The confrontation with difference is an especially large challenge when it comes to religion and religious beliefs. Because religion is integral to so many, it becomes a sticking point in negotiations, conversations, and policy development. Even for those without particularly strong religious convictions, religion must be considered in their interactions with those who do. It is precisely that interaction that I seek to further understand. Engaging in dialogue with those of different faiths or value systems brings to the surface myriad difficulties, chief among which is the challenge of simply coming together to begin the conversation. The most appealing approach to that challenge is often to find some sort of common ground on which everyone can agree, a foundation upon which relationships can be built. That common ground, however, can be just as harmful to the end-goal of dialogue as not having dialogue in the first place. Common ground approaches focus on similarities, ignoring or discounting the differences which both make us who we are and make conversations difficult to have. In ignoring differences, participants are forced to relegate salient aspects of their beliefs to a private (unseen) arena, where they may wither away, dulled from disuse, eventually no longer relevant as an identifier. The foremost question I seek to answer, then, is the following: How can religious identity be maintained in light of such approaches to dialogue?

This thesis presents a critical analysis of the contemporary Islamic discourse of interfaith dialogue (IFD) founded on normative examinations of the Qur'an and hadith. Expanding from this baseline, theories of religious universalism and particularism are engaged as well as underlying themes of humanism, social stability, and acceptance of God's will. These are further placed along a Dove-Hawk framework to demonstrate the patterns underlying interpretations regarding the legitimacy of IFD in situations of conflict. It examines the writings and speeches of nine recent and contemporary Muslim intellectual-activists scholars. This analysis reveals a fragmented discourse, which is generally supportive of IFD, and indicates limits to the religious legitimization of IFD during Christian-Muslim hostilities.

Submitted by Renata Lopes (renatasil82@gmail.com) on 2015-12-09T12:38:04Z No. of bitstreams: 1 julioeduardodossantosribeiroreissimoes.pdf: 1183121 bytes, checksum: 825b28f5e29b3e6022160ae6180aef3d (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Adriana Oliveira (adriana.oliveira@ufjf.edu.br) on 2015-12-09T13:50:03Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 julioeduardodossantosribeiroreissimoes.pdf: 1183121 bytes, checksum: 825b28f5e29b3e6022160ae6180aef3d (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2015-12-09T13:50:03Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 julioeduardodossantosribeiroreissimoes.pdf: 1183121 bytes, checksum: 825b28f5e29b3e6022160ae6180aef3d (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-02-12 / CAPES - Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / Os estudos mais recentes sobre a identidade católica têm apontado para o século XVI como o ponto de partida de muitos traços delineadores desta mesma identidade, especialmente pela ação missionária dos jesuítas no contexto das Grandes Navegações. Este trabalho dispõe-se a compreender o motivo pelo qual os mesmos missionários oscilavam entre um discurso tridentino de fechamento doutrinário e a ação evangelizadora inclusiva, especialmente na Ásia. Para tanto, lança mão da análise de um missionário específico, Roberto Nobili (1577-1656), atuante na Índia do século XVII. O mesmo tem sido tomado como exemplo de abertura cultural e alteridade. Pretendemos demonstrar que Nobili pode ser compreendido como um jesuíta típico dentre os não-portugueses no século XVII, que corresponde à segunda geração de missionários da citada Ordem religiosa. Foi possível delimitar esta possibilidade interpretativa como clara, e as ambivalências da ordem ficam igualmente claras ao lidar com as produções literárias de Nobili. / The most recent studies about catholic identity point towards 16th century as the origin of many traces which delineate such identity, specially through the jesuit‟s missionary action in the context of Great Navigations. This essay pretends understanding the motives for the tension between a Tridentine doctrinaire enclosure and a inclusive missionary approach, especially in Asia. For that, we assay a specific missionary, Roberto Nobili (1577-1656), who worked on India during the 17th century. Roberto has being taken as an example of cultural openness and otherness. We aim to demonstrate that Nobili can be comprehended as a typical Jesuit among the non-Portuguese in 17th century, which corresponds to the second generation of missionaries of the quoted religious Order. It became possible to delimitate such interpretative approach as clear, and the ambivalences of the Order are also quite clear when we deal with Nobili‟s literary productions.

Thesis advisor: Ali Banuazizi / The resurgence of religious violence in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries has led to a growing academic interest in the religionization of politics. Weary of the failures of secular nationalism in ensuring national security and protecting the right to self-determination, many communities have turned to religious nationalism to meet these political needs. As a result, some religious nationalist movements and organizations have resorted to violence in promoting their political agendas. This thesis conducts a comparative analysis of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Rohingya crisis in Myanmar in order to investigate the relationship between religion and violence and how this relationship contributes to the intractability of ethnic conflict. Key findings include symbiotic relationships between religious nationalist organizations and civil society, as well as latent processes of religious “Othering.” Implications for future peace-building efforts are explored, with a key focus on interfaith dialogue and grassroots activism. / Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2020. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Arts & Sciences Honors Program. / Discipline: Policital Science.

This dissertation explores the prospects for Christian-Muslim dialogue regarding the ecological crisis. It compares the views of Sallie McFague and Seyyed Hossein Nasr, leaders in ecological theology and ethics. In 1990, at the Spirit and Nature symposium at Middlebury College, they dialogued unsuccessfully. They could not understand each other across the ideological gulf of McFague's postmodernism and Nasr's traditionalism. However, beneath an outer shell of significant differences, McFague and Nasr share profound common ground. They both understand the ecological crisis as a result of the desacralization of nature in human perception. They believe that Western Christianity's failure to cultivate a spiritual vision of nature set the stage for the development of a thoroughly mechanistic and desacralized worldview in the Renaissance and Enlightenment. They both articulate visions for the resacralization of nature. While unique, these visions both image the world as a body animated by the Spirit of God rather than as a lifeless machine. Furthermore, both authors find insights to support human harmony with the natural world in the mystical wisdom of their traditions. The dissertation models a process of dialogue that unveils McFague's and Nasr's common ground. The first two chapters explore their stories and contexts, modeling the importance of getting to know one's interlocutor. In chapters three and four, their overall ecological theologies are outlined. Only in chapter five, in a dialogical setting in which both authors' ideas are viewed empathetically, are their differences engaged. Chapter six looks at their common ground, tracing how it grows out of their mutual ecological concerns. Finally, chapter seven creatively synthesizes their ideas, especially their proposals for the reintegration of nature into cities and their descriptions of the mystical understanding of the God-world and human-world relationships. The dissertation explores how the mystical consciousness of the unity of the human body with the body of the world needs to be cultivated more widely, and extended into the practice of interfaith dialogue. Christians, Muslims, and all others concerned about the ecological crisis need to become more aware of our unity and see through the illusion that we are separate.

This reception study, drawing on Robert White’s culturalist approach to religious media and Jane Mansbridge’s oppositional consciousness, explores the meaning-making process of Queer Christians in Sweden about Parvez Sharma’s A Jihad for Love. The study argues that against a background where Muslims and Queer Muslims facing multiple forms of othering in Western mainstream media, queer-affirming Muslim alternative media can be a precursor to interfaith encounter and interreligious dialogue between Queer Christians and Queer Muslims. The results show that A Jihad for Love potentially increased the imagination and political interest of Queer Christians in Sweden in Queer Muslim lives. Finally, this study contributes to the reception of queer-affirming Muslim alternative media which has long been neglected and offers interesting insights about Queer Christian conceptualization of freedom, tolerance, secularism, religion and media in Swedish society.   Keywords: A Jihad for Love, religious media, queer affirming alternative Muslim media, Queer Muslims, Queer Christians, Sweden, interfaith dialogue, secularism

Religion was regarded as a marginal factor by scholars of International Relations for a long time. The main reason for this ignorance is that the discipline of International Relations has followed the major paradigm - secularization thesis - in social sciences until recently. This resulted in ignorance of religion as an explanatory factor in International Relations. However, this situation has recently started to change. Beginning from 1990s, the role of religion in international relations has started to be reexamined / and secularization theory has started to be criticized. On the other hand, religion has started to be regarded as a tool for peacebuilding, at the same time. In addition to its contribution to conflicts and wars, religion is increasingly seen as a potential tool for peaceful cooperation / and inter-religious dialogue is becoming a part of diplomacy and conflict resolution policies. Within this context, interfaith dialogue is a case which shows the extent of the change in the discipline of IR regarding the role of religion. This thesis aims to make a comprehensive discussion on the historical and contemporary relation between religion and international relations by focusing on the role of interfaith dialogue, specifically dialogue initiatives within the EU and the UN. The dialogue projects of these institutions and their relation with security-driven policies are examined. Thus, the main concern of this study is to raise a question about the role of interfaith dialogue, especially the one proposed by the institutions above, in transforming the role of religion in international relations.

A change in missiology?: Perspectives on the theology of the Church of Sweden Mission 1945-2000, as reflected through leadership and by missionaries. Like orhermissionary organisations, the Church of Sweden Mission (CSM) has undegone farreaching change and development since its foundation in yhe nineteenth century, This study focuses on how missionaries and CSM's leadership have perceived the developments that have taken place. A survey was constructed and sent to all living missionaries during 2004-2005. Then six focus-group discussions were organised and various appeals for financial collections in local churches during the period 1945-1999 have been scrutinised. The methods employed are based on qualitative analysis (focus-groups), quantitative analysis (survey) and text analysis. A pilot survey, sent to a limited number of persons, was carried out in 2001 and provided guidance for the foumulation of questions both for the survey and for the focus-groups. Chapter 2 give Swedish historical perspectives on mission and missiology from the first beginning of interest in foreign mission around the year 1800 til 2000. Chapter 3 gives international perspectives on missiology after 1945 focusing two major international handbooks on missiology and a Norwegian handbook. Chapter 4: Survey to all missionaries 2004-2005. The answers to the survey showed a clear tendency in the shift of motivation from mission to dialogue and from evangelisation to diaconal and humanitarian goals. 38 per cent say that they have changed their own missiology. Chapter 5: Focus group discussions in 2005. The majority of the participants in the six different focus-group discussions stated that the CSM had gone through major changes both theologically and practically, during the period under study. Chapter 6: Appeals for collections 1945-1999. The analysis shows that evangelisation remained the overall motive that was given for the whole period. On one hand there was a widespread continuity over the whole period, and on the oter hand a certain change in diaconal motives from the 1970s onwards, which were more often presented side by side with evangelisation. All three studies point to a change from conservative theology, to first to liberal theology and then on to radical theology. The change being less clear in the collection appeals than in the survey and the focus-group discussions.

This paper is a case-study on a group of American students, who spent a four- month period in Oman on a semester abroad program hosted by Al Amana Cen- tre. This paper examines the changes that have occurred in the students concep- tual thinking, their attitudes towards Muslims, Arabs and Islam and their personal theology, and identifies causes of those changes. In the first section, I will introduce the interfaith work that Al Amana Centre does, and lay a summary of the history and theory of Christian-Muslim dialogue. I will also explain the concept of Theology of Religion, which is central in examining the students’ own theological views. I will also introduce transformative learning theory that I use as a theoretical framework in this study In the last section of this paper, I analyze the research material which includes program curriculum, student interviews, student essays and students’ answers to questionnaires and surveys. From this material, I have identified repeating ideas and patterns and compared them to the framework offered by transformational learning theory. This paper seeks to answer to the question: what kind of effects does the Al Amana semester abroad program, infused with cultural immersion, have on the students in this particular case study. In the conclusion part of this paper, I con- clude that the semester abroad program facilitates opportunities for deep reflec- tion and extrarational experiences that work as a catalyst for transformation. It is hoped that this study can offer guidelines for other programs that aim at transforming attitudes and believes, and that work with cultural immersion and interfaith dialogue. It should be noted though, that the conclusions and outcomes of this study are tied to the specific context and people who attended the semes- ter abroad program, and should not be taken as universal or context-free.

Religious diversity is the inevitable corollary of globalization and with it comes the challenge and opportunities of greatly increased interaction with religious Others. The United States was founded on an Anglo-Saxon Protestant basis but has now become "the world’s most religiously diverse nation" according to one Harvard religious studies scholar. To deal with this development, American thinkers, mainly Christians, have devoted a good deal of scholarship in the past three to four decades construing strategies how to meet and interact with the religious Other. During the 70’s and 80’s, a typology of exclusivism, inclusivism and pluralism was developed by Christians as a response to religious diversity. Many see today that it is a necessity to find an alternative to hostility and violence and therefore dialogue is the order of the day. Since Christians are still by far the largest faith-group, and the US has economic resources, US Christians have a natural predominance in dialogue. Is that good or bad from the stand point of the minority Other? One such minority is a major sub-division of Hinduism, namely Vaishnavism. Christian-Vaishnava dialogue in the US is a new phenomenon in the past two decades and an emerging minority representative is a globalized Vaishnava organization ISKCON, popularly known as the Hare Krishna movement, which has its Western roots in the counter-culture of the 1960’s. While ISKCON struggled for legitimacy in the 70’s and ‘80’s, it has in recent decades become a major factor in Hindu and especially Vaisnava representation. How American Christians respond today to Vaishnava dialogue and how this typology arose and functions as a theoretical basis for the on-going development of Christian-Vaishnava dialogue is the subject of this action-research minor field study.