"The volume begins with a general overview of faith-based peacebuilding by pastor and peace-practitioner David Steele. Several CRS staff members provided input on the early drafts [...] The case studies that follow all deal with initiatives involving Catholic actors. This is the tradition out of whi
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ch CRS functions, and within which it learns. However, CRS and its church partners frequently and intentionally act in tandem with other civil society organizations, and they cooperate with other faith-based actors. Two of the case studies in this work (one from Uganda and one from The Philippines) deal with inter-religious efforts, while a third (India) deals with a broad ecumenical effort among leaders and members of diverse Christian denominations. In addition, many cases demonstrate how church partners are able to engage key decision-makers and leaders at different levels of society at critical moments in the course of a conflict. The central learning question for all the case studies is “what are the key factors that have contributed to, or impeded, the effectiveness of church peacebuilding action?” The intent is to surface lessons while helping to develop an internal, disciplined habit of reflection within the organization. The general guidelines for writing the studies emphasize four good learning practices: a) linking interventions to the context, b) articulating the implicit and explicit hypotheses or “theories of change,” c) using, building upon and/or complementing evaluation, and d) recognizing potential rival explanations for why things happened. It should be clear that the cases are exemplary, not representative. They provide a small sampling of the peacebuilding activities conducted by CRS and its partners in recent years. Each CRS region freely determined which particular case it would bring to the undertaking. Adherence to the initial qualifying criteria — including engagement with external actors (civil society, government or inter-religious) and commitments to social cohesion or equity — varied considerably." (Introduction, page 3-4)
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"The communication dimension of Interreligious Dialogue has never been especially addressed and studied. Because of this the FABC Office of Social Communication organized the fifth Bishops' Institute for Social Communication (BISCOM V) in Bali, Indonesia from November 22 to 27, 2005 under the theme,
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Interreligious Dialogue As Communication. The theme was approached in four steps: First, we had an overview about Interreligious Dialogue from the Vatican and FABC perspective. This was followed in a second step by Interreligious Dialogue experiences from different Asian countries. Third, was a discussion of the use of modern means of communication for Interreligious Dialogue. And the fourth was an attempt to understand social communication in different Asian religions. The understanding of social communication follows the approach of Vatican II's Inter Mirifica, where this expression is proposed since the concern of the Church goes beyond mass media, audiovisual means, media of diffusion or other similar expressions. This understanding pertains to the communication of and in human society which includes all means and ways of communicating between people. Such an understanding is essential also for Interreligious Dialogue which very often happens between individuals and persons or smaller groups of people in many different ways - verbal and non-verbal, in action and in silence, through drama and dance." (Publisher description)
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"Interreligious dialogue schemes based upon different faith traditions exist; however, to chose one scheme over another can generate religious tensions, possible accusations of bias and even event-cumreligion snubbing. One way of circumventing this potential problem is to adopt a generic, non-sectar
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ian model based upon human communication science. The critical literature was reviewed and Taylor et al. 's (1977) classic transactional communication model (TCM) was explicated. This eight-element model comprising of (1) Source, (2) Stimulus, (3) Receiver, (4) Sensory Receptors, (5) Interpretation/Response, (6) Noise, (7) Feedback and (8) Situation/Context was applied to a hypothetical bi-lateral dialogue to demonstrate its methodological viability. This scientific (re)conceptualisation of dialoguing redefined its constitutive elements, provided new insights into the theoretical foundations of the enterprise, and highlighted important praxis requirements for the design, organisation and running of future events." (Abstract)
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