The Specific Vulnerability of Religious Minorities
Published on 24. October 2022
Book
Paperback/Softback
302 pages
978-3-86269-235-4 (ISBN)
Description
Introduction
In April 2018, I had the opportunity to visit the museum devoted to Monsignor Oscar Arnulfo Romero, the Salvadoran prelate who was murdered on 24 March 1980 while offering Mass. It is widely accepted that he was killed by a right-wing death squad for his public denunciation of social injustice and human rights violations. Romero was declared a martyr by the Vatican in 2015 (and canonized in 2018), but this almost did not happen. My guide told me that the canonization process was stalled for ideological reasons due to his presumed adherence to liberation theology. Moreover, because he was killed for political reasons, Vatican theologians argued for a long time whether he qualified as a martyr. Eventually, they agreed he was indeed a martyr, reaching the compromise that he was killed in odium fidei ("in hatred of the faith").
The debate about martyrdom and canonization is an internal matter of the Vatican, but it reflects a broader misunderstanding of the vulnerability of religious engagement both within and outside academia. No one would disagree that social and political activism of religious people can be risky and even life threatening in authoritarian contexts. However, risks related to religious engagement are rarely understood as violations of religious freedom, nor are they recognized as a consequence of behavior inspired by religious convictions. Often, the religious dimension is readily discarded at the expense of alternative explanations. Studies that focus expressly on religious persecution tend to overlook its behavioral dimension.
Yet, religious minorities are vulnerable in more ways than is commonly accepted, at least that is the core message of this thesis. In this introduction, I first describe the initial observations that constitute the background of my research (1.1). Based on these initial observations, I give a justification for studying the vulnerability of religious minorities (1.2), discuss the aim of this research (1.3) and introduce my research questions (1.4). I then offer some definitions of key concepts (1.5), introduce my case studies (1.6) and present a reading guide for this dissertation (1.7).
In April 2018, I had the opportunity to visit the museum devoted to Monsignor Oscar Arnulfo Romero, the Salvadoran prelate who was murdered on 24 March 1980 while offering Mass. It is widely accepted that he was killed by a right-wing death squad for his public denunciation of social injustice and human rights violations. Romero was declared a martyr by the Vatican in 2015 (and canonized in 2018), but this almost did not happen. My guide told me that the canonization process was stalled for ideological reasons due to his presumed adherence to liberation theology. Moreover, because he was killed for political reasons, Vatican theologians argued for a long time whether he qualified as a martyr. Eventually, they agreed he was indeed a martyr, reaching the compromise that he was killed in odium fidei ("in hatred of the faith").
The debate about martyrdom and canonization is an internal matter of the Vatican, but it reflects a broader misunderstanding of the vulnerability of religious engagement both within and outside academia. No one would disagree that social and political activism of religious people can be risky and even life threatening in authoritarian contexts. However, risks related to religious engagement are rarely understood as violations of religious freedom, nor are they recognized as a consequence of behavior inspired by religious convictions. Often, the religious dimension is readily discarded at the expense of alternative explanations. Studies that focus expressly on religious persecution tend to overlook its behavioral dimension.
Yet, religious minorities are vulnerable in more ways than is commonly accepted, at least that is the core message of this thesis. In this introduction, I first describe the initial observations that constitute the background of my research (1.1). Based on these initial observations, I give a justification for studying the vulnerability of religious minorities (1.2), discuss the aim of this research (1.3) and introduce my research questions (1.4). I then offer some definitions of key concepts (1.5), introduce my case studies (1.6) and present a reading guide for this dissertation (1.7).