Religious Framework Research Articles

An Eco-Ethical Interpretation of Confucian Tianren Heyi

Opposed to a commonly held interpretation that Confucian discourse regarding tianren heyi (天人合一) is simply a human-centred philosophical fusion of humanity and nature, this article argues that the Confucian discourse is in fact composed of two contradictory orientations, one ren-centred (roughly equivalent to “anthropocentric”) and the other tian-centred (“nature-centric” in a specific sense), which generally correspond to the two major camps of environmental philosophy in the West in the twentieth century. It will be further argued that the two orientations of the Confucian view have different yet related functions with regard to environmental protection and conservation: the tian-centred understanding establishes a metaphysical and religious framework for Confucian eco-ethical norms, in which ecological prohibitions and policies are built into the political and religious infrastructure, while the ren-centred orientation adds practical values and meanings to the ontological care of the human relation to the environment. In modern times, the two orientations of Confucian eco-ethics are under further development, moving away from being dualistic philosophies and converging on the eco-ethical way of life. Contemporary Confucians are investigating how the two traditional “orientations” can be unified as one holistic perspective which could provide theoretical and practical guidance for our understanding of the human position in the universe, the harmony between humans and nature, and the value of environmental protection and conservation.

You Cannot Be in Love with a Word: Theologies of Embodiment in Dreyer's "The Passion of Joan of Arc", Axel's "Babette's Feast" and von Trier's "Breaking the Waves"

My article investigates the representation and significance of the suffering female body in three films by Danish male directors operating in a religious framework: Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928), Axel’s Babette’s Feast (1987) and von Trier’s Breaking the Waves (1996). In these films the visual level complements the narrative level in order to accentuate the heroines’ physical suffering, often in a manner which is particularly poignant. More specifically, my analysis will point out the ways in which the body is brought into the foreground in each film and valorised against the backdrop of a confrontation between the body as pathos and the word as logos. Dreyer’s images and close-ups use the potentialities of the body to suggest the spiritual chasm between Joan of Arc and her judges. Moreover, the opposition between Joan and the theologians is also rendered in terms of the opposition between the oral and the written word, from which she is excluded. Hers is the embodied word and the passion; the subjective experience of embodied suffering becomes a test for her truth. With Babette’s Feast we move into a Lutheran pietistic background but the action is still played out in terms of Protestant – Catholic worldviews. Here the suffering of the body is toned down in a symbolic representation. Babette’s feast is actually an act of self-giving, her own body being offered to the others, symbolized by the cailles en sarcophages she prepares for the consumption of the community. Bess in Breaking the Waves challenges directly the theological foundations of the Calvinist faith of the community, opposing their veneration of the word as the letter of the Bible with an existential dedication to the embodied Word and the immediate consequences this has for human relationships. Like Joan, Bess lays bare the mechanics of power which becomes violently inscribed on her body.

African Independent Churches in Zambia (Lusaka)

ABSTRACT The African Independent churches (AICs) in Zambia, as elsewhere in Africa, from their very beginning formed a protest movement against the cultural imperialism undertaken by the missionary representatives of the historic mission churches and also played an important role in the anti-colonial political struggles. In Zambia, the early AICs were closely related to witchcraft eradication movements such as the Mchape, or socially and politically oriented prophet-healing churches such as The Lumpa church of Alice Lenshina. Since the 1970s and in particular in the 1990s the Christianity in Zambia has been significantly marked by the proliferation of the African Independent Churches - both of Pentecostal and prophet-healing type. These churches that started mushrooming particularly in urban settings became part of the strengthening charismatic movement, particularly within Protestantism. A typical feature of AICs is focus on spiritual healing and religious syncretism - the local traditional customs and beliefs in dangerous ghosts, ancestral spirits, or witches are placed within the biblical religious framework where the Holy Spirit (Muzimu Oyela) is considered to be the only source of healing whereas other ‘inferior spirits’ are labelled as demons. The traditional methods of healing are creatively combined with Christian healing by means of prayers, spiritual blessings, laying on of hands on patients and demon exorcism - it is believed that only a body rid of bad spirits can receive the Holy Spirit, and thus be healed. The paper draws on both secondary literature concerning African Independent Churches and primary data issued from fieldwork in Lusaka (2008-2009).

In God we trust – the role of religion for cohesion and integration in current European societies

The aim of the paper is to investigate the role of religion for social cohesion and integration in European societies. For the purpose of this article, we assume that religion matters not only in the form of different aspects of individual religiousness, but also as a constituent of the social and legal framework. Social cohesion is understood as the aggregated result of individual vertical and horizontal trust. We use data from the International Social Survey Programme in order to test a comparative multilevel model for the societies of the European Union as to whether trust in others and in political institutions both depend on individual religiousness and the religious framework of society. Without denying the potential exclusive effect of religion, the data show that religion still is important on different societal levels: counter to prevalent findings, a-religiousness and Protestantism on the individual level do not reduce feelings of integration, while independent of the denomination, active community work does increase societal trust. On the country level, we found that a close state–religion relationship and a Protestant majority both increase social cohesion.

Embedded Implication of Cultural Worldviews in the Use and Pattern of Magical Material Culture

The continuing challenge for archaeologists of ritual and magic revolves around recognition of such beliefs and practices in the archaeological record. This is especially true in contexts where material culture functions as both mundane utilitarian objects and magical devices simultaneously or alternatively. In such cases, mere typologies are insufficient to differentiate magical application from quotidian use. Nor are the most frequently used criteria for distinguishing between magical and non-magical artifact function—irregularities of depositional location—reliable predictors, if the underlying logic of those locations defies articulation. A critical first step in recognizing magical material culture involves understanding the embeddedness of worldviews, particularly aspects of cosmology, in the use and pattern of magical material culture. This article examines the implicated roles of religious frameworks and doctrine with cosmological constructs on “cultural logic” by using an example of 17th-century Anglo-European numerology to illustrate the connection between worldviews and material expression.

Tussen secularisme en theologie: Repliek

In reply to comments on my article ‘Can theological virtues be integrated in a secular moral philosophy?’ (same journal, same issue), I make 4 points: (1) My effort to find a position between secularism and theology show my critics to belong to either one of the extremes. (2) My approach is necessarily hermeneutic because (moral) experiences and meanings cannot be described in a pure phenomenology since they are always already contextualized in conceptual frameworks. (3) Although the theological virtues were ‘discovered’ in a religious framework and a theological conceptuality, they don’t necessarily disappear with those frameworks but can in principle be reframed. (4) The theological concept of grace could be reinterpreted in an ethics of passivity.

Exploring mental health consequences of childhood abuse and the relevance of religiosity.

Although childhood abuse is an established risk factor for mental health problems in adulthood, there is relatively little empirical evidence concerning intervening factors that may mitigate the risk. One potentially protective factor is religiosity. A unique opportunity to explore religiosity's relevance exists with a community-based sample of adult Jewish women that includes sizable subsamples of both rigorously devout ultra-Orthodox (Haredi) and nonreligious Secular Jews. A global measure of any childhood abuse (ACA) includes sexual, physical, and/or emotional abuse. Mental health is assessed with the Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI distress) and a single item reflecting unresolved anger about the past. Predictors of distress severity are examined with separate hierarchical regressions for each religious observance (RO) group. Despite being located at opposite ends of the religiosity spectrum, several surprising similarities emerge including no significant RO group differences in distress among abuse survivors. Moreover, ACA emerges as the strongest predictor of BSI distress within both groups and regressions explain similar amounts of variance. In contrast, two important differences emerge regarding unresolved anger and any recent abuse (ARA). Anger makes a strong contribution to explaining Haredi distress severity, less so for Secular respondents (6.1% vs. 2.9% respectively) while ARA is significant only for Haredi respondents. These initial findings suggest that abusive traumas in childhood may seriously compromise religiosity's potentially protective role. Broadening the research agenda to focus on resilient survivors would expand our understanding of healing resources-both within and outside of a religious framework. Moreover, a better understanding of unresolved anger would likely enhance interventions with greater potential for mitigating the suffering of those abused in childhood.

ESCOLA, RELIGIÃO E COMUNIDADE: ELEMENTOS PARA COMPREENSÃO DO “CATOLICISMO IMIGRANTE”

This paper focuses on the relations between the process of Catholic institutional readaptation and the phenomenon of non-Portuguese European immigration in the Brazilian State of Rio Grande do Sul. The following aspects are highlighted in the analysis: the dynamic of the religious framework strategically built amidst the “immigration” zones and its effects on rural populations composed mainly by “German” and “Italian” descendants since late XIXth century; the context of primary religious socialization of future Church professionals; and the role of the Catholic school system in the formation of various dominant groups.

Understanding medication adherence among patients of Turkish descent with type 2 diabetes: a qualitative study

Objectives. To explore perspectives of Turkish migrants with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) on adherence to oral hypoglycaemic agents (OHA).Design. In-depth interviews with 21 T2DM patients of Turkish descent recruited from primary care and community sources in Ghent, Belgium, using a theoretical sampling procedure. Analysis was guided by a grounded theory approach, using Nvivo 8.Results. Respondents reported a multitude of barriers and facilitators of adherence to OHA. Some of these barriers are distinctive for T2DM patients of Turkish descent. Respondents' causal beliefs about stress and the Belgian climate often led to non-adherence during less stressful periods, like summer holidays in Turkey. Some respondents adjusted their medication use to food intake or during Ramadan fasting. Concerns about OHA were the main reason for the widespread use of herbal medicine in this sample. The religious framework used to interpret diabetes led, in combination with feelings of depression, to non-adherence in some respondents while it facilitated medication adherence in others. A potential gender effect with respect to the self-management of OHA was observed. Non-distinctive factors include: beliefs about OHA, polypharmacy, beliefs about the course of diabetes, forgetfulness, the perception of the doctor's medical expertise, feelings of depression and social support.Conclusion. Health care providers should explore in detail and regularly patients' perspectives on illness beliefs, medication beliefs and their trust in doctors' medical expertise as this will provide useful starting points for promoting medication adherence. Whenever possible health care workers should engage with their patients in therapeutic alliances.

Progeny and Parody: Narcissus and Echo in Stevie Smith’s Poems

Probably to their credit, critics of Stevie Smith have not labored long in attempting to align her with a particular critical agenda. Rather, she's been most consistently read as liminal, resistant, ambivalent, and eccentric. (1) What makes her vexing for our curricula (to which courses does she properly belong?) has made her fascinating for Julie Sims Steward and Kristin Bluemel, who have fruitfully focused on the tensions, symmetries, and contradictions between her drawings and her poems; for James Najarian, Sheryl Stevenson, and William May, who have been sensitive readers of Smith's polyvocal intertextual innovations; and for Catherine Civello and Laura Severin, who have explored Smith's fiction and poems with a view to her engagement with popular culture and her representation of childhood as a means of subverting conventional gender concepts (particularly those concerned with domestic femininity). Approaching her from a poststructuralist perspective, many of her readers have noted some aspect of her gender- and genre-bending play with notions of subjectivity, identifying Smith as a prescient postmodernist and a challenger of patriarchy. While these may be persuasive arguments, it has nonetheless remained difficult to locate Smith within the galaxy of gender politics and feminism. Smith's most prolific critic, Romana Huk, observes, for instance, that Smith's work has been difficult to appropriate for feminist revisions of literary modernism because her critiques, parodies, and retellings of narratives often resolve themselves in less than clearly alternative terms, and even incorporate what appear to be traditionalist statements about women without employing what we recognize as irony. (Poetic 148) In the absence of classic irony, I propose to sharpen our understanding of Smith's feminism by attending to a classical motif to which she often figuratively returns in her poems: that of Narcissus and Echo. (2) Her work dwells on the metamorphosis both in the myth and of the myth, which has accumulated new and gendered meanings. And like Ovid's locus amoenus, Smith's scenes of narcissistic gazing are sites of disruption, familiar territory in which something dangerous is hiding. Indeed, the danger inheres in the well-worn assumptions that the myth has been made to serve, especially Christian and Freudian accounts of desire, worship, creation, childhood, and motherhood. Smith reveals that these psychoanalytic and religious frameworks, which seem utterly opposed, are both invested in the Narcissus narrative in similar ways: they preemptively erase Echo from the picture, they posit narcissism as a fundamentally feminine trait, and their concepts of childhood reproduce Narcissus's own infelicitous confusion of self and reflection. Against these shared contrivances of feminine and childish both Christian and secular narratives produce (even as they also disavow) a fragile fiction: the coherent adult male ego. It is not surprising that Smith scents both the instability and deep irony beneath these gendered constructions of adulthood, nor that some of her most withering critiques are aimed at dismantling them. Whether the child is cast as a narcissist in tidy contrast to a putatively selfless parent or is understood merely as a visible reflection of a parent's virtues, Smith explodes the self-serving fictions--demonizing and idealizing alike--into which adults write children. She undertakes this by mocking the poses of humility and subjection that disguise facile sexist fantasies of self-righteousness, and by reintroducing Echo into the Ovidian scene and teasing out her parodic potential. The children in Smith's poems collude with her various incarnations of Echo to subvert and ironize the pernicious repetitions of the Narcissus story in culture. Myth and worship In his 1914 essay On Narcissism: An Introduction, Freud postulates that while all infants pass through a phase of primary women tend to develop an intensification of the original narcissism, a phenomenon unfavorable to the development of a true object-choice (88). …

Disability as a Path to Spiritual Enlightenment: An Ethnographic Account of the Significance of Religion in Paralympic Sport

This article explores the importance of spirituality amidst the culture that surrounds high performance athletes who have acquired impairments. In so doing, it highlights the way in which spirituality and religion may be used as a vehicle for dealing with issues of re-embodiment and how this might impact long-term athlete well-being. Featuring ethnographic data collected over the course of a number of Paralympic Games, the essay explores the act of re-embodiment and how being “re-born” in line with various religious frameworks is something to which elite athletes with a disability may turn in order to make sense of their place in the world. Drawing on literature from the field of religious studies as well as a critical theorization of disability, the essay sheds light on the relationship between sport and religion using the “imperfect” bodies of Paralympians as a catalyst to explore the importance and meaning of spirituality in the everyday existence of sportspeople with disabilities.

From Tacit Knowing to a Theory of Faith

From Tacit Knowing to a Theory of Faith

Religion and Resistance to Extraction in Rural Peru: Is the Catholic Church Following the People?

This article analyzes the Catholic Church’s involvement in social conflicts resulting from resource extraction activities in Peru. The nature and degree of the Catholic Church’s involvement vary greatly according to the type of conflict and the diversity of standpoints of the Church at the local level. The article focuses on three distinctive, widely known conflicts against the expansion of extractive activities. It shows that the importance conventionally given to the role of particular religious figures, their adherence to progressive ideologies, and the defense of the Church’s strategic interests do not fully encompass the complexity of local processes. In contrast, the article contends that the Church’s institutional embeddedness in local networks is the most influential factor in the involvement of Catholic organizations in anti-mining conflicts. Embeddedness coincides with a spirituality that prioritizes local people’s agency, whereby the priests and Church organizations accompany and follow the initiatives of local communities instead of taking a leading role. This does not mean that the Church takes a passive stance in these conflicts. Priests and other pastoral agents have incorporated environmental and human rights discourses into an explicit religious framework that amplifies the social space of the Church and provides legitimacy for mobilizations. In parallel, locally generated doctrinal frameworks permeate the official discourse of the Catholic Church, reinforcing the position of those committed to the defense of local demands.

World Humanism(s), the Divine Comedy, Lao She's "灵的文学与佛教" ("Literature of the Soul and Buddhism"), and Gao's Soul Mountain

In her article "World Humanism(s), the Divine Comedy, Lao She's "灵的文学与佛教" ("Literature of the Soul and Buddhism"), and Gao's Soul Mountain" Letizia Fusini analyzes the Lao She's and Xingjian Gao's conceptions of literature as an activity concerning the realm of the spirit. Fusini utilizes Dante's Divine Comedy for comparison between the literary ideals pursued by the two Chinese writers and regards Lao She's and Gao's humanist and non-political approach underlying their respective notions. Considering Lao She's call for the emergence of a "Chinese Dante" (1941), Fusini contends that China might have found its own "Dante" in Gao who seems to have shared the same destiny of the exiled Florentine poet. Although Lao She ascribed to the Buddhist clergy the task of creating a Chinese literature of the soul modeled on the Divine Comedy, Fusini argues that Gao might have fulfilled this task without resorting to any religious frameworks, but to a personal, intense, and profoundly Chinese spirituality.

Cruzando la frontera con Rousseau: Emilio y el Viaje por los Estados Unidos, 1783-1784, de Francisco de Miranda

El presente estudio aplica el análisis de la geografía transnacional de la Ilustración desarrollado por Charles W. J. Withers con el fin de examinar las travesías atlánticas de Francisco de Miranda, precursor de la indepencencia hispanoamericana, en relación a Emilio, la obra pedagógica de Jean Jacques Rousseau. Durante su época como oficial del ejército español en Cádiz, Miranda participó en la lectura y difusión de Rousseau en España, extendiendo la red de lectores que desafiaron la censura de la Inquisición y crearon una esfera de opinión clandestina. El Diario del viaje por los Estados Unidos de América ilustra cómo Miranda transculturó las teorías de Rousseau sobre el empirismo, el viaje y la educación para desarrollar una epistemología criolla secular que afirmó su visión de la independencia, y aseguró su entrada a la República de Letras de la Ilustración como un sujeto americano. El modelo epistemológico que Miranda deriva del viaje coincide y a la vez diverge de la obra de jesuitas criollos como Francisco Clavijero y otros, quienes, como demuestra Jorge Cañizares-Esguerra, desarrollaron una epistemología patriótica dentro del marco religioso.

Popular Islamic Practices of Spiritualism Among the Digo of Kenya

The introduction and subsequent spread of foreign monotheistic beliefs in Africa, like Islam and Christianity, during the late 16th and early 17th centuries was undertaken on the presumption that African communities were basically animists. This assumption was a great error as it overlooked the existing religious frameworks and sought to impose alien practices hitherto unknown to the natives. However, in an attempt to find a compromising middle ground, syncretism (hybridization) emerged as a common feature of religious experiences by African communities that clamored for both their traditional and the foreign beliefs. This paper synthesizes the various aspects of the belief in spirits as experienced and practiced by the ethnic Digo of Southern Kenya in the midst of Islamization. The Digo are the largest single ethnic block to have embraced Islam among the Mijikenda. However, despite mass Islamization, the Digo have maintained a profound belief in traditional spirits against the teachings of Islam. To demonstrate that these popular Islamic practices are important marks in maintaining the cultural identity of the ethnic Digo group in the sea of ethnic Muslim ummah, we use Bourdieu theory of practice.

Valuing the Flourishing Life

In this paper it will be argued that the naturalist metaphysical assumptions of scientific attention to psychological, physical and behavioural aspects of the person, with particular attention to the explanatory normative promise of evolutionary psychology, might be necessary, but are not sufficient to establish any final picture of the flourishing person. How and what we are shaped to be, is amongst these factors, a consequence of our capacity to escape the causal determinants of biology and be responsive to matters of value as embodied in our social institutions. Because we are self-reflective, imaginative and critical, we construct varying cultures which sometimes embody very different pictures of what is to be valued and what is to count as identity and flourishing with respect to those values. If this is the case, then it is also necessarily the case that any visions of healthcare incorporating a broad scope directed towards flourishing and wellbeing will incorporate a picture of the healthy person governed by some ethical, socio-political or religious framework. Values so derived might sometimes be unwittingly implicit in a putatively neutral ‘scientific’ account of wellbeing.

Mediated Piety in Contemporary Syria: Women, Islam, and television

Dr Rufayda al-Habash is a prominent female preacher (da‘iya) in Syria today and is a representative of the Islamic revivalist movement. The channel Iqraa and her personal website are the main visual venues through which her message and knowledge are disseminated. By analyzing her as an exemplar, this study examines how da‘iyas use media to augment their religious authority, engage with the discursive tradition of Islam, and address everyday issues of ordinary women. The paper argues that the use of media allows Dr al-Habash to become more visible and active in the religious field that is dominated by male preachers and theologians. Although she functions within religious, media, and interpretivist frameworks that have been designed, put in place, and regulated primarily by men, she creatively utilizes available resources to achieve multiple goals.

Beliefs, stigma and discrimination associated with mental health problems in Uganda: Implications for theory and practice

There are major gaps in knowledge about beliefs, stigma and discrimination in Uganda, including the relationship between different cultural beliefs and stigmatising responses, how stigma and beliefs result in discrimination and the impact of social factors such as gender, poverty and ethnic conflict. This exploratory study aims to understand beliefs, stigma and discrimination associated with mental health in Uganda in more depth from the perspectives of different stakeholders. Focus groups and interviews were undertaken with mental health activists, policymakers, practitioners, non-governmental and human rights organisations, journalists and academics. Stigma was reported by individuals, families, communities and institutions, including health services. The study also found stigmatising beliefs linked to traditional, religious and medical explanatory frameworks, high levels of 'associated stigma', common mental health problems rarely medicalised and discrimination linked to poverty, gender and conflict. The findings suggest the need to address stigma in their cultural and social context, alongside other human rights initiatives.

Long-Term Changes in Attitudes Toward Premarital Sex in the United States: Reexamining the Role of Cohort Replacement

Attitudes toward premarital sex in the United States have changed considerably since the 1970s. However, it is unclear whether these changes are due to cohort replacement, broader changes within cohorts, or a combination of the two processes. We examined within- and between-cohort changes in attitudes toward premarital sex in the United States from 1975 to 2008 using hierarchical age-period-cohort models based on data from the General Social Survey. We used a religious plausibility structure framework to examine several possible mechanisms for within- and between-cohort variation in premarital sex attitudes over time, including changes in religious participation, marital patterns, and family structure. The results provided mixed support for our hypotheses. Attitudes toward premarital sex became more permissive over time in the United States in part because of the process of cohort replacement, but the level of permissiveness peaked with the baby boomer cohorts. This cohort effect is due in part to differences in rates of religious service attendance and educational attainment. However, the overall increase in permissive attitudes toward premarital sex is also due to period effects that are not captured by the measures included in our analyses.