"Despite the wide-ranging topics presented in this collection, this volume takes ‘communication’ as the keyword for the various research and reflections on the life and mission of the Catholic Church during the COVID-19 pandemic as well as post-crisis. The reader will readily recognize that what
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is referred to as ‘communication’ here is an extremely elastic and multi-dimensional category. Within the context of the Church, particularly as discussed in this book, communication refers to words and images that the Church transmits to the faithful and to the world to help the people cope with issues brought about by the crisis. This communication helps contextualize these dramatic events in sound theological principles which need to again and again be creatively restated and reaffirmed with every human happening, both big and small, that takes place. Second, communication also refers to pastoral and evangelizing actions carried out by the Church and its members to sustain the life of the Church amid the grave situation of imposed isolation, pastors and members of the flock succumbing to COVID-19, shuttered church doors, and unlit altar candles. Third, communication refers to the models and strategies by the Church and its leaders to employ technological means to promote ecclesial communion, nourish the faith life of the people, and to dialogue with individuals and groups to create a truly synodal Church. Finally, communication also refers to ways that the Church discerns and engages with the signs of the times in order to transform raw experiences into valuable lessons, human suffering into salvific grace, and pandemic isolation and division into greater post-pandemic interculturality, interdependence, and collaboration." (Introduction, page xx-xxi)
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"Indonesia is religious diverse with six recognized religions and hundreds of registered religions, which contributes to rich beliefs, but also has potential for religiously based conflicts. There have been an increase in religiously motivated violent incidents such as terrorism, radicalism cases fr
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om year to year in some areas of Indonesia, illustrating that intolerance, irrespectiveness, and extremism exist. Studies have shown that interreligious dialogue can decrease fear, suspicion, and prevent misunderstanding. This paper introduces an interreligious dialogue tool “Peace Journey›› as an educative game that can increase its participants’ knowledge about religious diversity in Indonesia, as well as promote them with tolerance, respect, and peace." (Abstract)
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"In the emerging fields of religious and interreligious peacebuilding, the question of monitoring and evaluation is a challenging, yet necessary process. The need to develop comprehensive yet fitting evaluation models for religious and interreligious peacebuilding is not only important for donor int
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erests, but also critical as a means of documenting and learning for peacebuilders themselves. Theories and best practices in monitoring and evaluation have become prevalent in many fields, yet the amount of literature on evaluating intercultural and, especially, religious and interreligious projects remains scant in comparison. This volume offers a unique contribution that not only looks at several of the challenges and implications faced by religious and interreligious peacebuilders but also provides concrete examples of new models and tools for monitoring and evaluating religious and interreligious peacebuilding projects. In doing so, this volume serves as a tool and point of reference for individuals and organizations developing and implementing interreligious dialogue and peacebuilding projects." (Publisher description)
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"The tension between the two historical realities, Hinduism as an ancient Indian religion and Christianity as a religion associated with foreign power and colonialism, continues to animate Hindu-Christian relations today. On the one hand, The Routledge Handbook of Hindu-Christian Relations describes
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a rich history of amicable, productive, even sometimes syncretic Hindu-Christian encounters. On the other, this handbook equally attends to historical and contemporary moments of tension, conflict, and violence between Hindus and Christians. Comprising thirty-nine chapters by a team of international contributors, this handbook is divided into seven parts: theoretical and methodological considerations; historical interactions, contemporary exchanges; sites of bodily and material interactions; significant figures; comparative theologies; responses. The handbook explores: how the study of Hindu–Christian relations has been and ought to be done, the history of Hindu–Christian relations through key interactions, ethnographic reflections on current dynamics of Hindu–Christian exchange, important key thinkers, and topics in comparative theology, ultimately providing a framework for further debates in the area." (Publisher description)
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"The existing classifications of types of interreligious dialogue have limitations and shortcomings and do not allow us to describe this extremely complex, multi-faceted phenomenon in a systematic and complete way. The article presents an original classification of interreligious dialogue that provi
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des a more sophisticated tool for analyzing this phenomenon. On the basis of the “intention” criterion, i.e. the motivation that encourages followers of different religions to come into contact with each other, four major types of interreligious dialogue are “polemical,” “cognitive,” “peacemaking,” and “partnership”. These types of dialogue are lined up respectively around the following questions: “Who is right?”, “Who are you?”, “How can we live together peacefully?” and “What can we do to improve the world?” Using the criteria goal (tasks headed towards by the participants in the dialogue); principles (starting points which determine the interaction), and form (participants in the dialogue), various kinds of dialogue within each of the four types are identified and described. Presented classifications provide an approach that can be useful for analyzing various kinds of interreligious dialogue." (Abstract)
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"Religious pluralisation entails interreligious contacts of different kinds and at various levels. At the same time, an increasing mediatisation affects the perception of and encounter with other religious traditions and their adherents. These relations between interreligious contact and media have
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not yet been subject to extended research from the study of religion perspective. This issue wants to fill this gap by presenting different case studies and systematising considerations on constellations of interreligious contact/dialogue/encounter and media: specifically (a) the influence of mediated discourses on interreligious contact, (b) media extensions of local and global interreligious dialogue, and (c) the digital – and especially social – media as a platform for interreligious dialogue or encounter. This introduction gives an overview on concepts, questions and topics of this field of research, drawing on the case studies within this special issue." (Abstract)
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"In recent years, various forms of multifaith spaces have been emerging in Germany which include so-called Rooms of Silence in hospitals or educational institutions as well as Gardens of Religions. So far, empirical research on these spaces has focused on their establishment or their functions withi
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n the surrounding organisations. In this article we will put a focus on the ‘user experience’ of multifaith spaces based on an analysis of guestbooks. These books are a unique source of data for a qualitative in-depth analysis as they offer an opportunity for visitors for commentary including religious references and speech acts. Drawing on two case studies from a Room of Silence within a hospital and a Garden of Religions, we investigate how users experience and appropriate multifaith spaces and how guestbooks may become media of (inter-) religious contact." (Abstract)
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"This article discusses greeting messages as a genre of interreligious communication. Greeting messages are defined as official communication issued by religious institutions and addressed to the members of another religious community on the occasion of specific feast days or anniversaries. Drawing
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on the insights of politolinguistic analysis, this article treats these messages primarily as a form of public diplomacy. The case study analyses the messages issued on the occasion of the Hindu festival Diwali/Deepavali by the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue and World Council of Churches between 2015 and 2017. Distributed through the social media and posted on the institutional websites, the Diwali messages seek to speak as a Christian voice to all Hindus. Beyond the official addressee, the messages also potentially face the scrutiny of the global public sphere, especially an internal Christian readership. This article analyses what language strategies are used to deal with these varied demands." (Abstract)
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"Research on interreligious dialogue mostly focuses on face-to-face meetings, however, it also takes place in other contexts. Among them is the huge space of interactive media, where adherents of different religious traditions meet, e.g., in interreligious groups on Facebook, boards or commentary se
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ctions – but so far little has been researched on this field. The article is an explorative attempt to sort the field of interreligious dialogue and encounter in social media, drawing on a comparative perspective on the field of offline interreligious dialogue. For this purpose, it first gives a systematizing overview of the existing research on interreligious encounter in social media as well as on (offline) interreligious dialogue, identifying key questions and issues on interreligious encounter. Examples from different social media platforms then allow conclusions about commonalities and differences between online and offline interreligious encounter and suggest crucial aspects to follow up on in future research on this field." (Abstract)
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"The internet has been conceptualized as a public sphere in which constructive dialogues – such as inter-religious dialogues – can occur. Public spheres, however, require reason, reflectivity and sincerity rarely found in most web spaces. Therefore, this approach might be counterproductive. Inst
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ead, I suggest we consider online communication as a Foucauldian discourse, a site of struggle, in which norms and concepts are negotiated. This chapter considers a few theoretical frameworks that allow researchers to critically survey online inter-religious dialogue. Four case studies are then reviewed in light of these theoretical considerations. The chapter argues that online discourses need to be examined by paying attention to the technological affordances, the social and cultural context, and the linguistic strategies employed. It is suggested that, for interreligious dialogue to happen, it needs to carve out a space within this online media that is dedicated to contemplation and openness." (Abstract)
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"Interreligious dialogues have received attention since they were introduced as a security policy and social pacification measure after the attack on 9/11. This essay examines the development of interreligious dialogue in Germany as well as the influence of media discourses on interreligious dialogu
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e and asks to what extent they affect the motives, goals and modes of communication of both Muslim and non-Muslim participants. This analysis leads to the thesis that the mass media’s frequent security-policy framing of Islam within issues of integration, violence, and threat has developed interreligious dialogue groups as a space of face-to-face coping processes with the imagined religious conflict. Muslims attend it in order to put Islam in a different and positive frame. For the Christian participants this also presents the opportunity to reach a new relevance of religion in the public secular space." (Abstract)
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"While the first chapter looks at the existing constitutional and legal provisions for the exercise of freedom of religion and religious plurality, the other four chapters reflect upon some of the key sites of religious interface and syncretism that promote inter-religious understanding and pluralit
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y, analysis of the post-war context that has seen a marked increase in religiously motivated violence as well as existing opportunities and challenges for practice of religious freedom, examples of national and local level efforts and activities promoting religious plurality, and social media as a platform to engender religious plurality. We hope that the trained journalists will use this booklet as a guide in their new pursuits of improving the focus and coverage of religious freedom and religious plurality." (Introduction)
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"This paper proposes that Asian religions can address the challenges of the post-truth mindset by resorting to powerful images within their traditions to communicate within and across traditions in order to promote religious unity and harmony. It asserts that the images employed by Jesus to refer to
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himself, namely, the Way, the Truth, and the Life are images that hold not only rich spiritual significance for Christians but can also resonate deeply with the Asian religious and spiritual outlook. These images may be explored by religious traditions in their own particular contexts and communicated to adherents (intrareligious communication). These images can also serve as the foundation upon which Asian religions can enter into dialogue with one another to build mutual understanding and collaboration (interreligious communication). The thesis is when Asian religions are able to employ shared images to communicate within and across religious traditions, they are able to reaffirm the important role of religion/spirituality in the present social milieu, at the same time resist the negative impact brought about by trends of thought that seek to degrade and relativize religious and spiritual truths." (Abstract)
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"This Guide aims to help practitioners make sense of monitoring and evaluation as applied to inter-religious action in peacebuilding. It aims to support good practice among people who are involved in commissioning or contributing to such efforts, whether they be religious, secular or a combination o
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f both, to maximize peacebuilding learning and effectiveness. Therefore, the audience for this Guide is anyone who is involved in the design, monitoring or evaluation of inter-religious peacebuilding programs or initiatives. These users include interreligious peacebuilders, evaluators, practitioners, and leaders who are tasked with commissioning an evaluation or who are managing learning and evaluation processes, as well as donors (public and private) who are involved in funding and evaluating inter-religious action for peacebuilding. Thus, a wide range of people and organizations might make use of this Guide. Throughout the Guide, we indicate which sections might be most useful for which audiences. For purposes of simplicity, we will flag sections for three (overlapping!) overall categories of users: Inter-religious peacebuilding implementers; Internal project managers or monitoring and evaluation specialists; External evaluators." (Pages 5-6)
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"With 13 religions, 8061 religious centers, 2 million of young people, Catalonia accommodates a wide range of religions. Almost 90% of people own digital devices. In this framework, we aim to study the consumption of digital media by Catalan millennials from all over the region, with only young peop
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le from the city of Barcelona being excluded for the purpose of analysis in future projects. Religious apps, games, websites, online communities and participation in forums are some of the main issues we want to explore. We also aim to establish whether or not these devices contribute to consolidate online religious communities and to achieve inter-religious dialogue. For fulfilling this goal, we surveyed more than 1800 young people aged 12–18 years. Methodology also included in-depth interviews with coordinators from youth organizations and netnography. This research is based on previous investigations into communication, digital media, sociology and religion by authors such as Campbell, Elzo, Leurs and Hemming." (Abstract)
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"L’arrivée d’Internet provoque des évolutions dans le rapport aux médias des communautés religieuses. Il y a une volonté de visibilité externe grâce à l’usage d’Internet comme moyen de communication et comme mode de présence. À partir de l’exemple de l’Union fraternelle des cro
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yants de Dori au Burkina Faso, cette contribution analyse l’appropriation d’Internet par des acteurs interreligieux pour sortir de leur isolement et de jouer le rôle d’agents religieux de paix dans le monde. Le cas de l’UFC montre que si les religieux se saisissent du web, l’interreligieux peut être mobilisé pour promouvoir des objectifs sociaux et politiques dans les sphères publiques africaines." (Résumé)
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"The book is divided into five sections: 1. Community Empowerment and Sustainable Development; 2. Hate speech and Incitement; 3. Radicalization and Extremism; 4. Human Rights and Gender Equality; 5. Inter-religious and Intercultural Discourses in the media. Articles submitted are linked to one of th
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e sub-themes above in the context of media and information literacy. Special attention has been given to the intercultural dimensions of these areas. Papers involve an effort to engage the reader to understand media and information literacy beyond their home country or professional area of competence." (Page 16)
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