The Constitutional (In)Validity of Religious Vilification Laws: Implications for Their Interpretation

A study is conducted to determine whether religious vilification laws are contrary to the implied freedom of political communication affirmed in the High Court's decision in Lange v Australian Broadcasting Corporation. He feels that to the extent that religious vilification laws are interpreted with principles, they are likely to leave sufficient place for freedom of religious discussion that happens to be relevantly political, at the same time the implied freedom of political means that the prohibitions imposed by religious vilification laws need to be interpreted narrowly and the exceptions construed widely, in order to leave room for political communication.

A(S) CIÊNCIA(S) DA(S) RELIGIÃO(ÕES) NO ALVORECER DE UM NOVO PARADIGMA

A reflexão proposta neste estudo está centrada na possibilidade de o Novo Paradigma Sistêmico , tal qual o concebe o físico norte-americano Fritjof Capra, fundamentar um modelo epistemológico, possível de integrar em seu âmbito os pontos de vista divergentes no debate sobre o tratamento científico do fenômeno religioso. A história das ciências da religião está marcada pelo dilema epistemológico: explicar ou compreender a religião? As ciências da natureza contrapuseram-se às ciências do espírito, que diferiam das primeiras pelo objeto, pelo método e pela relação entre o sujeito e o objeto. O debate que esteve presente no cenário dos séculos XIX e XX mostrou-nos a impossibilidade de se definir um modelo de ciência que incorporasse, em seu seio, uma integração dos pontos de vista divergentes, em razão dos princípios que norteavam o paradigma cientificista. No entanto, a emergência do paradigma dos sistemas vivos ou da complexidade , liderado pela física, veio conceber o caráter sistêmico da realidade; que o concreto material é energia sob o aspecto subatômico; que sob o aspecto subatômico, a matéria não existe em lugares definidos com certeza, mas apenas mostram tendências a existir. Estas e outras descobertas possibilitaram aos cientistas afirmar a existência de um Novo Paradigma , em que as categorias análise, regularidade e objetividade, que caracterizavam o antigo, são substituídas por: síntese, irregularidade e conduta epistêmica. O paradigma emergente possibilitou a construção de um modelo epistemológico do conhecimento científico, que apontamos como legitimador das condutas fenomenológicas, tal qual as concebem G. van der Leeuw e F. Heiler, ao mesmo tempo em que possibilita a integração de pontos de vista divergentes, no debate entre as vertentes, explicação/compreensão.(AU)

Religious diplomacy and socialism. The Romanian Orthodox Church and the Church of England, 1956-1959

This article analyzes the relationship between the Orthodox Church and the communist regime during one of the most intense periods of religious persecution in the Romanian People's Republic from 1956 to 1959. The church hierarchy demonstrated its support for the socialist construction of the country, while, at the same time, the regime began a campaign against religion by arresting clergy and reducing the number of religious people in monasteries; rumours even circulated that in 1958 Patriarch Justinian was under house arrest. Seeking closer contact with Western Europe, the regime allowed the hierarchy to meet foreign clergymen, especially from the Church of England. These diplomatic religious encounters played a double role. The regime realised that it could benefit from international ecclesiastical relations, while the image of Justinian in the West changed from that of "red patriarch" to that of a leader who was genuinely interested in his church's survival.

Wittgenstein and the justification of religious belief

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The use of metaphors as models in religious discourse, with special reference to implications for syllabuses in religious education

DUE TO COPYRIGHT RESTRICTIONS ONLY AVAILABLE FOR CONSULTATION AT ASTON UNIVERSITY LIBRARY WITH PRIOR ARRANGEMENT

Religious young adults recounting the past:narrating sexual and religious cultures in school

Schooling can be a pivotal time in young people’s formative experience when identities are negotiated and forged. However, contradictory dominant cultures can operate within the school context, making it very challenging for individuals to negotiate their religious and sexual identities within a sexualised and heteronormative space. This essay draws on interview data relating to 18- to 25-yearolds of diverse religious faiths in the UK, who recounted their secondary schooling experiences, and focuses on the formal and informal ways in which the school was constituted in relation to religion and sexuality.

Religious compliance in Islamic financial institutions

The central goal of this research is to explore the approach of the Islamic banking industry in defining and implementing religious compliance at regulatory, institutional, and individual level within the Islamic Banking and Finance (IBF) industry. It also examines the discrepancies, ambiguities and paradoxes that are exhibited in the individual and institutional behaviour in relation to the infusion and enactment of religious exigencies into compliance processes in IBF. Through the combined lenses of institutional work and a sensemaking perspective, this research portrays the practice of infusion of Islamic law in Islamic banks as being ambiguous and drifting down to the institutional and actor levels. In instances of both well-codified and non-codified regulatory frameworks for Shariah compliance, institutional rules ambiguity, rules interpretation and enactment ambiguities were found to be prevalent. The individual IBF professionals performed retrospective and prospective actions to adjust the role and rules boundaries both in the case of a Muslim and a non-Muslim country. The sensitizing concept of religious compliance is the primary theoretical contribution of this research and provides a tool to understand the nature of what constitutes Shariah compliance and the dynamics of its implementation. It helps to explain the empirical consequences of the lack of a clear definition of Shariah compliance in the regulatory frameworks and standards available for the industry. It also addresses the calls to have a clear reference on what constitute Shariah compliance in IBF as proposed in previous studies (Hayat, Butter, & Kock, 2013; Maurer, 2003, 2012; Pitluck, 2012). The methodological and theoretical perspective of this research are unique in the use of multi-level analysis and approaches that blend micro and macro perspectives of the research field, to illuminate and provide a more complete picture of religious compliance infusion and enactment in IBF.