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"Much speculation was raised in the 1990s, during the first decade of Internet research, about the extent to which online platforms and digital culture might challenge traditional understandings of authority, especially in religious contexts. Digital Creatives and the Rethinking of Religious Authority explores the ways in which religiously-inspired digital media experts and influencers online challenge established religious leaders and those who seek to maintain institutional structures in a world where online and offline religious spaces are increasingly intertwined. In the twenty-first century, the question of how digital culture may be re-shaping notions of whom or what constitutes authority is incredibly important. Questions asked include: Who truly holds religious power and influence in an age of digital media? Is it recognized religious leaders and institutions? Religious digital innovators? Or digital media users? What sources, processes and/or structures can and should be considered authoritative online, and offline? Who is really in control of religious technological innovation? This book reflects on how digital media simultaneously challenges and empowers new and traditional forms of religious authority. It is a gripping read for those with an interest in Communication, Culture Studies, Media Studies, Religion/Religious Studies, Sociology of Religion, Computer-mediated Communication, and Internet/Digital Culture Studies"--

This book offers a variety of positions on how technology is influencing religious communal and cultural life. There is no doubt that our interaction with technology will shape the human community up ahead. These essays provide a basis for thoughtful choice and action.

The Chinese and Russian Communists, as Marxist-Leninists, are fundamentally hostile towards religion, and are committed to its ultimate eradication. Although their attitudes towards religion are similar, their prescriptions for dealing with it are different. In essence, this difference arises from two divergent conceptions, one optimistic, the other pessimistic, regarding the progress of religion towards oblivion in a situation where the Communist Party has assumed leadership and where the "social" roots of religion have supposedly disappeared. The Chinese hold the optimistic view, a position which may be explained in part by the fact that institutional religion has traditionally been weak in China. I quote here C. K. Yang's description of institutional religion in China as it emerged in the modern period:As an organised body, modern institutional religion had a very small priesthood, divided into minute units of two or three priests each, largely unconnected with each other. It had barely enough financial resources for subsistence for this scanty personnel. It was deprived of the support of an organised laity. … It did not participate in various organised aspects of community life such as charity, education, and the enforcement of moral discipline. There was no powerful centralised priesthood to dominate religious life or to direct operation of the secular social institutions.

Timothy Samuel Shah, Thomas F. Farr, and Jack Friedman's volume, 'Religious Freedom and Gay Rights' brings together some of the world's leading thinkers on religion, morality, politics, and law to analyze the emerging tensions between religious freedom and gay rights in three key geographic regions: the United States, the United Kingdom, and continental Europe

Exploring what he calls 'the moral horror that is severe poverty,' Bharat Ranganathan develops a demanding account of the obligations that affluent people have to assist severely impoverished people. He argues that this is an immediate ethical as much as a social or structural imperative. Noting that developmental economists and moral and political philosophers have focused on wealth inequalities in increasingly sophisticated ways, Ranganathan observes that - within religious ethics - normative issues around severe poverty have nevertheless received insufficient attention. Bringing together general moral, religious, and philosophical principles with particular economic, social, and political realities, and engaging constructively with the writings of John Rawls and Peter Singer, this passionately argued book boldly challenges deleterious trends within ethics by unpacking, in a much more systematic way than hitherto, the pressing dilemmas around acute impoverishment. It will find an eager readership among scholars of religion, ethics, developmental studies, and theology.

New Media and Religious Transformations in Africa casts a critical look at Africa's rapidly evolving religious media scene. Following political liberalization, media deregulation, and the proliferation of new media technologies, many African religious leaders and activists have appropriated such media to strengthen and expand their communities and gain public recognition. Media have also been used to marginalize and restrict the activities of other groups, which has sometimes led to tension, conflict, and even violence. Showing how media are rarely neutral vehicles of expression, the contribut

The relationship of ethics to international politics -- Just war and jihad -- Just peacemaking theory -- Religion, morality, and international politics -- On speaking to Hezbollah and a Jewish settler -- War and wisdom from Islam and Christianity -- Reflections on the role of violence -- Response to terrorism and the war in Iraq

"This multi-authored book explores the ways that many influential ethical traditions - secular and religious, Western and non-Western - wrestle with the moral dimensions of poverty and the needs of the poor. These traditions include Buddhism, Christianity, Confucianism, Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism, among the religious perspectives; classical liberalism, feminism, liberal-egalitarianism, and Marxism, among the secular; and natural law, which might be claimed by both. The basic questions addressed by each of these traditions are linked to several overarching themes: what poverty is, the particular vulnerabilities of high-risk groups, responsibility for the occurrence of poverty, preferred remedies, how responsibility for its alleviation is distributed, and priorities in the delivery of assistance. This volume features an introduction to the types, scope, and causes of poverty in the modern world and concludes with Michael Walzer's broadly conceived commentary, which provides a direct comparison of the presented views and makes suggestions for further study and policy"--Provided by publisher

During the last decades the world has been facing tremendous political transformations and new risks: epidemics such as HIV/Aids have had a destabilizing effect on the caretaking role of kin; in post-socialist countries political reforms have made unemployment a new source of insecurity. Furthermore, the state's withdrawal from providing social security is taking place throughout the world. One response to these developments has been increased migration, which poses further challenges to kinship-based social support systems. This volume focuses on the ambiguous role of religious networks as providers of social security