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Abstract
Highlighting the transformed landscape of political communities in the twenty-first century, I reexamine the discourse of civil religion (DCR). Widely recognized in religious studies and notably in American history, this concept reveals a subtle yet intricately functional framework of community consciousness within political entities. This article posits that the prevalent interpretation of civil religion, and its application across diverse contexts, falls short of effectively reflecting and utilizing the essence identified by Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Robert Bellah—classical and modern architects of civil religion, respectively. Many discussions of DCR often disregard the role of the traditional sense of religion and religiousness. Instead, they fixate on superficial symbols and rituals associated with secular institutional bodies and communities. In this article, I contend that reintegrating the ordinary sense of religion into the discourse is crucial for envisioning and constructing a new community consciousness capable of adeptly responding to the burgeoning demands of our highly multicultural world. Following the conceptual roadmap of civil religion, which seeks transcendent, sacred, and unifying narratives, symbols, and rituals, I introduce a new model termed Interfaith, Cosmopolitan Civil Religion (ICCR). Within this model, ordinary religious agents, through interfaith engagement, assume positive roles in nurturing a broader sense of community and unity.

This article tackles the problem of religious radicalism. Religious radicalism is here interpreted as a protest against the pathology of secularism characterized by the privatization of religion. The privatization of religion is a process in which religion is regarded as an irrational and personal element, so that it cannot play a public role. In order to meet the pathology of privatization, this article offers the paradigm of post-secularism as proposed by Juergen Habermas that opens up the possibility for religion to actively participate in the public sphere. Furthermore, this writing argues that in post-secular society characterized by the public role of religion, it is essential to build a democratic and rational dialogue between religion and philosophy, faith and reason. A bridge that connects both is public reason. This article also shows that the post-secular condition opens up opportunities for theology to promote tolerance in a pluralistic society and to strengthen the public engagement of religion. This can avoid reducing religion to private piety without public responsibility while promoting the public engagement in religion in order to liberate the marginalized and oppressed.

This article places the British material on religion and social policy in a comparative perspective. In order to do so, it introduces a recently completed project on welfare and religion in eight European societies, entitled 'Welfare and Religion in a European Perspective'. Theoretically it draws on the work of two key thinkers: Gøsta Esping-Andersen and David Martin. The third section elaborates the argument: all West European societies are faced with the same dilemmas regarding the provision of welfare and all of them are considering alternatives to the state for the effective delivery of services. These alternatives include the churches.

In verschiedenen Medienformaten wird heutzutage durch kommerzielle Absatzstrategien unterschwellig "Unsichtbare Religion" kultiviert. In der Dissertation werden vor allem die von Kindern und Jugendlichen genutzten Medienformate untersucht und interdisziplinär aus der Soziologie, der Psychologie und dem Marketing aufgezeigt, wie "Unsichtbare Religion" konstituiert und initiiert werden kann. Um dies nachzuweisen, werden aus kunst- und medienwissenschaftlicher Sicht die hierzu benötigten grundlegenden Codes der Bilddeutung herangezogen. Der Verfasser entwickelt ein Deutungsmodell des Subliminalen Marketings, mit dessen Hilfe die interdisziplinären Erkenntnisse integriert und verschiedene Medienformate quantitativ und qualitativ inhaltsanalytisch analysiert werden. Es zeigt sich dabei, dass in der Stichprobe weit über die Hälfte der Medieninhalte transzendente Elemente beinhalten und ebenso in welcher Weise diese die "Unsichtbare Religion" bedingen. In Bezug auf mögliche Konsequenzen dieses Verfahrens ist besonders bedenkenswert die subliminale Konditionierung durch religiöse Wirkmechanismen und die Verherrlichung der Gewalt und Brutalität in Computerspielen, die unter anderem mittels der Anwendung des überweltlichen Lichtes konstituiert wird. Durch menschenrechtliche und pädagogische Bezüge wird ein Medienbildungskonzept begründet und in Aufklärungsinterventionen, die an Schulen durchgeführt wurden, tentativ erprobt und dokumentiert.

In Between Philosophy and Religion Volumes I and II, Brayton Polka examines Spinoza's three major works_on religion, politics, and ethics_in order to show that his thought is at once biblical and modern. This book and its companion volume will be essential reading for any scholar of Spinoza

AbstractWe present four modes of public religion—secularist, generalist pluralist, particularist pluralist, and exclusivist—and discuss conditions under which white evangelicals employ these different modes. Ethnographic research on white evangelicals participating in multifaith initiatives in Los Angeles, Portland, Boston, and Atlanta indicates that they prefer the secularist mode that avoids religious expression. In addition, the research indicates that when white evangelicals do participate in multifaith contexts where religious expression is encouraged, they prefer the particularist mode that uses faith-specific language rather than the generalist mode that invokes interfaith language. Quantitative data from a national study of community organizing organizations confirms that white evangelicals are more likely to participate in multifaith initiatives that operate in the secularist rather than a religious mode of public engagement. We anticipate that our analytic typology describing four modes of public religion will be valuable for future studies that examine the public engagement of religious actors.

This article explores the nature and formation of African-derived religions in Brazil and their importance for Black people's unity and resistance against historical denial and social exclusion. The history of the diversity, development, and leadership of these religions is traced succinctly. For centuries, they have been subject to racist stereotyping and police persecution. Today, although religious freedom is professed to be a constitutional right, persecution continues in the aggressive anti-African activity of evangelist Christian sects, often with the support of mass communications media. African religions come from two major cradles of civilization: the Congo and the Gulf of Guinea. Central African cultural heritage imprints a strong ancestral tone to contemporary African religions in Brazil, whereas the West African matrix has shaped their liturgical and visual presentation and given them intermediary deities. African religious communities have been a major agent of resistance and social cohesion.

Half title page -- Frontispiece -- Full title page -- Copyright page -- Contents -- List of Tables and List of Figures -- Foreword -- Preface -- Orthography and Pronunciation -- Chapter 1: The Historical and Intellectual Background -- Chapter 2: The Temiars and their Religion -- Chapter 3: Temiar Religion (1967)-- Preface and Introduction -- Chapter 4: Temiar Religion (1967)--The Cosmos -- Chapter 5: Temiar Religion (1967)--Species -- Chapter 6: Temiar Religion (1967)--Souls -- Chapter 7: Temiar Religion (1967)--Spirit-mediumship -- Chapter 8: Temiar Religion (1967)--Theology -- Chapter 9: Field-report Correspondence with Edmund Leach -- Chapter 10: Temiar Mediumship in Context -- Chapter 11: Indigenous Religious Systems of the Malay Peninsula -- Chapter 12: Danger and Dialectic in Temiar Childhood -- Chapter 13: Rationalisation and Re-enchantment: Temiar Religion, 1964-94 -- Chapter 14: Temiar Religions, 1994-2012: Islam, Christianity, ʔalʉj Səlamad -- Afterword -- Appendix 1: Four accounts of H.D. Noone's work on Temiar Religion -- Appendix 2: Dance types and spirit-guide song genres -- Appendix 3: Further accounts of burial practices -- Appendix 4: Children's accounts of their dreams -- Bibliography -- Index.

The new senate of the empire and religion -- Religious groups among senators -- The dynamics of senatorial religion in Rome and Italy -- Representing imperial religion : the provinces -- Towards a "theology" of Roman religion -- Innovations and aspirations -- Conclusion: Two saecular games

"Religion" has retaken a front seat in the news. Its presence in the media is echoed in the concerns of policymakers, whence it is more strongly felt again in the thinking and writing of social scientists. Concerning religion, "resurgence" is a word that shows up in many a social science title of late. For scholars such as sociologist Rodney Stark, this language is merely further evidence of a deep-seated secularist inattention in the social sciences: religion has never been absent from human affairs, it just hasn't been of interest to prejudiced scholars. "Pluralism, not secularism, is the dominant trend in an 'age of explosive, pervasive religiosity,'" argues former secularization theorist Peter Berger in the title words of his 2006 article. The three books under consideration here do not share directly in either of these arguments. Nor do any make a claim for "resurgence," though each author acknowledges some version of the secularization myth and its dismantling in developments and events of the recent past, and each knowingly writes in that context (Benne, 2–6; Buruma, 1–3; Beiner, xiv n11, 4–5, 312).

When a person defines his or her own identity, religious belief is a powerful, decisive factor. Throughout history, religion has often been a source of conflict. This article will show how religious communities can promote a peace process and how religion can be part of a peaceful solution.

Religion and liberty are often thought to be mutual enemies: if religion has a natural ally, it is authoritarianism--not republicanism or democracy. But in this book, Maurizio Viroli, a leading historian of republican political thought, challenges this conventional wisdom. He argues that political emancipation and the defense of political liberty have always required the self-sacrifice of people with religious sentiments and a religious devotion to liberty. This is particularly the case when liberty is threatened by authoritarianism: the staunchest defenders of liberty are those who feel a de