Suchergebnisse

Der Autor behandelt nach dem dahinter stehenden Staatsbegriff und mit Blick auf das Verhältnis von Staat und Gesellschaft nacheinander repräsentative Demokratie, Theokratie und die Totalitarismen des 20. Jahrhunderts. Diese sämtlichen, von ihm abgelehnten Staatsformen sieht der Autor durch Wurzeln im christlichen Mittelalter und durch den ihnen gemeinsamen in die Gesellschaft expandierten modernen Staat verbunden. In seiner fundamentalen Systemkritik hält er dem das Bild von einem islamischen politischen System entgegen, das auf der Autonomie der Religionsgemeinschaften - darunter zählt er u.a. auch Atheisten - im weltlichen Bereich aufbaut und auf einer Art direkter Teilhabe des einzelnen ohne Parteienpluralismus. So werde die Gesellschaft (bezeichnet mit dem Koranbegriff der "umma") gestärkt gegen den im nichtislamischen Bereich zum Selbstzweck gewordenen modernen Staat. Eine Staatsreligion soll es nicht geben. Unklar bleiben Mechanismen zur Lösung möglicher Konflikte zwischen den Religions- und Rechtsgemeinschaften und die Frage nach der Umsetzung der (S. 138) postulierten Überlassung von Gesetzgebung, Erziehung, Wirtschaft, Gesundheitswesen und Wissenschaft an eine nicht näher definierte Zivilgesellschaft. Die hier formulierte islamische politische Philosophie und Staatstheorie haben bei dem mit der vorliegenden Übersetzung anvisierten Zielpublikum der muslimisch-bosniakischen Volksgruppe in Bosnien-Herzegowina bis dato kaum Widerhall gefunden, wie das Vorwort bedauernd hervorhebt. (SOI-Clw)

The author discusses the works by Croatian and foreign theologians and historians (Ivo Pilar, Alois Hudal, Janko Simrak, Krunoslav Draganovic, Fran Grivec and Dragutin Nezic) about the Serbian Orthodox Church which appeared in the inter-war period. These authors posed a series of questions which are still open for debate today. Pilar describes the Serbian Orthodox Church as an institution which has an important role in the process of Serbian national integration. Hudal analyzes the reasons for the decline of Catholicism in the Balkans, discussing the negative consequences which befell the Roman Catholic Church in the Yugoslav Monarchy, which supported the expansion of the Serbian Orthodox Church. The works of Simrak, Nezic, and Draganovic deal with the complex process of attempting a union between the Roman Catholic Church and orthodox Christians. The author mentions that these writers and their works are not well known to the Croatian public, and that only during the 1980s was more intensive research undertaken by Croatian academics on the topic of the political and cultural activity of the Serbian Orthodox Church. The author concludes the article by suggesting that these works by Croatian and foreign historians and theologians can serve as the basis for further research on this topic. (SOI : CSP: S. 573f.)

While the author is impressed by Cornwell's style and presentation, he is appaled by the lack of seriousness exhibited by the author who writes about an imprtant subject (not broached for the first time, by any means) and by demonstrated inability to supress his preconceived notions and even prejudices. Cornwell relies heavily on Owen Chadwick, which assures that he mentions most important facts about the involvement of the Cardinal and Pope Pius XII (whom Cornwell systematicaly entitles by his family name. Pacelli) in contemporary politics, but he bends and ignores Chadwick's research when he makes his judgment about the Pope. Cornwell's treatment of the Catholic Church in the Independent State of Croatia (he gives it an entrie chapter) is a traversy of research and objective writing. His main source. if not the only, for the presentation of the Church in Croatia during the World War II is the 35 years old book by Carlo Falconi. Cornwell perhaps did not know , but he could have and must have been informed, that Falconi wrote his piece on the basis of the propagandistic material given to him by the Yugos]av secrete service and propagandists, which served the purpose of anti-Chatolic propaganda in Yugoslavia. A well intended reader could excuse Cornwell (he does not read Croatian and could not know what some authors wrote about Falconi's sources at the time his book appeared), if he did not point those "Croatian materials" as essential not only for the condemnation of the Croatian Catholic episcopate, but for Pius XII as well. (SOI : CSP: S. 190)

Contrary to the presuppositions of historiography in former Yugoslavia, the author argues that one of the greatest problems in the relationship between Church and State in the NDH was the issue of conversions. The Catholic Church stood firmly on the principle that no one can be admitted into the Church unless he or she demands admittance free of all pressures and interferences. Likewise, the Church disagreed with the government that it can meddle in the area of conversions, the terrain the Church considered exclusively its own. Bishop Jerome Mileta of Sibenik Diocese is one of the most illustrative examples of that attitude of the Church. The author brings forth for the first time documents which shed new light on the issue of "conversions" in that diocese. (SOI : CSP: S. 248) + The question of religious conversions has always been a thorny issue in the Balkan territory, because it is often confused with the issue of nationality. The problem of religious conversions in the Independent State of Croatia (NDH) (1941-1945) was no exception. Soon after its foundation, the newly established government issued laws, which abolished existing ones pertaining to religious conversions and allowed conversions to one of the "legally recognized religions". Even though it is not explicitely mentioned, the aim of the law was to allow "conversions" of the Orthodox to Protestantism, Islam or Catholicism, since the government believed that the traditionally strong opposition to the Croatian state of that segment of the population greatly depended on the influence of the Serbian Orthodox Church on it

According to Luhmann, religion transforms the indefinable/undefined into the definable/defined complexity, thus outlining the problems of the whole society. Due to this function, religion remams bound to the level of the entirety of a social system. Nevertheless, in time, in the course of the functional differentiation of society, different sub-systems have been created for different tasks (economy, science, politics, education, etc.) and religion has been accorded the status of one such system. Besides distinguishing among various subsystems, this process implies the separation of diverse task-areas within the religious system itself. By and by, within the Christian religion, three functionally differentiated spheres have emerged which Luhmann labels as a) the church, i.e. the entirety of spiritual communication in which the function of the system of religion is fulfilled for the whole social system; b) Diaconate (Diakonie), which performs the system's tasks towards other social sub-systems (these tasks, in line with the theory of systems, may be termed services -Leistungen) as well as towards personal systems (in line with the theory of systems they may be termed pastoral - Seelsorge); and c) theology (Theologie) whose role within the religious system may be described as reflexion (Reflexion) i.e. the task of the reflexive contact of one's own identity. (SOI : PM: S. 255)