …

Europe With(Out) A Heart And A Soul?, András Máté-Tóth

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

"You don't know what kind of spirit you are," Jesus said to his disciples, James and John, as they wanted to condemn a Samaritan village because it didn’t want to receive him (Luke 9:55). I would like to start my article by transforming Jesus' statement and by using it for Europe: “Europe – Jesus could say today – You don't know of what kind of spirit you are.” But Europe has many answers to Jesus' statement. Europe is not without a soul, it was never an empty body and it is not one today

Human Rights And Religion In Central And Eastern Europe, András Máté-Tóth, Kitti Sándor

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

In this article we try to delineate the mutual relationship between human rights and religion in the cultural region of Central and Eastern Europe (hereafter CEE).1 We will do it by using the theoretical framework "wounded collective identity" elaborated in recent years by András Máté-Tóth.

Forewords And Frontmatter To Role Of Religion In The Western Balkans’ Societies, Sotiraq Hroni, Guusje Korthals Altes

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

No abstract provided.