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Religions
Special Issues
Interreligious Dialogue and Conflict
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Interreligious Dialogue and Conflict

A special issue of Religions (ISSN 2077-1444).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 January 2025) | Viewed by 5114

Special Issue Editor

Dr. Georgios Trantas

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Religion and Culture, VID Specialized University, NO-0319 Oslo, Norway
Interests: religioscapes, migration, diasporas; international relations, politics of religion and culture, cultural diplomacy, soft power; identity, belonging, European integration (Europeanisation); interreligious dialogue, conflict, reconciliation; balkans, eastern mediterranean, middle east

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues, 

We are pleased to invite you to contribute to our Special Issue with an article which explores the intersection and interrelation of politics and religion, with a particular focus on the aspects of hostility, threat of aggression, conflict and reconciliation. The international political landscape is rife with types of engagement, as mentioned above. Geopolitical tensions, often drawn from historical perceptions of enmity, antitheses, belonging and sovereignty over territory, are not devoid of the religious element and soft power that it entails. As advocates of war or mediators of peace, religious actors have a significant role in swaying popular views and ultimately offering political legitimacy.

This Special Issue aims to inform scholarship through various disciplines and case studies that fit the intentionally broad description above. To that end, we welcome submissions that deal with issues such as conflict justification (just war), religious spatial/territorial ownership, as well as mediation, interreligious dialogue and conflict resolution.

Case studies may (non-exclusively) focus on the Arab–Israeli conflict, the Yugoslav wars, or the Russian–Ukrainian war, whereby emergent patterns, overlaps and differences may be identified through the juxtaposition of cases, and the extension parallels between religious actors may be drawn on the basis of their attitudes and rhetoric comparatively.

In this Special Issue, original research articles and reviews are welcome. Research areas may include (but are not limited to) the following: religious studies and theology, politics and international relations, anthropology and ethnography, sociology and social sciences. Interdisciplinarity is desirable and strongly encouraged. 

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Georgios Trantas
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Religions is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • religion
  • war
  • conflict
  • reconciliation
  • religioscapes
  • soft power
  • Europe
  • Middle East
  • Balkans
  • Russia

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Published Papers (5 papers)

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Research

18 pages, 342 KiB  
Article
The Mandate of the World Russian People’s Council and the Russian Political Imagination: Scripture, Politics and War
by Alar Kilp and Jerry G. Pankhurst
Religions 2025, 16(4), 466; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16040466 - 4 Apr 2025
Viewed by 276
Abstract
The Mandate of the XXV World Russian People’s Council of 27 March 2024 framed the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine as a “holy war”. This paper presents an in-depth textual analysis of the Mandate followed by an extended thematic and contextual analysis. [...] Read more.
The Mandate of the XXV World Russian People’s Council of 27 March 2024 framed the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine as a “holy war”. This paper presents an in-depth textual analysis of the Mandate followed by an extended thematic and contextual analysis. The findings indicate that the Mandate’s mainstream discourses of eschatological–apocalyptic holy war and katechon state were not previously expressed at the level of official church leadership. They contribute to the ideological escalation of the Russian confrontation with Ukraine and the West around declared traditional values and the holy mission of the Russian people, while the involvement of Orthodoxy in the Russian ‘holy war’ narrative is neither exclusive of other religious referents nor of disbelief in ecclesial doctrine. The main referent of the Self (and correspondingly, of the sacred) is the (Russian) ‘nation’ or ‘people’, for which ‘spiritual’ and ‘civilizational’ are comprehensive religious markers of cultural identity. While two religious adversaries of the Russian geopolitical agenda of Ukraine—the Ecumenical Patriarchate and Ukrainian Orthodoxy—are not directly mentioned in the Mandate, it nevertheless attempts to re-formulate an Orthodox ‘just war’ theory, intensifies antagonistic inter-Orthodox relations in the Russia–Ukraine dimension and strengthens the resolve of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) and the Russian Federation to retain Ukraine’s Orthodox Church as an exclusively Russian space. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Interreligious Dialogue and Conflict)
13 pages, 372 KiB  
Article
The Third Conquest of Constantinople: The Symbolism of Hagia Sophia’s Reconversion to a Mosque
by Georgios E. Trantas
Religions 2025, 16(4), 429; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16040429 - 27 Mar 2025
Viewed by 332
Abstract
This article discusses the conversion of Hagia Sophia to a mosque in 2020. Examining this act through the prism of the neo-Ottoman political platform and with consideration of the meaning and importance of this historic cultural monument, it is inferred that the reconversion [...] Read more.
This article discusses the conversion of Hagia Sophia to a mosque in 2020. Examining this act through the prism of the neo-Ottoman political platform and with consideration of the meaning and importance of this historic cultural monument, it is inferred that the reconversion constitutes a political decision par excellence, intended to symbolically mark the beginning of a new era for Turkey while closing the chapter of Kemalism. In doing so, the current political establishment seeks to communicate its resolution to invert the process of secularisation, as a form of revanche for the Westernisation of the country and the identity erosion that it caused. Further, the reconversion symbolically connotes the conquest of Constantinople and the triumph of Islam over Christianity anew, harking back to past glories and upholding them as guidelines for the future, thus hinting to a revisionist political agenda, applicable both domestically and abroad, intended, according to rhetoric at least, to consolidate Turkey as a regional power and a worthy successor of the Ottoman Empire. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Interreligious Dialogue and Conflict)
11 pages, 213 KiB  
Article
One Hundred Years of Bloodshed: The Extermination of Christians by Muslims in the Ottoman Empire, 1822–1922
by Eleni Tseligka
Religions 2025, 16(3), 366; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16030366 - 14 Mar 2025
Viewed by 786
Abstract
This paper argues that the Armenian genocide, the genocide of the Greeks of Pontus and the Greek Catastrophe, and the Nestorian and Assyrian genocide, all of which took place during the late Ottoman Empire, were not isolated historic incidents, but rather different phases [...] Read more.
This paper argues that the Armenian genocide, the genocide of the Greeks of Pontus and the Greek Catastrophe, and the Nestorian and Assyrian genocide, all of which took place during the late Ottoman Empire, were not isolated historic incidents, but rather different phases of a broader agenda of Christian extermination in Asia Minor. The early 19th-century Ottoman Christian scepticism over the established status quo of the millet system, which had served as a platform of religious conflict resolution and intercultural dialogue but dictated subordination to Islam, was perceived as defiance by Ottoman Muslims, who interpreted the Christian strife for social equality as the loss of their privilege, thus creating bottom-up pressure for violence, resulting in the genocide and ethnic cleansing of the majority of Ottoman Christians between 1822 and 1922. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Interreligious Dialogue and Conflict)
16 pages, 259 KiB  
Article
The Culturalization of Politics, Religion and Cultural Wars: The Case of Turkey and the Turkish Cypriot Community
by Nikos Moudouros
Religions 2025, 16(2), 155; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel16020155 - 28 Jan 2025
Viewed by 1215
Abstract
This article examines the transformation of religion into a structural part of cultural war, as well as the broader process of the culturalization of politics, as a hegemonic strategy. Within this specific context, the article describes the evolution of cultural war in Turkey [...] Read more.
This article examines the transformation of religion into a structural part of cultural war, as well as the broader process of the culturalization of politics, as a hegemonic strategy. Within this specific context, the article describes the evolution of cultural war in Turkey and how it is transferred in the context of the Turkish Cypriot community. The first part of the article contains a general analysis of the process of the culturalization of politics and its connection with the question of hegemony. The second part focuses on the case of Turkey and, more specifically, on how the Turkish right has instrumentalized religion in cultural war. It places the AKP within the aforementioned context and describes the importance it has placed on the strengthening of religion in the educational structures of the country. The last part of the article focuses on the evolution of cultural war between Turkey and the Turkish Cypriot community. It examines the key views of the AKP on the transformation of Turkish Cypriot collective identity and the role religion should play. It also examines the reaction of sections of the Turkish Cypriot community, mainly originating from the historical dimension of Turkish Cypriot secularism. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Interreligious Dialogue and Conflict)
14 pages, 238 KiB  
Article
Religion Against Violence: Insights of Contemporary Philosophy and Eastern Patristics
by Olga Vasilievna Chistyakova
Religions 2024, 15(11), 1360; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15111360 - 8 Nov 2024
Viewed by 1246
Abstract
This article examines the concepts of violence and religion as social phenomena of modernity. Religion and the church are presented not as specific organizations or denominations, but as important social institutions and are reflected in philosophical and anthropological terms. I carry out the [...] Read more.
This article examines the concepts of violence and religion as social phenomena of modernity. Religion and the church are presented not as specific organizations or denominations, but as important social institutions and are reflected in philosophical and anthropological terms. I carry out the idea that religion as a modern social institute in cooperation with other social communities can resist violence, especially its aggressive forms. Based on some philosophical theories, the causes of the emergence of the different forms of social violence, as well as definitions of violence, are explored. In this context, the article presents the ideas of Hanna Arendt, Carl von Clausewitz, Bertrand de Jouvenel, James Mill, and Max Weber. Special attention is paid to the conception of the mimetic origin of aggression and violence in “primitive” or “archaic religions” elaborated by the French philosopher René Girard. He compares the social roots of aggression and violence in these religions with the Biblical ones and prefers the latter for their potential in preventing and overcoming the imitation types of violence. Girard’s anthropological justification of the mentioned historical religious traditions is presented. A significant part of the paper is devoted to the views of the Eastern Church Fathers of Early Christianity, considered in the concurrence of their humanistic ideas with those of noted contemporary philosophers. I see meaningful ideas for preventing extreme forms of violence and aggression in the contemporary world in the doctrines of the Early Eastern and Byzantine Fathers, especially those of the classical patristic period. In this regard, this article presents the anthropological and humanistic teachings of Athanasius the Great, Gregory of Nazianzus, Maximus the Confessor, and John of Damascus. The Early Church Fathers’ ideas are analyzed from a philosophical point of view, as having rational and anthropological grounds which are relevant for the present day’s human existence. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Interreligious Dialogue and Conflict)
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