Pope Francis’ “Culture of Encounter” and “Fraternity”: Enhancing the Postsecular Discourse in IR
On February 4, 2019, the Document on Human Fraternity for World Peace and Living Together was signed by Pope Francis and the Grand Imam Ahmad al-Tayeb in Abu Dhabi. The moment marked a historical breakthrough in the area of interreligious dialogue becoming one of the broadest commented interrelig...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Ovidius University Press
2021-12-01
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| Series: | Annals of the "Ovidius" University of Constanţa. Political Science Series |
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| Online Access: | http://annals-politics.univ-ovidius.ro/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/AUOC-PolSci%20Vol.%2010%20%282021%29%20-%20Articole/AUOC-PolSci%20Vol.%2010%20%282021%29%20-%20Kulska%20-%2025-47.pdf |
| Summary: | On February 4, 2019, the Document on Human Fraternity for World Peace and
Living Together was signed by Pope Francis and the Grand Imam Ahmad al-Tayeb in
Abu Dhabi. The moment marked a historical breakthrough in the area of interreligious
dialogue becoming one of the broadest commented interreligious initiatives of the last
decades. But it also symbolized the changing role of religious discourse in its relation to
the political discourse as well as their mutual “entanglement”. Soon the series of events
that followed visibly evidenced the growing role of the religious ideas and religious
actors in the global discussion on the most problematic contemporary issues and their
increasingly collaborative relations to non-religious actors, both at governmental and
non-governmental level. As such they became the exemplification of the new
postsecular discourse that had been conceptualized two decades ago calling for a more
inclusive approach towards religion in the public sphere as well as for a “mutual
process of learning” between the religious and the secular domains. In the area of
international politics, it has been further developed into the concept of the religious and
inter-religious engagement, proposing some practical tools for a more effective
exploitation of the religious potential. Adopting the IR perspective, the article aims to
analyze both normatively and empirically how the religiously based initiatives and ideas
have contributed to international debate developing its own concepts such as “culture
of encounter” and “fraternity” that from a secular point of view represents the call for
political inclusion and non-discrimination of minorities (Petito, Daou, and Driessen
2021, 10). Based on the examination of the Holy See’s documents and through
application of comparative, interpretative, and discourse analysis methods, the main
focus will be put on Pope Francis’ teaching who formulated both concepts as the
leading topics of his pontificate. Realized in the global context through interreligious
dialogue, they constitute the exemplification of what Jodok Troy (2021) called “global
politics from below”. |
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| ISSN: | 2286-315X 2668-0831 |