Den kristna traditionen är djupt rotad i vårt samhälle. Kristna högtider är allmänna helgdagar och vigslar, dop och begravningar i kyrkan tillhör det vanliga. Trots detta är Sverige idag ett av världens mest sekulariserade länder och bara 10% av svenskar menar att religion spelar en viktig roll i deras liv. Medlemsantalet och antalet gudstjänstbesökare i Svenska kyrkan sjunker för varje år. Målet med detta arbete är att visa på hur visuell kommunikation kan användas för att förändra förutfattade meningar om kristendomen och bygga broar mellan åsikter och ideologier. I Normkreativ kyrka tar jag avstamp i den klassiska kristna bildkonsten för att skapa en ny upplevelse av välbekanta bibliska motiv. På så sätt vill jag skapa förståelse för min personliga trosuppfattning och visa på hur kristendomen kan göras relevant i Sverige idag.

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Återkomsten av religion i form av ortodox kristendom är ett intressant fenomen som kommer att undersökas i denna studie. Målet är att försöka förstå vilken roll har Rysk Ortodox Kyrka i identitetsskapandet och värderingsförändringar i ryskt samhälle samt analysera relation mellan kyrkan och de stora politiska aktörerna.

In this essay I present the ecclesiology of the Salvation Army as it appears in Sweden today. One thesis that I examined is that the Salvation Army has changed its self-understanding from seeing itself as an Army from the beginning of the movement, to gradually understanding itself as a Church. The essay confirms this assumption and concludes that it is largely due to the challenges of ecumenical theology that developed with the publication of the BEM document in 1982, adopted by the World Council of Churches' Faith and Order Commission. Further, statistics show that 3 out of 4 new members of the Salvation Army in Sweden are what are Adherents, defined as a type of civilian membership, and not uniformed soldiers. The purpose of the essay has therefore been to explore what the change of membership, from soldiers to adherents, has meant for the ecclesiology of the movement. I have captured both of these assumptions, that the Army understands itself more and more as a church and that most new members are Adherents, when I have formulated the overarching research question: How does a growing proportion of Adherents play into the Salvation Army's gradually changing self-understanding from army to church? In the essay, I have used a qualitative research method which includes a hermeneutic approach where I interpret the changes and observe to understand its consequences for the ecclesiology that appears in the Salvation Army. The essay discusses the "army concept" which implies a “mission-oriented” ecclesiology and the "church concept" which implies a "community-oriented" ecclesiology. My source material consists of both written dogmatic material, observations of enrolling of both soldiers and adherents in Corps and interviews with new members. I note that the ecclesiological themes that appear in my materials are somewhat different. The written material has some army rhetoric, which means that in addition to a community-oriented ecclesiology one can also see a mission-oriented ecclesiology, while the observations and especially the interviews give a clearer picture of a communion-oriented ecclesiology where the congregation also appears as a sacramental communion. The likeness of ecclesiology between the Salvation Army to other free-churches in Sweden is so profound that I propose the idea of “free-church salvationists” in the army in Sweden. In the essay, I state that a probable further ecclesiological development may be that the more Adherents who become members, the more communion-oriented ecclesiology will implicitly appear in the Salvation Army in Sweden and at the same time the army rhetoric will gradually disappear. This means that the Salvation Army in Sweden may in the near future be described as "an army without soldiers".

The aim of this essay was to study how the religious congregation in the Swedish town Västervik, as a part of the Swedish state church, was publishing posts on their Facebook. By using the method qualitative text analysis and sorting all published posts on Svenska kyrkan i Västerviks Facebook page in 2020 into categories, it became possible to get a general picture of the material.The goal was also to understand the material that was posted on their Facebook page through socio-religious theories that argues that the Swedish state church has become a resource and a producer of services in the Swedish society. The ambition was also to see if the material published on Facebook could connect to what earlier studies had identified about churches and organizations on social media, and to what rapports say about the reducing members and the relationship between the youth and the church.The study of the essay shows that the congregation in Västervik is publishing material which indicates that they, as a part of the Swedish state church, is a resource and a producer of services. Not least because they have a lot of posts with non-theological content.The study also shows that the congregation uses their Facebook to create dialogue with their followers and members, and that they especially have a lot of posts with videos of their worship service online. This makes them available to members, and they do not seem to make a separation between the physical church and the church online. Furthermore, the study does not show that the congregation tries to attract nor keep members, but some posts are directly reaching out to youths, also from channels outside Facebook. This makes it possible to think that they want to improve their relationship between the church and the youths. Something that in the long run could benefit the amount of members in the congregation.

Baptism has long been seen as an uncomplicated and inclusive element in the Church of Sweden. The process studied in this thesis has, however, indicated a change on this point. Three people (one of which has been serving as a minister in the Church of Sweden for fourteen years), baptised as children in The Lords New Church, a church that follows Emanuel Swedenborg’s teachings, was baptised anew in the order of the Church of Sweden in November 2018, after the Church of Sweden had declared their original baptism to be invalid.A statement on the matter was released from the Church of Sweden in which several documents were referred to as supporting the arguments of the Church of Sweden. These documents, along with the statement from the Church of Sweden, are presented and discussed in this thesis.The discussion shows that the documents can be read in more than one way, and that the Church of Sweden seems to have used only parts of them in its reasoning on the matter.

I denna fallstudie har jag undersökt hur kvinnans möjligheter har utvecklats i den kristna kyrkans historia, med särskilt fokus på den tidiga kyrkans samtid och medeltidens strukturer. Syftet var att särskilt se till kyrkorum och äktenskap, och om kvinnans möjligheter har utvecklats till det bättre eller det sämre mellan dessa tidsperioder. Frågeställningen har formats efter detta syfte. Uppsatsen är kvalitativ och empirin är noga utvald, där både författarnas könsidentitet och litteraturens aktualitet har tagits i beaktande. Uppsatsen utgår ifrån en induktiv ansats, vilket innebär att den inte är teoristyrd. De teoirer som har valts är både förankrade i det historiska perspektivet, men också i det feministiska perspektivet.  I slutsatsen framkom det att kvinnor hade större möjligheter i den tidiga kyrkan, men i slutsatsen framkommer också klasskillnaders avgörande betydelse för kvinnor i valda tidsperioder.

This study aims to explore the understanding about teaching in the Church of Sweden through analysis of the letter of the Bishops and interviews with a teacher of the community and a priest. The study also covers which theology that comes forward in the letter of the Bishops and in everyday life for the teacher of the community and the priest.  The study shows the relationship between learning and teaching as well as which theology that comes forward in that mission. A difference occurs between the terms learning and teaching that is not shared by everyone. It is shown that everyone’s own experience and beliefs is a crucial part of the teaching process in order to accomplish learning. The letter of the Bishops wants to connect teaching and learning while the informers says there is a difference. The mutual understanding is that we learn together, and that faith also is practice.  The teaching going on is constantly changing in the meeting with other persons, artefacts and the context. Peoples lives and the church’s traditions are in constant motion. By being aware of the authority perspective and by working with trust it will be a great lesson and learning takes place. The theology that is created takes place in the meeting that occurs between human lifes and the tradition. There is no text or tradition that individually contains theology. The theology is created in the meeting with people. The meeting requires both people and text, neither can bring out theology on its own.

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No description available.