Eastern European Studies Commons^™

Book Review: Die Mehrdeutigkeit Geteilter Religiöse Orte: Eine Ethnografische Fallstudie Zum Kloster Sveti Naum In Ohrid (Mazedonien), Dejan Aždajić

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

A review of Evelyn Reuter, DieMehrdeutigkeit Geteilter Religiöse Orte: Eine Ethnografische Fallstudie zum Kloster Sveti Naum in Ohrid (Mazedonien). Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag, 2021, 410 pp. €45,00, ISBN 978-3-8376-5519-3.

The Work Of The Nazi Special Services Among The Protestants Of The Reichkomissariat Ukraine (According To The Top-Secret Materials Of The Nkvd-Nkgb), Oleksandr Korotaiev

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

Studying the work of Nazi special services among the Protestant denominations of the Reichskommissariat Ukraine during World War II is an under-explored aspect of modern historical science. The article attempts to fill this gap by covering the work of the Nazi secret services, Gestapo1 and Sicherheitsdienst (SD),2 among Evangelical Christians (EC), Baptists (B), and Christians of the Evangelical Faith (Pentecostals, CEF) of the RKU. The basis of this study is the recently declassified documents and archival materials of the KGB of the USSR. The article first provides a brief analysis of the activities of the Soviet intelligence services (NKVD3) …

Book Review: Looking East In Winter: Contemporary Thought And The Eastern Christian Tradition, James R. Payton

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

A review of Rowan Williams, Looking East in Winter: Contemporary Thought and the Eastern Christian Tradition. London: Bloomsbury Continuum, 2021. $30.00 (hardcover). ISBN: 978-1-4729- 8924-6.

Adaptation Practices And Forms Of Struggle In Jewish Communities For The Preservation Of Religious Worldview In Soviet Ukraine (1920s-1930s), Tetiana Savchuk

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article is devoted to the reconstruction of the ways of adaptation of the Jews to the Soviet anti-religious experiments and the definition of forms of counteraction to these attacks during the 1920s and 1930s. There is insufficient research in the historiography of the struggle of Jews for the preservation of their religious worldview. The development of historiography shows a certain imbalance in the studies of the methods and extent of anti- church policy while ignoring the reaction of believers to the Bolshevik experiments. Based on archival documents of the Soviet secret services (not previously introduced into scientific circulation) and …

Neither Buddhist Nor Taoist, But Both (And Even More): Exploring The ‘Hall Of Infinite Principle’ (Guangli Fotang): A Chinese Temple In The Romanian Capital, Serban Toader

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

This ethnography regards the sole Chinese temple in the Romanian capital Bucharest, its people and activity, as well as the thinking that supports this new religious movement (Maitreya Great Tao,Mile Dadao 彌勒大道). It is common knowledge that Taoism, Budhism, and Confucianism appear, at least in the official discourse, as a braided rope of unified Chinese tradition, each of the three at the same time preserving their particular features. Nevertheless, Mile Dadao not only seems to implicitly unite the three traditions in one (to which other foreign or popular traditions may be added as well), but also aims to act as …

The Model Of Development Of Precarious Practices During Covid-19 Pandemic: Society, Religion, And Individual, Оlena Honcharova, Valentyna Kuryliak

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article examines the phenomenon of precariousness and its development in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. It is postulated that precariousness is a process of instability, which primarily affects the working class and destabilizes social relations at all levels, including the level of personal relationships. The human way of life has been shifted as a result of the epidemiological situation in the world caused by the COVID-19 infection. This process can be observed in the spheres of employment, medicine, religion, family, leisure activities, etc. Against the background of social turbulence, the processes of precariousness began to develop, which worsen …

Leading The Way, But Also Following The Trend: The Slovak National Party, Tim Haughton, Marek Rybář, Kevin Deegan-Krause

Honors Scholarly Publications

Despite spells outside parliament, with its blend of nationalist and populist appeals the Slovak National Party (SNS) has been a prominent fixture on Slovakia’s political scene for three decades. Unlike some of the newer parties in Slovakia and across the region, partly as a product of the point of its (re-)creation, SNS has a comparable organizational density to most established parties in the country and has invested in party branches and recruiting members. Although ordinary members exercised some power and influence during the fissiparous era of the early 2000s, SNS has been notable for the role played by its leader …

Pinpointing Patterns Of Violence: A Comparative Genocide Studies Approach To Violence Escalation In The Ukrainian Holodomor, Kristina Hook

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

This article utilizes the case study of the 1930s Ukrainian Holodomor, an artificially induced famine under Joseph Stalin, to advance comparative genocide studies debates regarding the nature, onset, and prevention of large-scale violence. Fieldwide debates question how to 1) distinguish genocide from other forms of large-scale violence and 2) trace genocides as unfolding processes, rather than crescendoing events. To circumvent unproductive definitional arguments, methodologies that track large-scale violence according to numerically-based thresholds have substituted for dynamics-based analyses. Able to address aspects of the genocide puzzle, these methodologies struggle to incorporate cross-cultural contextual variation or elicit ripe moments for specific, real-time …

Space And Defense – Volume Twelve – Number Two – Summer 2021, Space And Defense Journal

Space and Defense

No abstract provided.

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 …

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 …

Book Review: Orthodox Revivalism In Russia: Driving Forces And Moral Quests, Walter Sawatsky

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

A review of Milana Benovska, Orthodox Revivalism in Russia: Driving Forces and Moral Quests, Routledge, 2021. 240pp. ISBN 9780367474201. Ebook $128.00

At God’S Service: Anatoly Dublyanski—A Metropolitan Of Western Europe And Paris Of The Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church In The Diaspora (1912–1997), Vladyslav Fulmes

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

A metropolitan of Western Europe and Paris, Anatoly Dublyansky, who was born in Volyn (Ukraine), was a prominent hierarch of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church (UAOC). Due to his intense activity, he considerably influenced the development of the culture of his native Volyn region, as well as the UAOC in Germany. After his emigration to Western Europe in 1944, he took an active role in the formation of church and religious life in Germany, and later devoted his life to the UAOC in the diaspora, having first become ordained to the priesthood, and, after the death of his wife, to …

Frontmatter Volume 41, No. 7, Paul B. Mojzes

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

COMMUNIST ATHEIST PROPAGANDA IN UKRAINE (1946-1991)

SLOVAKIA’S SENIOR CITIZEN HOLOCAUST SURVIVORS

PRISON CHAPLAINCY IN UKRAINE (1991-2021)

SACRALITY IN MODERN UKRAINIAN POETICS

AT GOD’S SERVICE: METROPOLITAN ANATOLY DUBLYANSKY BOOK REVIEWS

The Influence Of Atheist Propaganda Of The Communist Regime On The Lives Of Believers And Their Children (1946-1991), Oksana Vysoven, Nina Brehunets, Yuriy Figurnyi, Elena Zham

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article is devoted to the analysis of the antireligious policy of the Soviet government, which was carried out by the communist regime in Ukraine in the cultural and educational spheres to completely eradicate religion from the lives of the Soviet people. The main purpose of atheistic propaganda was to convince ordinary people that religion and its bearers were enemies of the communist state. Atheistic propaganda was carried out in the form of lectures on natural science and atheistic topics, atheistic evenings of questions and answers, and demonstrations of scientific and feature films. Punitive and repressive methods of atheistic propaganda …

The Club Of Senior Citizens Who Survived The Holocaust: A Case Study From Slovakia, Monika Vrzgulová

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

This paper chronicles the process of how an informal group of Holocaust survivors in Bratislava organized into a senior citizens club that gradually evolved into a source of civic activism directed at the majority of society. Based on qualitative research: repeated interviews with survivors in Bratislava about their experiences of the Holocaust and the Communist era, which the author has carried out from 1995 to the present. It also draws on other data acquired during discussions at the Senior Citizens Club (2005–2017) and active observations of the survivors as civic activists engaged in public discourse and educational events for the …

Book Review: Orthodox Christianity And The Politics Of Transition: Ukraine, Serbia And Georgia, Paul Crego

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

A review of Tornike Metreveli, Orthodox Christianity and the Politics of Transition: Ukraine, Serbia and Georgia. London and New York: Routledge. xii, 181 pages. ISBN: 978-0-367-42007-9 (hbk.)

Instrumentalizing The Past: The Politics Of Holocaust Memory In Contemporary Poland, Jonathan Zisook

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study investigates Poland’s politics of Holocaust memory from the contentious Jedwabne debate in the early 2000s through the present and shows how the history of the Holocaust has been both distorted and exploited in contemporary Polish politics and culture. It pays special attention to the most recent period of Law and Justice Party rule (2015-2020) and considers the varying ways that the government has constructed its approach to the past by asserting a “policy on history” (polityka historyczna) in state-sponsored research, the educational system, legislation, museum narratives, and more. In so doing, this work argues that the …

Frontmatter (Volume 41, Issue 6), Paul B. Mojzes

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

No abstract provided.

Space And Defense – Volume Twelve – Number One – Winter 2021, Space And Defense Journal

Space and Defense

No abstract provided.

Material Encounters: Making Memory Beyond The Mind, Ariel Wills

Masters Theses

Can acts of making carry the memories of our embeddedness within the world? This thesis explores how making things can nurture a sense of kinship that cuts across the organic and inorganic, erasing the distinction between living and dead, material and spiritual. Through handwork such as art-making, sewing, knitting, cooking, woodworking, and beyond, the burden of remembering and of archiving is shared across human and non-human bodies, cultivated through practices of making, and through the materials themselves. By recounting the stories of my family’s experience as Jewish immigrants in the United States, I aim to reveal how their domestic practices …

Book Review: Democratization In Christian Orthodox Europe: Comparing Greece, Serbia And Russia, Regina Elsner

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

A review of Marko Veković, Democratization in Christian Orthodox Europe: Comparing Greece, Serbia and Russia (New York & London, Routledge, 2020) 176 p. ISBN 9780367420833.

Dynamics Of The Religious Situation Changes And Attitudes Towards Religion In Ukraine, Igor Bogdanovskiy, Kateryna Nastoyashcha

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article analyzes the results of several sociological studies on the level and nature of religiosity in Ukraine. In particular, the paper deals with the study “State and Church in Ukraine 2019: the Results of the Year and Prospects for the Development of Relations,” conducted by the Razumkov Center with the support of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation Representation in Ukraine; the latest wave of the World Values Survey, conducted by the Info Sapiens company (in Ukraine it was conducted by the Center for Social Monitoring), etc. The statistical data were analyzed, particularly official reports on the network of churches and …

Use Of Invented Religions In Ukrainian Protest Movements Against Russian Orthodoxy 2018-2021, Vyacheslav Ageyev

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

Since 2018, three projects operating in the framework of “invented or parody religions” and aimed against the Russian Orthodox Church have arisen in Ukraine. The article describes their invention, practices, “belief systems,” political acts, and tries to predict whether any of these or similar projects have any future in predominantly conservative Christian Ukraine.

Religious Dimensions Of Anti-Trinitarianism In The Projection Of The Spiritual Progress Of Society, Oleh Sokolovskyi, Andrii Kobetyak

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article analyzes the ideological and cultural, structural and typological, ideological and doctrinal features of anti-Trinitarianism in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in the 16th and 17th centuries. The idea has been further developed that it is a religious phenomenon formed on the basis of deep value interactions between Western and Eastern Christianity, which has passed a difficult path of evolution and differs in the features of doctrinal-institutional content. The regularities of the origin, development, and preservation of anti-Trinitarian communities in modern Ukraine are substantiated.

Frontmatter (Volume 41, Issue 5), Paul B. Mojzes

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

No abstract provided.

Characteristics Of Growing Churches In Estonia: A Qualitative Study, Ago Lilleorg, Kaido Soom, TõNu Lehtsaar

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

This is an overview of the characteristics of growing churches in Estonia. The study is grounded in semi-structured interviews conducted in 2019-2020 in nine Protestant congregations that have grown in 2003-2017. There were three to four interviewees from each congregation, a total of 14 being women and 18 men. The transcripts of the interviews were analyzed by combining both the open and the invivo coding model. No prescribed categories were used in the analysis. The results were formulated as characteristics of growing churches: spiritual life; inner climate; human focus; the minister of the church; relationships outside the church; and a …

Book Review (In Lieu Of A Belated Memorial): Ecumenical Adventure [Shapers Of Ecumenical Theology Series 2], Angela Ilić, Luka Ilić

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

A review of Charles C. West, Ecumenical Adventure [Shapers of Ecumenical Theology Series 2]. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2019, 158 pages. ISBN: 978–1–5064–4934–0

Us Military Policy In Poland And The Baltics: To Stay Or Not To Stay, Owen Bates

Sigma: Journal of Political and International Studies

No abstract provided.

Economic Ethics Of Ukrainian Protestants As A Means Of Stabilization Of Economic Processes, Liudmyla Shtanko

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article considers the influence of Protestant business with its inherent business ethics, attitude to work, "labor ethics" on economic processes in Ukraine. It is noted that although Ukraine does not belong to a group of Protestant countries; Protestants take a very active position in addressing many issues of social orientation. This paper describes the activity of Protestants in various fields of public life in Ukraine, including science, education, health, legal, and social spheres. Protestant businessmen have formed a Protestant business environment, which can include enterprises and organizations founded by Protestants and the influence of the founders on the concept …