Translated material
Interreligious dialogue – integrating or disintegrating?
Report at the International Scientific and Practical Conference "Social Functions of Religion in the Conditions of Modernization of Society: XXI Century". Moscow, March 1, 2011.
interreligious dialogue is an important part of religious and social life. And like everyone an important phenomenon for society, it is subjected to some mythologization. IN in particular, in the public space, information associated with the concept "inter-religious dialogue" is often understood as "dialogue of religions". But anyway religions themselves do not know how to conduct a dialogue, dialogue is always conducted by people and the people created by them structures. Accordingly, interreligious dialogue is a composite concept.
Firstly, how many combinations of people and their associations, so many options for dialogue. The subjects of the dialogue can be religious leaders of different levels and formal intra-confessional status, theologians, people employed religiously colored social projects, active lay people, and simply interested citizens who only somehow associate themselves with one or another religion. And we, if we do not follow some intra-confessional point of view, we cannot exclude any of these subjects from the discussion.
Secondly, the same subjects can, in principle, conduct a dialogue in completely different genres. In practice, not all of them imply the maximum benevolence. The most famous genres are joint projects (from commemorative Soviet "struggle for peace" to a mixed group for helping the elderly) and theological discussions of different levels (from university to "kitchen"). But there is, for example, such a genre as a complaint to the prosecutor's office (only recently atheist group called on supporters to demand accountability Archpriest Vladimir Vigilyansky under Article 282 of the Criminal Code for the words “atheists are to blame for millions victims of our fellow citizens”[1]): this is indeed a form dialogue, albeit unpleasant for us, as were the religious wars in the Europe, the Crusades, etc.
Obviously, that not every dialogue is subjectively aimed at greater mutual understanding of the parties. And, obviously, not everyone approaches this result. But these are two different criteria: for example, the same Crusades were not motivated by the desire to understand Islam, but contributed to understanding.
Subject this article is not a mutual understanding of religious subjects: about this subject and so much has been written. This article addresses the question of how religiously motivated activity, namely, interreligious dialogue, affects the process of integration or disintegration of society as a whole.
This the question is very relevant for today's highly atomized Russian society. Now how to integrate fellow citizens into a real, living civil organism, to a civil nation, are concerned, it seems, everyone who is bothered at all such topics, starting with President Dmitry Medvedev[2].
Maybe Is it possible to become such a modern nation a society that is far from homogeneous in religious and/or ethnicity? Basically, maybe. Diversity does not exclude civil unity. We see this in Spain, Britain, Germany, etc. But society may also find itself in a serious crisis of unity, as today's Belgium. Can live for decades in a situation of civil war, like Ulster in not so old years. But a severe crisis of unity is quite possible without ethno-religious confrontation, as it was, for example, in the United States of the era Civil War. The ethnic and religious "map" does not predetermine anything for "identity" is not something fixed and unchanging. The question is always in the priorities of diverse identities, in what parameters that separate or unifying, will be more important for citizens.
talking about today's Russia, it seems to me that we should accept that we live in a country which, in the main, ceased to be the metropolis of the empire, but partly still operates as such and has not yet made the transition to a national state, characteristic of post-imperial countries in the 20th century [3] century. (Hardly our the country is destined for some kind of “special path”: a “special path” for Russia was promised many times, and, of course, we have and will have features, but also common regularities cannot be avoided.) And this means that for Russia, as before it for a number of European countries in a somewhat similar post-imperial fate (Austria, Hungary, Germany, France, Britain), the question of design (or reconstruction) of common civic identity.
Which does the current inter-religious dialogue contribute to this process? If we're talking about desecularization, as a process of activation of religiously motivated actors in society, past the stage of secularization[4], what does this process in terms of civic integration?
Pre we can say that the Russian situation is different from the British or French the fact that in those countries the process of secularization coincided with the process of formation nation of citizens or even lagged behind this process, while in Russia, on the contrary, accelerated Soviet secularization far outstripped this process. If in British Prime Minister David Cameron may be sad that the specifically British policy of multiculturalism undermines the civic unity [5], then in Russia there are completely different problems: we still have to undermine almost nothing, and we still may well form instead of a general civil community a set of some other communities, one way or another connected with ethnic and religious identity (I repeat, this is not about a rigid alternative commonalities, but about what criteria of identity will dominate). How much bloody can be the conflicts of these communities and how far the disintegration of the country will come, it is still difficult to imagine.
WITH this point of view should be returned to the idea of the dialogue being completely different subjects. Interreligious dialogue can take place in different levels, and I tend to think that at the local level such dialogue is always most productive and most integrative, because at the local level, groups of believers (or, for example, atheists) entering into dialogue do it on behalf of themselves, they, simply because of the low hierarchical position, do not try to act as representatives of some broad community, and their interreligious dialogue is directed, as a rule, to the solution of a specific tasks - to satisfy curiosity about others, to agree with them on a specific finally, just chat on topics of common interest. What whatever the result, it will concern precisely these small groups of people.
At all We see a different picture at the level of leadership of large religious organizations. The problem is not that people “at the top” are less disposed to dialogue and search mutual understanding than people "below", the problem is not at all in the personal qualities of those or other people. The problem is that the "people at the top" speak not only from own name, but on behalf of "their believers", that is, on behalf of a great or even a very large mass of people, among whom inevitably there are many disagreements that cannot be simultaneously represented in a position leading group.
Mechanism "religion by proxy" described by Grace Kelly[6] in all countries that have undergone modernization in general, of course, allows the hierarchy and the clergy of major religions, such as Orthodoxy or Islam, speak on religion on behalf of people “involved in the Church,” as Patriarch Kirill put it[7]. Of course, inside large and even not very large religions, there are disagreements that can be understood as religious, which should give rise to processes of intra-confessional correction. These processes can also be important for the theme of national unity, which is obvious on the example of the conflict between Salafis and traditional Muslim elites in North Caucasus. But outside the North Caucasian region proper religious intra-confessional disagreements do not find a significant response in society. Therefore, more important for us are cases when the mechanism of "religion according to powers of attorney” is used to promote views that are not strictly religious.
Of course in a free society, nothing can stop religious leaders from speaking out and on non-religious topics, including political ones (the notion that The church should not at all stand up for the perimeter of the church fence, which remains for us inherited from the USSR, grossly contradicts basic human rights, although some people combine human rights rhetoric with demands for severe restrictions freedom of speech for the clergy). And religious leaders, of course, speak out to the most different topics, and more and more actively. Reasonable - in terms of conservation confessional unity - self-restraint (accepted, for example, in the Russian Orthodox Church) do not always work.
For example, representatives of the largest Russian religious organizations, as well as high-ranking lay people, participating in the authoritative international forum "Dialogue civilizations", speak out in great detail on behalf of the "Orthodox", "Muslims" and other unstructured communities. "Dialogue civilizations", whatever one understands by this strange term, thus, underway; it is even recognized at the highest international level (for example, in UN), but it is quite noticeable that the goal of the dialogue is not the last (or maybe and first of all, anti-liberal and anti-American propaganda with quite certain political positions shared by the founder of the Forum, Vladimir Yakunin. On the example of the "Dialogue of Civilizations" one can see how significant a group of high-ranking clerics and laity expanded the religious "power of attorney" to the political level. No noticeable protest from those whom the "power of attorney" comes from, we do not see. As directed in domestic political meaning the activities of the Forum? It is not easy to estimate, but it can be assumed that it consolidates some conservatively directed socio-political currents, but definitely opposes these currents to the liberal-minded part society, regardless of religious self-identification.
If turn to internal Russian affairs, this is a political expansion "power of attorney" occurs, first of all, in connection with the adopted in our country mixture of religious and ethnic identity. It is especially typical for leaders of the major organizations of the four "traditional religions" (quotation marks indicate there is no doubt about their historical traditionalism, but simply an established illegal term). Leaders rely on the concept of primordialist essence of ethnicity, almost totally dominant in Russia. Actually, this "traditional four" is largely formed according to the criterion of maximum mixing of two principles - religious and ethno-cultural (that is why we have to talk about “main organizations”, because marginal organizations often make little or no use of this mix-up, a prime example - North Caucasian Salafists). And if the intensity of religiously motivated passions in most cases in Russia is not very high (there are, of course, significant exceptions), then the intensity of ethnic passions is perhaps the highest in comparison with other factors of socio-political mobilization. At the same time, in today's Russia is always talking about "ethnic conflicts", so this high the level of emotions is designed to provide a relatively high level of mobilization support - which is what leaders need. It should not be assumed that religious leaders systematically claim the status of ethno-national leaders, although such there are examples. But the mixture of ethnic and religious inevitably pushes religious leaders to such attempts.
Want emphasize that we are not talking about presenting these leaders with intellectual and moral claims. More precisely, such claims must be made the majority of our society, including the majority of its intellectual active layer. Not religious leaders so closely mixed in post-Soviet mass consciousness ethnic and religious elements of identification (although the leaders also contributed). They did not invent the naturalization of ethnicity and extremely counterproductive framework of "interethnic relations", in which we habitually deals with social problems known in the public controversy of other countries like discrimination, ghettoization, hate crimes, racism majority and minority racism, etc. And they certainly didn't invent it. conflictological approach to these very “interethnic” and “interreligious” relationships. But they are an organic part of our society, and not at all. intellectual avant-garde, and they are moving in the same direction.
This sometimes the movement goes too far. One can give an example, recently presented to the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC), not because the ROC is more claims, but because the activity of its leadership is more important than activity of the leadership of other religious organizations. Keeping within adopted in the ROC variety of the concept of civilizational nationalism [8], Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin has recently invites religious organizations to speak on behalf of "their peoples" for settlement of "interethnic conflicts". And this proposal was actually adopted by President Medvedev: March 1, 2011 at the Council for Interaction with religious associations under the President created a Commission on harmonization of interethnic and interreligious relations.
But Archpriest Vsevolod goes further: with the same goal of resolving conflicts, he proposes to change the country's legal system so that "every people" can live according to “their own law” (including, obviously, at least some religious norms). At the same time, Archpriest Vsevolod directly refers to the experience of the Russian Empire[9]. He might also refer to the experience of the Ottoman Empire with its millimeters - that would be a more adequate reference for the idea of considering religious leaders as ethnic leaders. Indeed, in some historical situations, religious leaders have acted effectively as leaders political, including in political post-conflict negotiations. Only here in modern Russia, and not only in Russia, there is very little reason for this hope, since "religion by proxy" in the Russian case does not mean real authority of religious leaders in non-religious matters (at least least in relation to large religions)[10].
But the main thing is not in inefficiency, but in how at least partial implementation of the proposals of Archpriest Vsevolod on the prospects of civil unity.
IN what religious leaders are right about is that for civic unity respect for legitimate characteristics, including religious and ethno-cultural, all citizens, including clear minorities. The latter should also include the most traditional groups of believers (the category of “churched” in Orthodox terminology). Undoubtedly, for members of some religious communities the unifying legal norms of the modern state are a problem. Here there is some conflict between secularism and human rights. But the solution proposed in theories by Archpriest Vsevolod, is unlikely to improve the situation with human rights, since how instead of some norms that are burdensome for some citizens, other norms will come, burdensome for other citizens. In today's Russia, non-secular norms are already are being implemented within the same region - in Chechnya under the leadership of Ramzan Kadyrov, and it can be seen that this is not reflected in the human rights situation in better side.
Representation Archpriest Vsevolod about the desirability of some kind of "legal pluralism" directly directed against the formation of a civil nation, which implies precisely single legal space. In practice, these proposals, whether they are somehow implemented, cannot lead back to the empire (simply because impossible anyway), but they can lead to the disintegration of the country or to emergency measures to preserve its unity.
Certainly, I don’t mean that it is the religious leaders who will certainly “destroy Russia” or that they aspire to such an outcome. But the method they promoted interreligious dialogue as a side effect has - in case of success - unification and self-identification of citizens, primarily by religious and ethnocultural features (religious feature, weak in itself, here strengthens "in the wake" of the ethno-cultural) - to the detriment of the general civil identity, which is already weaker than ethno-cultural.
Undoubtedly, the majority of Russian citizens do not seek the disintegration of the country and will not consciously support the ideas directed towards it. But this is where it works. mechanism of "religion by proxy", allowing a citizen not to vote in support for a specific program, but with their "power of attorney" unconsciously to support religious figures in their social and political activity. So on the basis of the universal desire for dialogue and conflict resolution is undermined even the current weak civic unity, which promises only more serious conflicts in the future.
[1}Text statements to the Investigative Committee // Website of the Sanity Foundation. February 21, 2011 // http://zdravomyslie.ru.
[2] Meeting of the Presidium of the State Council on measures to strengthen interethnic harmony // Website of the President of the Russian Federation. February 11, 2011 // http://kremlin.ru/news/10312.
[3] Such understanding of the development trajectory of modern Russia is shared in one way or another version by many researchers. See, for example: Pain E. Ethnopolitical pendulum: dynamics of the mechanisms of ethnopolitical processes in post-Soviet Russia. M., 2004.
[4] Karpov V. Desecularization: A Conceptual Framework // Journal of Church and State. 2010. Vol.52, №.2. P. 232-270.
[5] PM’s speech at Munich Security Conference // The official site of the Prime Minister's Office. 5 February 2011 // http://www.number10.gov.uk/news/speeches-and-transcripts/2011/02/pms-speech-at-munich-security-conference-60293.
[6] Davie G. Religion in Modern Europe: A Memory Mutates. Oxford, 2000.
[7] See it fundamentally important speech: Appeal of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill to residents of Pskov // Site of the Russian Orthodox Church. August 18, 2010 // http://www.patriarchia.ru/db/text/1253614.html.
[8] The ecclesiastical version of nationalism is described in more detail by me in the context of the general evolution of Russian nationalism in: Verkhovsky A. Russian nationalist movement: 20 years after Perestroika // Eurasian Review. 2010 Vol. 3 // http://www.evrazia.or.kr/review/01Verkhovskii.pdf.
[9] Transcription of the program “Judge for Yourself” on Channel 1 February 17, 2011 // Channel 1 website // http://www.1tv.ru/sprojects_edition/si5691/fi7757.
[10] Dubin B. “Lung burden”: mass Orthodoxy in Russia in the 1990s–2000s // Religious practices in modern Russia: Collection of articles / Ed. C. Rousselet, A. Agadzhanyan. M., 2006. S. 69-88. Sources
- A. Verkhovsky. Interreligious dialogue - integrating or disintegrating? // ReligioPolis. 2011. March 21.