Domestic scholars interested in the study of socio-religious conflicts have a very difficult task. In the absence of their own theoretical tradition in the field of conflictology, the long domination of ideological stereotypes and illusions about the role of religion in society, and in the context of the uniqueness of those socio-religious processes that exploded in the 90s of the last century, the researchers found themselves in a real way. On the one hand, the achievements of Western conflictology had just (...) begun to flow into scientific circulation and were still waiting for its processing, on the other - for the emergence of their own thorough conflictological intelligence it took some time., for tendencies of development of religious relations, of course, are viewed only with the run of historical events. (shrink)

The article examines the extent and forms of discrimination against Christian minorities; determines tendency to it strengthen in the future.

Half a century has passed since the time of the Second Vatican Council - half a century for which a significant part of the world has unrecognizably changed - many-sided and trivial global processes have unfolded; new outlines of world civilization have emerged, geographic boundaries and demographic scales of religions have changed - but because of this, the Roman Catholic Church by the mouths of its head and the highest spiritual pastor of Pope Benedict XVI defines the Second Vatican Council (...) as "the most important ecclesiastical event of the 20th century". (shrink)

In Ukraine, there are now officially registered six All-Ukrainian Muslim departments and centers, a number of Islamic-based public and political organizations, associations of national minorities, the Islamic lands dominated by Islamic religion. The Islamic community of the country is replenished annually by migrants and students from countries of different Islamic orientation. It is clear that all this actualizes the problem of inter-institutional relations in the Islam of Ukraine, the search for ways and means of minimizing and preventing possible confrontations and (...) conflicts between them. (shrink)

The article of Alla Aristova «Migrant crisis in Europe: challenges for interreligious relations» identifies and classifies main features of the current wave of migration from the Muslim countries to Europe, its differences from the previous migration inflows of the last century, and the potential impact on inter-religious relations, social and religious processes in European society.

The twelfth century, the first decade, has become an extremely serious test for those branches of science who consider researching religious conflicts as their competence - primarily for the sociology of religion and conflict science. The latter were forced to admit that the classical conflictological tradition on which they based their theoretical intelligence practically lost their heuristic opportunities. These industries were faced with the urgent need to develop new paradigms, with plural, viable and competing, capable of explaining and describing not (...) simply - using the statements of statements - "increasing the role of the religious factor in international events," but the growing impact of religious conflicts on social systems of different levels. Therefore, the subject of broad religious studies discussions are quite painful problems: how to deviate from stereotypes in the methodological analysis of modern processes of transformation of religion as a whole and global systems of interreligious relations; what theoretical and methodological means will enable new approaches to the knowledge of religious conflicts and, most importantly, the principles of governance; how to prevent a rapid obsolete and heuristic "deterioration" of the conceptual apparatus; how to slow down the pace with which knowledge loses its relevance, and so on. (shrink)

The article actualizes the significance of scholastic encyclopedias for the religious and secular culture of medieval Europe. Their role as a compendium of accumulated knowledge and at the same time ideological synthesis of Christian religious doctrine and scientific achievements, ancient and scholastic traditions, university, and church-monastery intellectual culture is shown. The main attention is paid to the multi-volume Vincent of Beauvais’ work «Speculum Maius» as the most significant work among medieval encyclopedias and its conceptual completion. The extraordinary role of the (...) encyclopedia as a documentary evidence of knowledge, ideas, worldview, mentality of the Western European Middle Ages is proved. The author outlines the principles of codification of «The Great Mirror»; highlights the influence of the Christian-theological context on the content, structure and methods of organizing its material; the relationship of encyclopedic work with the processes of development and rationalization of the religious worldview. The focus is on the universalizing potential of the Christianity concepts, the extraordinary expression of which was the work by Vincent of Beauvais. The aspiration for universality was manifested both in the desire to understand the world as a Whole, created by God-completed omnipresence, and in attempts to base all the accumulated human experience, all kinds of knowledge and life on the principles of the Christian worldview. The encyclopedia is valued as a real «mirror» of an entire era, the medieval reception of Christianity, the history of European science and knowledge. (shrink)

One of the essential features of the history of Islam and Muslim religious spirituality is the cult of knowledge. Islam has developed a completely different model of the relationship between faith and knowledge, knowledge of God and knowledge of the universe, religion, and science than that which was characteristic of Christianity. For centuries, this difference will be startling: we will see the European civilization, where the church authorities brutally destroyed the germs of free thought and scientific thought and Muslim civilization, (...) where the cult of knowledge acquired a sacred dimension. The widespread development of medieval Muslim culture, science and art, which has made a significant contribution to the development of world scientific thought, has been posited as the embodiment of Muslims in the life of one of the main religious duties - the acquisition of knowledge, since the path to knowledge is interpreted in Islam as a way to comprehend power and the mercy of the Almighty. "There is no better worship for Allah than gaining knowledge" - it will be written on Maktabas and madrasah. Teachers and students will quote the verses of the Qur'an: "O Lord! Increase my knowledge "! Each new Muslim ruler - from the Caliph to his advisers and ministers - had to build a mosque, his own mausoleum and... a library. (shrink)

In the article the author highlights the different objective and subjective factors that have determined the tragic, controversial dimensions of destiny, personal evolution, social and ideological consequences of the reformer’s activities.

Since the beginning of the 1990s, the progressive growth and activity of various denominations, the controversial and turbulent processes of organizational development of religious and church life have become the object of close attention of sociologists and religious scholars. Statistical and sociological data have convincingly shown that the quantitative composition of religious communities and the number of existing denominations has increased ten times, that the religiosity of the Ukrainian population has become a mass phenomenon, and in the public consciousness and (...) public opinion there have been significant shifts in the credibility of the Church's religious values. As a result, an increasing number of scholars have firmly argued for the era of “religious revival” in Ukraine. (shrink)

The subject of our consideration was the question of the essence and specifics of the implementation of the communicative-translation function by the religion. Tasks put forward within the division: 1) characterize the specifics and structure of religious communication in the paradigm of the general theory of communication; 2) analyze the transformations of religious communication in the modern age; 3) highlight the specifics of the communicative and translated function of religion and the directions of its transformation in a globalized world.

Among the essential features of the oxidial mentality with its attraction to rationally-built, logical-centric knowledge are attempts to bring any phenomena under clear definitions, generalizations, concepts. Naturally, one of the aspects of "Western" perception and understanding of Islam is the desire to isolate and concentrate in the most concise and simultaneously powerful definition of the most significant features of Islam, that is, the "essence of Islam".

In the article by Alla Aristova "Ukraine: Beyond the Boundaries of Religious Freedom", the changes in the confessional landscape, and in the level and quality of religious freedom that have occurred in recent years in the annexed and occupied territories of Ukraine are analyzed. The features of the religious situation on the Crimean peninsula and the Eastern regions of Ukraine are generalized.