non-Christian Religions Research Articles

Reason, Islam and Christianity

The debate sparked off by Benedict XVI’s speech in Regensburg has not only relaunched relations between Islam and Christianity, but has also provoked an internal debate in all around the world. In these lines we offer a summary of some interventions that have appeared so far, which serve to rethink and relaunch the current dialogue between faith and reason, modernity and Christianity, non-Christian religions and the Catholic Church. In this article, we will look at the responses that emerged after the speech and other subsequent interventions, which have made this a “globalised discourse.” Rationality must be found not only in the sciences but also in philosophy, religions, ethics and art.

Can Christians Plausibly Explain Virtuous Non-Christians?

It is a plain fact – obvious to any minimally perceptive person familiar with an adequate cross-section of humanity – that rationality, erudition, and moral goodness are to be found among both secular people and religious people alike, including followers of Christian and non-Christian religions. Can Christians plausibly account for this? Can they plausibly account for the fact that many non-Christians (whether religious or not) are not only morally good in many respects but also morally better than many Christians? More specifically, if they think salvation is for Christians rather than non-Christians, must they think (implausibly) that all Christians are morally better than all non-Christians? If not, must they think that (if not everyone is saved) God is unfair in saving some who are morally worse rather than others who are morally better? In this paper, I will defend a negative answer to these last two questions and (at the same time) a positive answer to the title question.

Pursuing Racial Order and Social Progress: Violence, Afrophobia and “Religious Racism” in Brazil

Abstract This article explores “religious racism,” or discrimination against devotees of African-derived religions in Brazil, as a broader pattern of structural racism rooted in racialized religious alterity, Afrophobia, and the epistemic divide between religion and nonreligion. The term religious racism has been proposed by some devotees and anti-racist activists to emphasize that Afro-Brazilian religions are uniquely targeted in ways other non-Christian religions are not. Unlike religious intolerance, the term religious racism explicitly connects discrimination against Afro-Brazilian religions to colonization, color or racial hierarchy, and anti-Black prejudice. This article clarifies the ideological groundings of religious racism that encourage Neo-Pentecostal extremists to pursue “order and progress,” as the national motto suggests, through physical violence.

Евангелическо-лютеранская церковь Дании: социально-экономический и территориально-организационный аспекты

The study exemplifies the use of an institutional-territorial approach for a comprehensive description of a national denominational landscape. The article aims to provide such an account by analysing relevant official data and performing statistical processing using computational tools. The focus is on the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Denmark and its administrative-territorial structures. The study places emphasis on the financial aspect, one seldom discussed in academic discourse. The denominational landscape of Denmark is a multicomponent system, with the National Lutheran Church holding a distinctive legal status as a dominant entity. Its historical and social significance, along with the ability to preserve functions that mirror those of the state, allow the Church of Denmark to maintain its civilisational and culture-building role for the populace, especially the indigenous one. However, Denmark is not exempt from the secular trends prevalent in the Nordic countries. One notable tendency is the decline in adherents of the Evangelical Lutheran Church observed over recent decades. This decline is most evident in the capital region, where the proportion of migrants in the population is higher and daily life is more vibrant than in other areas. Territorial variations in religiously motivated behaviour are evident, with the highest percentages observed in the country’s peripheral regions (despite the overall figures showing a negative trend). These areas also boast the most significant proportion of registered members of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. Exploring non-Christian religions in Denmark presents a promising avenue for future research.

Understanding Christians' underrepresentation in STEM and why it matters

In many Western societies, religious people (particularly Christians) are underrepresented in STEM fields, relative to their numbers in the general population. We review existing literature that supports two broad types of explanations for religious underrepresentation in STEM, focusing primarily on Christians in the US. First, Christianity and science may actually conflict or be perceived by Christians to conflict with one another, which reduces Christians' engagement in STEM fields. Second, science and scientists may be portrayed, and Christians stereotyped, in ways that lead Christians to believe they would not belong in STEM. We argue that it is critical to further investigate these explanations, as doing so will shed light on how to broaden participation and engagement in science among a sizeable chunk of the population. We conclude our review by discussing promising directions for future research and implications for non-Christian religions, as well as in contexts outside the West.

Universal justice: Poetic-affective criticism of Psalm 28

The central message of Psalm 28 has been successfully revealed by utilising poetic-affective criticism. Poetic-affective criticism is a new method in reading lament psalm by focusing on various aspects, such as lament, feeling, the concept of God and changes in textual mood. Applying poetic-affective criticism to Psalm 28 through the study of its various aspects (lament, feeling, the concept of God and changes in textual mood) enables us to find its central message. Universal justice is inherently embedded in the universe. Violation against this universal justice brings about self-destruction to those standing against it.Intradisciplinary and/or interdisciplinary implications: The conclusion reached by this article implies that there is a point of contact between Christianity and other religions. Non-Christian religions, though foggy and distorted, contain to a certain extent God’s Torah which was given to preserve the unity of society harmoniously thus creating an awareness of orderliness of the universe, and an appreciation that there is God who created and sustained the universe.

II. Vatikan Konsili: Katolik Kilisesinin İslam’a Bakışı ve Müslümanlarla İlişkisi

This paper deals with the Catholic Church’s perspective on Islam and ıts relationship with Muslims in the light of the Second Vatican Council documents. It is very important because the Second Vatican Council and ıts decisions to understand the Catholic and Muslim relations today. Although the Church discussed Catholic-Muslims relations 60 years ago, but since the Vatican II is the last general council, it based all decisions and implementations regarding Islam and relations with Muslims on this Council. Morever, ıt is the general council refering to Muslims for the first time. It is the council that officially begins Catholic-Muslim relations and determines how to will be these relations. Nostra Aetate, the declaration on the Church's relationship with non-Christian religions, is the council document most concerning to Muslims. In this document, espacially the Church's approaches to Islam and its relation with Muslims.The phrase "in our time" in the first paragraph of the document justifies the Church's attitude towards Islam and its closeness with Muslims. Today, more than half of the world's eight billion population consists of Christians (mostly Catholic) and Muslims. And nowadays, just as this document (N.A.1) states, humanity is getting closer to each other, and the bonds between different people are getting stronger due to travels, migrations, media, and technological developments. At the same time, Catholic-Muslim encounters increases rapidly on some platforms in which information and ideas are exchanged such as social media. Thusly, the Church determined the ways of how to dialogue and collobaration with Muslims in order to live together in Nostra Aetate. This paper aimed to reveal the Second Vatican Council's teaching on Islam and the Catholic-Muslim relationship. As well, the Catholic-Muslims relations analyized from Catholic Church’s perspective. It's refered to the other council documents such as Lumen Gentium, Gaudium et Spes, Ad Gentes, including Nostra Aetate. The following main sources studying is: Austin Flannery's the book in which he gathered the documents of the council, Vatican Council II: Constitutions, Decrees, Declarations; Catholicism Engaging Other Faiths Vatican II and its Impact” edited by Vladimir Latinovic; Gavin D’Costa’s Vatican II, Catholic Doctrines on Jews and Muslims; S. J. Gerald O’Collins’s The Second Vatican Council on Other Religions. Thus, this paper, provided in a historical method, replied to the question of how important the decisions of Vatican Council II is understanding contemporary Catholic-Muslim relations. And than, It presented the Church that recognizes non-Christian religions within the inclusivist paradigm, ıts positive speech and conciliation attitude towards Islam and Muslims. Finally, It illuminated to the style of dialogue based on mutual understanding and collaboration that the Church initiated with Islam and Muslims.

Length of stay and determinants of early discharge after facility-based childbirth in Cameroon: analysis of the 2018 Demographic and Health Survey

BackgroundA minimum length of stay following facility birth is a prerequisite for women and newborns to receive the recommended monitoring and package of postnatal care. The first postnatal care guidelines in Cameroon were issued in 1998 but adherence to minimum length of stay has not been assessed thus far. The objective of this study was to estimate the average length of stay and identify determinants of early discharge after facility birth.MethodsWe analyzed the Cameroon 2018 Demographic and Health Survey. We included 4,567 women who had a live birth in a heath facility between 2013 and 2018. We calculated their median length of stay in hours by mode of birth and the proportion discharged early (length of stay < 24 h after vaginal birth or < 5 days after caesarean section). We assessed the association between sociodemographic, context-related, facility-related, obstetric and need-related factors and early discharge using bivariate and multivariable logistic regression.ResultsThe median length of stay (inter quartile range) was 36 (9–84) hours after vaginal birth (n = 4,290) and 252 (132–300) hours after caesarean section (n = 277). We found that 28.8% of all women who gave birth in health facilities were discharged too early (29.7% of women with vaginal birth and 15.1% after a caesarean section). Factors which significantly predicted early discharge in multivariable regression were: maternal age < 20 years (compared to 20–29 years, aOR: 1.44; 95%CI 1.13–1.82), unemployment (aOR: 0.78; 95%CI: 0.63–0.96), non-Christian religions (aOR: 1.65; 95CI: 1.21–2.24), and region of residence—Northern zone aOR:9.95 (95%CI:6.53–15.17) and Forest zone aOR:2.51 (95%CI:1.79–3.53) compared to the country’s capital cities (Douala or Yaounde). None of the obstetric characteristics was associated with early discharge.ConclusionsMore than 1 in 4 women who gave birth in facilities in Cameroon were discharged too early; this mostly affected women following vaginal birth. The reasons leading to lack of adherence to postnatal care guidelines should be better understood and addressed to reduce preventable complications and provide better support to women and newborns during this critical period.

John Calvin

Abstract This article provides an overview and critique of John Calvin’s understanding of non-Christian philosophy and religions. I suggest Calvin’s thinking differed in three significant ways from early and medieval church belief. First, he gave a far less prominent place to the role of the demonic in religions. Second, Calvin rejected both traditional and Renaissance versions of the prisca theologia. Finally, it is noted that he explained glimmers of truth in non-Christian religion and philosophy by developing a rather unique understanding of human enlightenment as gifting from a specific role of the Logos rather than as enlightenment by the Logos per se.

Ehrlichova religiološka obravnava svetovnih verstev

Lambert Ehrlich is considered one of the greatest experts of comparative religious studies of his time, both locally and internationally. He was among the pioneers in organizing systematic religious studies at the university level in Slovenia. He lectured on the non-Christian religions at the Faculty of Theology in Ljubljana in the following study subjects: religious studies (apologetics), comparative religious studies, missiology. The content of his discussion of world religions changed according to the methodology and objectives of study subjects. He discussed religions with the aim of proving the superiority of Christianity in comparison with other religions, so he approached to the study of religions as an apologist. The article presents Ehrlich's discussion of world non–Christian religions based on his writings and textbooks, which he was using for his lectures in the mentioned study subjects.

Contemporary Catholic Approaches to the People, Land and State of Israel. Edited by Gavin D’Costa and Faydra L. Shapiro

Recognizing the multidimensional challenge of the Israeli–Palestinian situation, the editors (lay Catholic and Orthodox Israeli academics) led a June 2018 conference in Jerusalem where Catholic scholars presented papers before Jewish and Arab respondents. Many revised their papers in light of questions and discussions. The book contains twelve essays in four sections. Sections include essays written around the themes of “Listening Again to Scripture,” “Mining the Tradition,” and “Seeking Justice and Peace,” with a final section containing two Jewish responses. The biblical heritage is examined from the perspective of the Second Vatican Council, its Declaration on the Church’s Relation to Non-Christian Religions (Nostra aetate), and recent developments in the Catholic teaching authority. Lawrence Feingold (USA) sees the Jewish return to the Land as a sign pointing to the fulfillment of history with the coming of the Messiah, but without reference to certain Evangelical Protestant interpretations. Etienne Vetö (Rome) explores the place of Palestinians (Christian and Muslim) in the Land under Jewish control. He argues that “what is at stake is a purified or transfigured conception of the land … which includes a call to share the land” (p. 23). Christian Rutishauser SJ (Switzerland) discusses the Land and State of Israel with a sketch from the Hebrew Bible to the present, pointing to the final days. He draws attention to major questions to be discussed by Catholics in contact with Jewish scholars, especially with regard to Israel. Gavin D’Costa (England) discusses the biblical background for a Catholic view of Jews in the State of Israel. Palestinians have a right to a state/homeland as well. David Neuhaus (Israel–Palestine) offers a decades-long personal experience that bridges the dichotomies of life in Israel and the West Bank. All should “be at home and enjoy citizenship in a political entity that guarantees the common good” (p. 190).

Fractals: The Secret Code of Creation

Fractals: The Secret Code of Creation

Access to adequate nutrition as a global bioethical principle: An uninvited retrospective discourse with UNESCO

During the development of the Universal Declaration of Bioethics and Human Rights (UDBHR), discussions were held with various non-Christian religions (Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam and Confucianism), as well as the Roman Catholic faith tradition around the content of the UDBHR, while the Protestant faith tradition was glaringly uninvited. If a Protestant delegation had been invited to the discussions on the development of the UDBHR in 2003, representatives could have indicated that the food ethics of UDBHR (access to adequate nutrition) are firmly grounded on biblical principles. Participants in the discussion could have indicated on the basis of a covenantal perspective that scarce, contaminated and toxic food or food that harbours no nutritional value is held by Scripture to be a reality, and that the calling of the church is to promote the availability of sufficient, safe and nutritious food. Along with this, interlocutors could have taken the discussion further to indicate that these matters could be supported from an Old Testament, as well as New Testament perspective (Christological and pneumatological).Contribution: From a broad Protestant standpoint, it would therefore be fair to claim that this global bioethical principle (access to adequate nutrition) should not only be supported but must also be actively promoted, locally and globally, not only by civil society and the state, but also by the church. Adequate and healthy food is the message of the kingdom of Christ.

Revitalizing Catholic Social Thought in a Multireligious World

Religion does influence personal choices and behavior, even today. In a multireligious society, religions and religious groups influence social life and public policy considerably. Hitherto, Catholic social teaching, thought, and practice were essentially, if not exclusively, based on the Christian vision of socioeconomic and political realities, without paying much attention to the existence and role of the world’s great religions and religious traditions in this endeavor. To revitalize Catholic social teaching in today’s world, the Church must enter into critical dialogue with non-Christian religions and harness their contribution to sociopolitical transformation. The teachings of Pope Francis, especially in recent social encyclicals, emphasize the importance of such conversations and identify possible paths to pursue.

Criticus èn verdediger

Critic and Defender. A talk in connection with Abraham Kuyper’s pamphlet Liberalisten en Joden from 1878. What did the Dutch politician and theologian Abraham Kuyper (1837-1920) think about Jews, and how did he approach them in the context of the Netherlands? To answer this question, we focus on one of his key texts related to this subject, his pamphlet Liberalisten en Joden (1878). When he distinguished the Jews as a separate group, he did so mainly because of their non-Christian religion. This approach was complicated, for the Jewish community was quite diverse in its relation to Judaism: some were orthodox indeed, but the majority was not orthodox, or not even religious. In addition, most Jews did not like to be distinguished as a separate group, they preferred to be Dutch like every other citizen in the country. Kuyper struggled with this complication, and combined antisemitic utterances with a defense of Jewish civil rights. This resulted in an ambivalent appreciation of his relation with Jews.

Silence, Exile and Cunning: Concealment and Worship at the Holy Infant Jesus Church, Bangalore

In the context of escalating religious tensions in India, sites that still openly welcome practitioners of different belief systems or encourage a propensity for interreligious ritual engagement face a range of complex challenges. At the Holy Infant Jesus Church in Bangalore, there is a shrine set aside for people of non-Christian religions, both Hindu and Muslim, who view this deity as a jagrata or ‘awake’ god who responds to the ‘desire’ of the supplicant, granting boons and wishes. Despite the contemporary hardening of boundaries and the quest for religious purity, this site exhibits the persisting appeal of ritual engagement across religious boundaries. The consequence of such engagement is not always open connections or dialogue but rather concealment of syncretic practices from others in the supplicants’ communities. Against this background, this presentation explores the following questions: Is religion a site of interaction rather than of intra-communal withdrawal? Is religious synthesis an endangered mode of cosmopolitanism now threatened by multiple quests for religious purity? Why are some syncretic practices more resilient than others and how do people engaged in such practices make sense of what remains and what is lost?

Did the Church replace Israel? The foundation of the Church and Israel

This paper presents the relationship between the establishment of the Church and Israel. The author tries to answer a question that is important for contemporary theology: Did the Church replace Israel? The paper also poses another question that correlates with the first: Were the chosen people of the Old Testament “disinherited” upon the foundation of the Ecclesia? Of fundamental importance for understanding the Church–Israel relations is the teaching of the Second Vatican Council, mainly its Declaration on the relations of the Church with non-Christian religions Nostra aetate (No. 4). It treats these relations from the history of salvation perspective, indicating a continuum between God’s old and new people. The document does not specify the mutual reference or deals with the soteriological status of the people of Old Covenant. In order to reveal the Church’s attitude to Israel, the author examined Jesus’ reference to the Torah and the key events in the work of the Church foundation: constituting of the Twelve and establishing of the Eucharist. They provide grounds for the claim that the Church is the Israel of the ultimate times. Regarding the Church-Israel relations from the perspective of the history of salvation provides the conclusion that God did not reject Israel, nor did He cancel its mission of the tradent of the revelation. The people of the Old Testament remained the carrier of what was fulfilled in Jesus Christ in the economy of salvation. Israel’s “disinheritance” did not occur upon the Ecclesia foundation.

Buddyzm dla młodego czytelnika. O kilku realizacjach w języku polskim

The article presents contemporary examples of Polish literature for young readers which are thematically related to Buddhism. Among this type of publications, three groups can be distinguished: books with collections of Buddhist fairy tales, a socio-moral novel, and a comic book. The novel Zenek i mrówki [Zenek and the Ants] by Andrzej Grabowski is particularly interesting. Here, Buddhism is presented in a very original way, with understanding of the needs of the Polish reader and with a sensitivity in presenting information about Buddhism. On the contemporary Polish publishing market, literature for young readers concerning non-Christian religions is rare, but the development of Buddhism in Europe means that one can expect further development of local Buddhist literature.

Reconsidering the Sensus Divinitatis in the Light of the Semen Religionis: John Calvin and Non-Christian Religion

Summary John Calvin’s references to the sensus divinitatis in the Institutes have been variously understood and applied. This article considers four interpretations of Calvin’s meaning and use of the term and critically evaluates these against his comments on enlightenment by the Logos in the prologue of the Gospel of John, and his thoughts on idolatry and non-Christian religion. In light of the analyses, I propose an alternative interpretation of the usage of the term, namely that Calvin employed it to stand in opposition to and in ongoing tension with the fruit of the semen religionis – namely idolatrous religion. I argue that this particular reading of Calvin’s adoption and adaptation of Stoic terminology has certain advantages over alternative readings, given his opposition to the religious hypocrisy of the Roman Catholic Church of his era.

A Catholic Response to John Pawlikowski on the Persistence of Antisemitism

A Catholic Response to John Pawlikowski on the Persistence of Antisemitism John Borelli (bio) The short answer to John Pawlikowski's question is: no, antisemitism has not been uprooted from Christianity. In fact, it may never be completely uprooted because Christians constitute a huge and diverse population, separated into churches of various affiliations and groupings. Only some Christians have taken an official position condemning antisemitism. There may always be subsets among Christians who claim that antisemitism is justified based on their understanding of Christian sources. Nearly all Pawlikowski's references are to Catholic sources. He is asking the question of Catholics, and the short answer is regrettably "no" and frustratingly "not yet." The massive communion of the Catholic Church includes 20 or more churches, with Latin or Roman Catholics constituting the vast majority, and uprooting antisemitism among Catholics is a more complex task than it might seem. Pawlikowski pleads for Catholics "in [a] concrete, detailed effort to finally uproot antisemitism from Christian religious identity." My reply is a resounding yes in agreement that Catholics should make a concerted effort to remove antisemitism finally from all aspects of Catholic identity. Pope Benedict XVI, speaking at the Yad Vashem Memorial on May 11, 2009, made clear that there is no room anywhere [End Page 299] within Catholicism or outside it for antisemitism and denial of the Holocaust: "May the names of these victims never perish! May their suffering never be denied, belittled or forgotten! And may all people of goodwill remain vigilant in rooting out from the heart of man anything that could lead to tragedies such as this!"1 This was a very strong statement by Pope Benedict. Earlier that year, when he granted remission of excommunication to four bishops ordained illicitly by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, Pope Benedict had not realized that one of the four was a denier of the Holocaust. All four bishops, including Lefebvre, who passed away in 1991, were deniers of the teachings of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council (Vatican II), including its teachings on Jews, which Pawlikowski summarized in his essay. In the Pope's haste to offer dissenting bishops an incentive to accept the full teachings of the Catholic Church, the pope and his advisors failed in the task of recognizing and uprooting the vestiges of antisemitism from the Church. To clarify that denial of the Holocaust was incompatible with Catholic teaching, Pope Benedict offered this prayer at his public audience on January 28, 2009, following that unfortunate realization: "May the Shoah be a warning for all against forgetfulness, denial or reductionism, because violence committed against one single human being is violence against all."2 There may always be antisemites among those who identify as Catholic, but such people should know that they will find no justification from current Catholic teaching for being antisemitic. Deborah E. Lipstadt, President Biden's Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism, has described antisemitism as "not unlike a stubborn infection."3 Lipstadt notes that the operative word is "persisting" in a definition provided by Helen Fein some years ago: "A persisting latent structure of hostile beliefs towards Jews as a collectivity manifested in individuals, as attitudes, and in culture as myth, ideology, folklore, and imagery, and in actions—social or legal discrimination, political mobilization against Jews, and collective or state violence—which results in and/or is designed to distance, displace, or destroy Jews as Jews."4 The unfortunate fact is that antisemitism persists because it has existed in some form [End Page 300] or another for nearly two millennia among Christians and others who learned it from Christians. The Adversus Judaeos Tradition Pawlikowski has dedicated himself over a lengthy and successful career to the study of Judaism and Christian-Jewish relations. He has authored greatly needed resources for Christians and others and worked tirelessly toward the repudiation of the Adversus Judaeos (Against the Jews) tradition. This effort became a churchwide effort for Catholics in 1965 with the promulgation The Declaration on the Relation of the Church to Non-Christian Religions (Nostra Aetate) by an overwhelming vote of 2221 out of 2312 votes cast in the final weeks of Vatican II.5 I welcome this...