Religion and Secularity

Religious concepts are used in designing both universalist and particularist models of order. This research focus analyzes religious and secular models of order, with the presumption that they are ambivalent and open to interpretation. It is especially interested in those religious or secular concepts that have gained political relevance in recent contemporary history, e.g., in the transformation of East (Central) European societies after 1989, the global financial crisis, or in the context of worldwide migration. At the same time, the research project also examines intersections of religion and particularist ideologies such as nationalism.

Research Projects

• Religious Family Values: Nationalism and Universalism Reconsidered (Marta Bucholc, distinguished fellow)
• Tensions between Universalism and Particularism in the European Union Project with a Special Focus on the War on Ukraine (José Casanova, senior fellow, summer term 2023)
• Universalism: World Domination and the Ethos of Humanity (Hans Joas, senior fellow, summer term 2023)
• Emotions in 1989: The Secularized Emotional Regime in France and Germany Facing the World‘s Turmoil (Hélène Miard-Delacroix, senior fellow, summer and winter term 2023)
• The Later Years of the Czechoslovak (Hussite) Church: between Universalism and Particularism (Zdeněk Nešpor, senior fellow, summer term 2023)
• The Ukrainian Orthodox Church and the Orthodox Church of Ukraine: Language and Liturgy as Universal or Particularistic Choices (Nadieszda Kizenko, senior fellow, summer term 2023)
• Islam and the Making of Turkish Difference in the Federal Republic of Germany, 1961–2006 (Brian Van Wyck, junior fellow, summer term 2023)

 Further projects are following.