Estonia: Religious Association Restrictions of Same-Sex Couple Religious Rights

EU law on same-sex unions (SSU) expects Member States to legally recognize the family life of same-sex couples in the form of marriage, partnership, or cohabitation. The normative expectation, which in about 2010 became a principled position of the EU institutions and the European Court of Human Rights, has not been endorsed by one Western European Member State (Italy) as well as the majority of the post-Communist Member States (Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania and Slovakia). There are a number of causes behind the failure to enact SSU laws: the legacies of the communist regimes, the prevalence of a certain interpretation of Christian doctrine, the medium level of economic affluence, and an unfavorable balance of power between the change and blocking coalitions of social, religious, and political actors. Unlike Western European countries, where the family life of same-sex unions was legally recognized primarily due to pressures from below (due to changes in public opinion and shifts in cultural values), governments and legislatures in most Central and Eastern European Member States are encouraged more from above (by the European Union and the Council of Europe). Therefore, the prospects for legal recognition of same-sex unions are slim in countries where the European normative agenda meets no significant support from domestic social values or religious and political actors. This conflict of national and EU forces is most likely to persist in Member States which are post-Soviet, culturally Orthodox, not shifted from materialist to post-materialist values, and governed by right-wing governmental coalitions

Implementing EU's Normative Agenda in the South Caucasus: Contradictory effects

It is not a secret that the EU has sought to influence regional developments by imposing liberal democratic norms on the third countries interested in closer relations with the union. Given that this soft power approach may effect change, we analysed the role of EU normative powers in influencing human rights dialogues. We also saw how both the political establishments and societies at large have adapted to these new circumstances. Further to the east, the lever for Europeanization seems to be eroding. To that end, the EU has continuously reaffirmed that its support for and cooperation with target countries must be conditional on the promotion of civil liberties and democratic reforms. While there is concern that the EU’s normative policies may be ineffective if they are not fully implemented on the ground, it is possible that the prospect of EU integration could prove to be an attractive aspiration for large segments of these societies. Fully implementing EU norms, however, may drive these countries into conflict with the conservative mores sustained by the state/religious institutions

Kiriku võim ühiskonnas, kultuuris ja poliitikas peale kommunismi

Väitekirja elektrooniline versioon ei sisalda publikatsioone.Ajaloolist lähenemist ja võrdlevat meetodit kasutav uurimus hindab kommunistlike režiimide mõju traditsioonilise kiriku võimu langusele avalikul alal. Kiriku võimu langust ühiskonnas, kultuuris ja poliitikas käsitleb uurimus ainsa ja määrava tunnusena, mis kaasneb kaasajal sotsiaalse, kultuurilise ja poliitilise sekulariseerumisega. Põhitähelepanu all on üheksa läänekristliku kultuuritaustaga postkommunistlikku ühiskonda, mille kultuurilised rahvusliikumised algasid 19. sajandil. See oli aeg, mil Euroopa ühiskonnad olid olulisel määral juba sekulariseerunud ning avalikke funktsioone täitev kristlus oli muutunud piibellikust ja dogmaatilisest, müütilisest ja konfessionaalsest, kultuur-, tsiviil- ja rahvusreligiooniliseks. Kiriku avalikku võimu on kommunismiaegsetest riigi ja kiriku suhetest enam mõjutanud kaks kommunismieelset riigi ja kiriku suhete mustrit – kultuuriline konfessioon (luterlik või katoliiklik) ning 19. sajandil kujunenud kiriku suhted rahvusliikumisega. Sõltumata sellest, kas kommunistlik kirikupoliitika oli kaasav või repressiivne, nõrgendas ta veelgi neid rahvuse ja kiriku vahelisi suhteid, mis oli nõrgad ka varem, ning tugevdas rahvuse ja kiriku liitu seal, kus vastavad suhted olid tugevad juba kommunistliku režiimi eel. Kirikute võim on erakordsel määral nõrgenenud kõigis luterliku traditsiooniga postkommunistlikes ühiskondades, kuid traditsiooniliselt katoliiklikest ühiskondadest vaid sellistes, milles kirikul puudub positiivne side rahvuskultuuriga. Kahel kaudsel moel on kommunistlikud režiimid aidanud ka kaitsta traditsiooniliste kirikute avalikku võimu. Kommunistlikud režiimid ei soodustanud religiooni individualiseerumist ja kaasajastumist ehk protsesse, mis samaaegselt Lääne-Euroopa liberaaldemokraatlikes ühiskondades kirikute võimu nõrgendasid. Lisaks on homoseksualismi taunimine säilinud kommunistlike režiimi väärtushoiakulise pärandina ka sellistes ühiskondades, kus kodanike sidemed traditsiooniliste kirikutega on lagunenud.The study assesses the specific impact of Communist regimes on the public authority of the traditional churches by using the historical approach and comparative method. The declining authority of the traditional church institutions in society, culture and politics is claimed to be the sole indicator of the social, cultural and political secularization that accompanies the processes of modernization. The main regional focus is limited to nine traditionally Western Christian post-communist societies, which experienced the origin of the cultural nation-building in 19th century. By this time publicly functional Christianities in European cultures and polities had transformed from the biblical and dogmatic, mythic and confessional to the cultural, civil and the national. The church-state relations of the Communist period have influenced the post-communist patterns of church authority less than pre-Communist historical struggles between Reformation and Counter-Reformation, and the legacy of church-state relationships of the early national awakening. Regardless of whether the pattern of Communist policy vis-à-vis the church was cooptive or repressive, the Communist period tended to weaken the pre-existing weak bonds between the church and the nation but to strengthen them where they were strong from the beginning. The church authority has been undermined in all post-communist Lutheran cultures, but only in such Catholic cultures, where the church lacks positive tie to national identity. Indirectly,the Communist regimes have helped also to preserve the traditional authority of churches. The social structures of the Communist regimes protected church traditions from religious individualization and modernization, which have weakened the church authority in Western liberal democratic societies. Additionally, the disapproval of homosexuality has persisted as a legacy of Communist regimes even in such post-communist societies where connections to churches have largely been lost

PATRIARCH KIRILL AND METROPOLITAN HILARION ON RELIGIOUS CONFLICT AND SECULAR WAR IN UKRAINE: A DIACHRONIC STUDY OF RELIGIOUS LEADERS’ MESSAGES

This paper analyses the public messages of Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and Metropolitan Hilarion 30 days before and one hundred days after the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022 (hereinafter: invasion). The findings demonstrate that the main speaker for the Russian Orthodox Church (hereinafter: ROC) on issues related to secular and religious conflicts in Ukraine was Metropolitan Hilarion in the pre-invasion phase and Patriarch Kirill after the invasion had started. Their messages were identical on themes related to the ‘Russian world’ (e.g., that spiritually fraternal peoples do not fight, that war in Ukraine takes place on the Russian territory, or that Russia’s involvement in wars in history and the present day have aimed to liberate or protect spiritually fraternal peoples). They both condemn Western values, blame the West for the imposition of post-Christian values on both Russia and Ukraine, and consider the West to be the cause of both historic and present conflicts with Russia. Patriarch Kirill’s messages change mostly after 3 April 2022 when themes (such as ‘Lenin, divider of historical Russia’, ‘approval’ of Nazi ideology in Ukraine) used by Putin and Lavrov to legitimate the invasion appeared not extensively, but still one by one into Patriarch Kirill’s discourse on Ukraine. In the same period, Hilarion decreases his involvement in public discussions of war in Ukraine and becomes more amicable regarding those Local Orthodox Churches which have recognized the autocephalous Orthodox Church of Ukraine (hereinafter OCU). Hilarion’s discourse of the role of the ROC in ‘wartime’ also started to focus on the humanitarian mission and on a proper distance between the mission of the Church and the role of the state. Patriarch Kirill, instead, connected the Church and religion to the Russian effort more directly. He used several frames (e.g., ‘internecine strife’; peace conditioned by the unity of Russians and Ukrainians; war in defence of Russian independence; religious blessing makes [Russian] troops victorious) and a rhetorical style (e.g., religious demonization of the enemy) to emphatically contribute to the legitimacy of the Russian war effort and to the strategic narratives of Putin’s regime. The latter are virtually missing in the discourse of Hilarion

Religion enters politics: the process of politicization of religious issues in four post-communist countries : master thesi

http://tartu.ester.ee/record=b2604022~S1*es

Religious Leadership and Critical Junctures in the 2022 Russian Invasion of Ukraine: 104 War Days of Metropolitan Hilarion

The chairman of the Department for External Church Relations (DECR) of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) Metropolitan Hilarion (Alfeyev) was dismissed from his office on the 104th day (June 7, 2022) of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Was Hilarion dismissed because of his ‘silence’ on the Russian invasion? We study the 104 ‘war days’ of Metropolitan Hilarion from four dimensions: leadership as position; leadership as process; leadership as result; and leadership as person. Our findings are multivocal: the Russian invasion of Ukraine did become a leadership challenge for Hilarion the way that previous military interventions (in Ukraine and Syria) and thorough broadening of the collaboration between the Church and the military in Russia during his 13 years as the Chairman of the DECR did not; Hilarion refrained from the rhetoric (religious demonization of the adversaries) and narratives (e.g. ‘spiritual brothers cannot be in conflict,’ labelling the conflict ‘an internecine strife’) used by Patriarch Kirill, but Hilarion still opted to leave his position of professor in Fribourg University instead of condemning (delegitimizing) the Russian invasion of Ukraine; Hilarion had contributed to Patriarch Kirill’s doctrine of the ‘Russian world’ since 2009 and did not revoke any of his related positions during the 104 days of war. As the ‘religious’ concept of the “Russian world” is the key narrative whereby religious leaders of the ROC have legitimated Russian imperialism over the territory and population of Ukraine, the key indicator for Hilarion’s assumed ‘silence’ should be the rejection of the Russian world doctrine, not his commitment to the principle “war is not a conflict solution method.” Finally, we observe his successor (Metropolitan Anthony) to be even less vocal than Hilarion on religious and geopolitical issues related to Ukraine. This period studied started with a secular critical juncture (start of invasion) and ended with a critical juncture in religious relations on Ukrainian territories occupied by the Russian Federation, when with the June 7, 2022, decision of the Holy Synod of the ROC to relocate dioceses of the Orthodox Church in Crimea into direct subordination to the Moscow Patriarchate, the latter initiated cuius regio, eius religio paradigm in its relations with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (of Moscow Patriarchate)

Kiriku mõjust religiooni politiseerumisele

Alar Kilp, Church influence on the politicization of religion.The article analyzes the influence of churches on the politicization of religion in four post-communist countries - Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Estonia. The main objective is to find out whether or not, in the future perspective, religious social conflict will become part of politics anyway or is this process influenced also by the tactical choices made by churches.Although the dominant churches in respective countries belong to different denominations (Catholic, Lutheran, Calvinist), these churches have similar institutional interests as well as challenges. Also, their everyday political choices are not directly dependent upon their theological doctrine. For the evaluation of the political influence of the churches, use is made of the religious market theory which assumes that the churches are motivated by their institutional interests.The article concludes that the tactical choices made by the churches have influenced the development of religious political cleavage. The backing of the radical Christian political parties in Poland or a close alliance with only one political party in the Czech Republic, have been tactical choices of the churches that have reduced the importance of religious political cleavage. The tactical choice of the dominant Hungarian churches, however, yielded the opposite result. Their choice to abandon the radical Christian parties for the moderate Christian Democratic parties increased the importance of the religious political cleavage

Historical reasons for the decline of religious affiliation: communism, confession or church’s relation with national identity?

In the beginning of the 19th century, the European populations in culturally Western Christian societies were religiously affiliated. By the end of the 20th century some decline of religious affiliation had occurred in all societies. Among the post-communist societies, however, the decline in religious affiliation has occurred with significant variations. The data from the World Values Surveys (WVS) of 1999/2000 shows an extraordinary high level of religious affiliation in Poland, which is surpassed only by Malta. At the opposite extreme, the three least religiously affiliated traditionally Western Christian cultures come also from the post-communist region. In general, the levels of church membership have declined less in Catholic, mono-confessional, and West-European societies. The alienation of individuals from the traditional Christian Churches, however, has not been primarily caused by the Confessional tradition, the Communist politics of religion or modernization, but because of the nature of the cultural relationship between the traditional religion and the national identity during the last two centuries. European nation-building started with the process of confessionalization (confession-building) of societies, which united or, if to use the sociological term, de-differentiated the “political” and “religious” spheres of life to the extent that the “sense of religious belonging” became equivalent to the sense of political membership. The Catholic, Lutheran, Reformed (Calvinist), and Anglican confessions of faith, formulated since the Reformation, defined the political membership and guaranteed the internal coherence of the society and culture. Typically, where religious minorities were tolerated, they were tolerated also as confessional minorities

Sekulaarne fundamentalism

BeSt programmi toetusel loodud videoloeng kursusel "Religioosne fundamentalism"(USUS.02.080