Download or read book Between Heaven and Russia written by Sarah Riccardi-Swartz and published by Fordham University Press. This book was released on 2022-04-05 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How is religious conversion transforming American democracy? In one corner of Appalachia, a group of American citizens has embraced the Russian Orthodox Church and through it Putin’s New Russia. Historically a minority immigrant faith in the United States, Russian Orthodoxy is attracting Americans who look to Russian religion and politics for answers to western secularism and the loss of traditional family values in the face of accelerating progressivism. This ethnography highlights an intentional community of converts who are exemplary of much broader networks of Russian Orthodox converts in the US. These converts sought and found a conservatism more authentic than Christian American Republicanism and a nationalism unburdened by the broken promises of American exceptionalism. Ultimately, both converts and the Church that welcomes them deploy the subversive act of adopting the ideals and faith of a foreign power for larger, transnational political ends. Offering insights into this rarely considered religious world, including its far-right political roots that nourish the embrace of Putin’s Russia, this ethnography shows how religious conversion is tied to larger issues of social politics, allegiance, (anti)democracy, and citizenship. These conversions offer us a window onto both global politics and foreign affairs, while also allowing us to see how particular communities in the U.S. are grappling with social transformations in the twenty-first century. With broad implications for our understanding of both conservative Christianity and right-wing politics, as well as contemporary Russian-American relations, this book provides insight in the growing constellations of far-right conservatism. While Russian Orthodox converts are more likely to form the moral minority rather than the moral majority, they are an important gauge for understanding the powerful philosophical shifts occurring in the current political climate in the United States and what they might mean for the future of American values, ideals, and democracy.
Download or read book Religion and Society in Russia written by Paul Bushkovitch and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 1992 with total page 287 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study traces the evolution of religious attitudes in an important transitional period of Russian history. It reconstructs the main events of the age, such as the rise of miracle cults, and demonstrates how they foreshadowed the secularization of Russian society.
Download or read book Religion and Identity in Modern Russia written by Juliet Johnson and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-03-02 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Focusing on the roles of Russian Orthodoxy and Islam in constituting, challenging and changing national and ethnic identities in Russia, this study takes Tsarist and Soviet legacies into account, paying special attention to the evolution of the relationship between religious teachings and political institutions through the late 19th and 20th centuries. The volume explicitly discusses and compares the role of Russia's two major religions, Orthodoxy and Islam, in forging identity in the modern era and brings an innovative blend of sociological, historical, linguistic and geographic scholarship to the problem of post-Soviet Russian identity. This comprehensive volume is suitable for courses on post-Soviet politics, Russian studies, religion and political culture.
Download or read book Sacred Stories written by Mark D. Steinberg and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 2007-01-24 with total page 867 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sacred Stories brings together the work of leading scholars writing on the history of religion and religiosity in late imperial Russia during the critical decades preceding the 1917 revolutions. Embodying new research and new methodologies, this book reshapes our understanding of the place of religion in modern Russian history. Topics examined include miraculous icons and healing, pilgrim narratives, confessions, women and Orthodox domesticity, marriage and divorce, conversion and tolerance, Jewish folk beliefs, mysticism in Russian art, and philosophical aspects of Orthodox religious thought. Sacred Stories demonstrates that belief, spirituality, and the sacred were powerful and complex cultural expressions central to Russian political, social, economic, and cultural life. Contributors are Nicholas B. Breyfogle, Heather J. Coleman, Gregory L. Freeze, Nadieszda Kizenko, Alexei A. Kurbanovsky, Roy R. Robson, Bernice Glatzer Rosenthal, Gabriella Safran, Vera Shevzov, Sarah Abrevaya Stein, Mark Steinberg, Paul Valliere, William G. Wagner, Paul W. Werth, and Christine D. Worobec.
Download or read book Religion and Language in Post Soviet Russia written by Brian P. Bennett and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2011-04-29 with total page 201 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Church Slavonic, one of the world’s historic sacred languages, has experienced a revival in post-Soviet Russia. Blending religious studies and sociolinguistics, this book looks at Church Slavonic in the contemporary period. It uses Slavonic in order to analyse a number of wider topics, including the renewal and factionalism of the Orthodox Church; the transformation of the Russian language; and the debates about protecting the nation from Western cults and culture.
Download or read book Religion and the State in Russia and China written by Christopher Marsh and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2011-01-20 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: >
Download or read book Popular Religion in Russia written by Stella Rock and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2007-09-10 with total page 249 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book dispels the widely-held view that paganism survived in Russia alongside Orthodox Christianity, demonstrating that 'double belief', dvoeverie, is in fact an academic myth. Scholars, citing the medieval origins of the term, have often portrayed Russian Christianity as uniquely muddied by paganism, with 'double-believing' Christians consciously or unconsciously preserving pagan traditions even into the twentieth century. This volume shows how the concept of dvoeverie arose with nineteenth-century scholars obsessed with the Russian 'folk' and was perpetuated as a propaganda tool in the Soviet period, colouring our perception of both popular faith in Russian and medieval Russian culture for over a century. It surveys the wide variety of uses of the term from the eleventh to the seventeenth century, and contrasts them to its use in modern historiography, concluding that our modern interpretation of dvoeverie would not have been recognized by medieval clerics, and that 'double-belief' is a modern academic construct. Furthermore, it offers a brief foray into medieval Orthodoxy via the mind of the believer, through the language and literature of the period.
Download or read book Holy Rus written by John P. Burgess and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2017-01-01 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A fascinating, vivid, and on-the-ground account of Russian Orthodoxy's resurgence A bold experiment is taking place in Russia. After a century of being scarred by militant, atheistic communism, the Orthodox Church has become Russia's largest and most significant nongovernmental organization. As it has returned to life, it has pursued a vision of reclaiming Holy Rus' that historical yet mythical homeland of the eastern Slavic peoples; a foretaste of the perfect justice, peace, harmony, and beauty for which religious believers long; and the glimpse of heaven on earth that persuaded Prince Vladimir to accept Orthodox baptism in Crimea in A.D. 988. Through groundbreaking initiatives in religious education, social ministry, historical commemoration, and parish life, the Orthodox Church is seeking to shape a new, post-communist national identity for Russia. In this eye-opening and evocative book, John Burgess examines Russian Orthodoxy's resurgence from a grassroots level, providing Western readers with an enlightening, inside look at the new Russia.
Download or read book Religion Expression and Patriotism in Russia written by Sanna Aitamurto, Kaarina Vladiv-Glover, Slobodanka Turoma and published by BoD – Books on Demand. This book was released on 2019-11-26 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The 2010s saw an introduction of legislative acts about religion, sexuality, and culture in Russia, which caused an uproar of protests. They politicized areas of life commonly perceived as private and expected to be free of the state's control. As a result, political activism and radical grassroots movements engaged many Russians in controversies about religion and culture and polarized popular opinion in the capitals and regions alike. This volume presents seven case studies which probe into the politics of religion and culture in today's Russia. The contributions highlight the diversity of Russia's religious communities and cultural practices by analyzing Hasidic Jewish identities, popular culture sponsored by the Orthodox Church, literary mobilization of the National Bolshevik Party, cinematic narratives of the Chechen wars, militarization of political Orthodoxy, and moral debates caused by opera as well as film productions. The authors draw on a variety of theoretical approaches and methodologies, including opinion surveys, ethnological fieldwork, narrative analysis, Foucault's conceptualization of biopower, catachrestic politics, and sociological theories of desecularization. The volume’s contributors are Sanna Turoma, Kaarina Aitamurto, Tomi Huttunen, Susan Ikonen, Boris Knorre, Irina Kotkina, Jussi Lassila, Andrey Makarychev, Elena Ostrovskaya, and Mikhail Suslov.
Download or read book Religion During the Russian Ukrainian Conflict written by Elizabeth A. Clark and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-11-05 with total page 351 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book investigates how the military conflict between Russia and Ukraine has affected the religious situation in these countries. It considers threats to and violations of religious freedom, including those arising in annexed Crimea and in the eastern part of Ukraine, where fighting between Ukrainian government forces and separatist paramilitary groups backed and controlled by Russia is still going on, as well as in Russia and Ukraine more generally. It also assesses the impact of the conflict on church-state relations and national religion policy in each country and explores the role religion has played in the military conflict and the ideology surrounding it, focusing especially on the role of the Ukrainian and Russian Orthodox churches, as well as on the consequences for inter-church relations and dialogue.
Download or read book Religion and Politics in Russia A Reader written by Marjorie Mandelstam Balzer and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-01-28 with total page 353 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Russia is not only vast, it is also culturally diverse, the core of an empire that spanned Eurasia. In addition to the majority Russian Orthodox and various other Christian groups, the Russian Federation includes large communities of Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, and members of other religious groups, some with ancient historical roots. All are in a state of ferment, and securing formal state recognition for specific communities is often daunting. This collection provides entry into the diversity of Russia's religious communities. Marjorie Mandelstam Balzer's introduction to the volume illuminates major political, social, and cultural-anthropological trends. The book is organized by religious tradition or identity, with further thematic perspectives on each set of readings. The authors include ethnologists, sociologists, political analysts, and religious leaders from many regions of the Federation. They analyze the changing dynamics of religion and politics within each community and in the context of the current drive to recentralize both political and religious authority in Moscow. Topical coverage extends from reassertions of Russian Orthodoxy to activities of Christian and Muslim missionaries to the revival of many other religions, including indigenous shamanic ones.
Download or read book Russian Orthodoxy Resurgent written by John Garrard and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2008-09-14 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Russian Orthodoxy Resurgent is the first book to fully explore the expansive and ill-understood role that Russia's ancient Christian faith has played in the fall of Soviet Communism and in the rise of Russian nationalism today. John and Carol Garrard tell the story of how the Orthodox Church's moral weight helped defeat the 1991 coup against Gorbachev launched by Communist Party hardliners. The Soviet Union disintegrated, leaving Russians searching for a usable past. The Garrards reveal how Patriarch Aleksy II--a former KGB officer and the man behind the church's successful defeat of the coup--is reconstituting a new national idea in the church's own image. In the new Russia, the former KGB who run the country--Vladimir Putin among them--proclaim the cross, not the hammer and sickle. Meanwhile, a majority of Russians now embrace the Orthodox faith with unprecedented fervor. The Garrards trace how Aleksy orchestrated this transformation, positioning his church to inherit power once held by the Communist Party and to become the dominant ethos of the military and government. They show how the revived church under Aleksy prevented mass violence during the post-Soviet turmoil, and how Aleksy astutely linked the church with the army and melded Russian patriotism and faith. Russian Orthodoxy Resurgent argues that the West must come to grips with this complex and contradictory resurgence of the Orthodox faith, because it is the hidden force behind Russia's domestic and foreign policies today.
Download or read book The Religion of the Russian People written by Pierre Pascal and published by St Vladimir's Seminary Press. This book was released on 1976 with total page 146 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Russia has long exercised a special fascination for people in the West, which has been increased recently by the publicity given to the dissent of its leading intellectuals. Western Christians, tortured by self-doubt and an agonizing revaluation of all their values, are now hearing new and strange voices from Russia that bear testimony to the strength of the Christian faith there. More than ever before it is necessary to explore the hidden strengths of the religion of the Russian people.
Download or read book Comparative Perspectives on Civil Religion Nationalism and Political Influence written by Lewin, Eyal and published by IGI Global. This book was released on 2016-06-27 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Throughout history, as well as in contemporary times, religion has had a significant impact on society and culture. Many times religious undertones are incorporated into political agendas or social movements in an effort to spur action from and engage the masses Comparative Perspectives on Civil Religion, Nationalism, and Political Influence investigates how belief systems, political behavior, and public action impact the general populace. Featuring theoretical concepts and empirical research across pertinent topic areas, this book is a pivotal reference source for students, scholars, and public figures interested in social behavior, religious studies, and politics.
Download or read book The Making of the New Martyrs of Russia written by Karin Hyldal Christensen and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-10-02 with total page 237 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Following the end of the Soviet Union, the Russian Orthodox Church has canonized a great number of Russian saints. Whereas in the first millennium of Russian Christianity (988-1988) the Church recognized merely 300 Russian saints, the number had grown to more than 2,000 by 2006. This book explores the remarkable phenomenon of new Russian martyrdom. It outlines the process of canonization, examines how saints are venerated, and relates all this to the ways in which the Russian state and its people have chosen to remember the Soviet Union and commemorate the victims of its purges. The book includes in-depth case studies of particular saints and examines the diverse ways in which they are venerated.
Download or read book Of Religion and Empire written by Robert P. Geraci and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2001 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is the first to investigate the role of religious conversion in the long history of Russian state building, with geographic coverage from Poland and European Russia to the Caucasus, Central Asia, Siberia, and Alaska.
Download or read book Law and the Christian Tradition in Modern Russia written by Paul Valliere and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2021-09-16 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book, authored by an international group of scholars, focuses on a vibrant central current within the history of Russian legal thought: how Christianity, and theistic belief generally, has inspired the aspiration to the rule of law in Russia, informed Russian philosophies of law, and shaped legal practices. Following a substantial introduction to the phenomenon of Russian legal consciousness, the volume presents twelve concise, non-technical portraits of modern Russian jurists and philosophers of law whose thought was shaped significantly by Orthodox Christian faith or theistic belief. Also included are chapters on the role the Orthodox Church has played in the legal culture of Russia and on the contribution of modern Russian scholars to the critical investigation of Orthodox canon law. The collection embraces the most creative period of Russian legal thought—the century and a half from the later Enlightenment to the Russian emigration following the Bolshevik Revolution. This book will merit the attention of anyone interested in the connections between law and religion in modern times.
