Cover of Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review
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Displaying: 1-20 of 55 documents


articles
1. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Joaquín Algranti, Damián Setton, Luciana Verona, Kendall Busse Leadership, Proselytism and Identity in the Jewish and Pentecostal Fields in Argentina. Comparative Analysis in Habad Lubavitch and Rey de Reyes
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In the social space of religion, minority groups frequently offer the possibility to study subjective conducts and institutional strategies that become more visible due to the subordinate position of those who execute them. This is the case for the proselytizing expansion carried out by some sectors of Judaism and of the Evangelical world in the predominantly Catholic cultural environment of Argentina. This paper analyzes the similarities and differences between the organization of Chabad Lubavitch and the Neo-Pentecostal mega church Rey de Reyes (King of Kings). It argues that the different modes of constructing authority in bothinstitutions, which revolve around “personal” and “official” charisma, enable different ways of managing proselytizing activity. Thus, the religious message is spread differently according to the degree of institutionalization of each organization. This article provides a comparative analysis and contributes to the field of Sociology of Religion with research grounded in qualitative techniques. The methodology used in this paper is an ethnographic case study of both communities, including in-depth interviews of lay and specialist members, fieldwork at worship services and proselytizing activities, and analysis of documents from thesetwo religious institutions.
2. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Adam Anczyk Plurality of Belief in Contemporary European Druidry
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There is a common notion, shared by the academics, that all (or most) Neopagan movements are polytheist (or duotheist), magic-oriented religious movements with higher or lower emphasis put on reconstructing – what can be called – “the Old Faith” or religions of ancient Europe. However research practice shows that among followers of various Pagan movements there is a place for plurality of belief. The subject of this article is a brief, survey analysis of contemporary Druidry, which is an example of how the spirituality of contemporary Pagans is constructed: historical, traditional and mythological themes are mixed with new formsof religious expression resulting in creating of a new form of religiosity in which there is open space for the plurality of belief.
3. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Constance A. Jones Metaphysical Religious Movements in the United States: A Comparison of Church Universal and Triumphant, Ramtha's School of Enlightenment, and Movement of Spiritual Inner Awareness
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This paper is a comparison of three new religious movements, each of which is a twentieth-century Western religious innovation that draws heavily on Eastern as well as Western traditions. The three movements have a number of beliefs and practices in common and all can be considered metaphysical, esoteric, and gnostic in orientation and function. All three of the movements have headquarters in the western region of the United States: The Church Universal and Triumphant (CUT), headed by Elizabeth Clare Prophet (1939-2009), is centered at Corwin Springs near Livingston, Montana; Ramtha's School of Enlightenment (RSE), headed by J. Z. Knight (1946-), is centered in Yelm, Washington; and the Movement of Spiritual Inner Awareness (MSIA), headed by John-Roger Hinkins (1934-), is centered in Los Angeles, California. All three have significant numbers of members outside the United States and translate their materials into non-English editions, although this comparison relates only to members within the U. S.
4. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
James R. Lewis The Devil’s Demographics Changes in the Satanic Milieu, 2001–2009
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From August 2000 to February 2001, I conducted an online survey of what eventually became 140 self-identified Satanists. A report detailing my findings from that questionnaire research was published in the Marburg Journal of Religion under the title “Who Serves Satan? A Demographic and Ideological Profile.” Eight years later, from June through December of 2009, a comparable online survey of 300 Satanists was conducted. However, because of certain problems with the second questionnaire, a third online survey was launched in 2011 – a third survey which, as this article went to press, was still in process. The present paper compares findings from the first survey with the second, using preliminary statistics from the third survey to counterbalance inadequacies in certain of the statistics from the second. Comparing results from the first with results from the second, the average age of respondents rose from twenty-five to twenty-nine. Partly as a consequence of higher average age, the new sample exhibited more diversity – in terms of respondents having a broader range of educational backgrounds, an increased likelihood of being a parent, and the like. Similarly, while the majority of respondents to the new survey were still broadly within the LaVeyan tradition,a far greater percentage than in the old survey professed some variety of theistic or esoteric Satanism.
5. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Anson Shupe The Modern North American Anti-Cult Movement: Its Rise and Demise According to Resource Mobilization Theory
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The emergence of innovative or new religious movements (NRMs), often popularly called "cults," is a feature of religion in virtually every society. So are counter-movement or anti-cult groups (ACMs). Here I examine the rise and fall of the North American ACM enterprise as it attempted over a thirty-year span to mobilize both official and public alarm as well as repressive actions, within a pluralistic society with no official governmental supervisory agencies at any levels, to respond to concerns over possible religious abuses. In particular, the fate of the Cult Awareness Network (based in Chicago, Illinois and one of the two trulynational ACM organizations), employing the concepts of sociology's resource mobilization theory, is delineated. The ultimately self-destructive reliance on violence as an interventionist technique, as well as apparently criminal activities, are explored.
annotated bibliography
6. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Dawn Hutchinson, Dell deChant A Selection Of Books, Monographs, and Essays on "Contemporary Gnosticism"
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review article
7. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Adam Possamai Political Culture, The Nation of Islam, The Nuwaubian Nation and the Muslim Brotherhood
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This review essay will be inter-disciplinary and international. It will use theories from international politics, drawn from case studies from Lebanon and Algeria, to understand the sociological and anthropological tension experienced between some minority Muslim groups and the state in Europe and the United States. It will start with Benjamin MacQueen’s analysis of the theory of political culture and conflict resolution and adapt it to understand the situation of the Nation of Islam (Herbert Berg) and the Nuwaubian Nation (Susan Palmer) in the United States, and that of the Muslim Brothers in Europe (Brigitte Maréchal).
book reviews
8. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Göran Larsson Black Mecca: The African Muslims of Harlem by Zain Abdullah
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9. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Mark Chapman A Republic of Mind & Spirit: A Cultural History of American Metaphysical Religion by Catherine Albanese
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10. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Boris Knorre Netraditsionnye Religii v Sovremennoy Rossii [Non-Traditional Religions of Contemporary Russia] by Еvgeny Balagushkin
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11. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Inga Bårdsen Tøllefsen Grounding Religion, a Field Guide to the Study of Religion and Ecology by Whitney A. Bauman, Richard R. Bohannon II and Kevin J. O’Brien, eds.
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12. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Eglė Aleknaitė Nine Worlds of Seid-Magic: Ecstasy and Neo-Shamanism in North European Paganism by Jenny Blain
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13. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Nawaraj Chaulagain The Easternization of the West: A Thematic Account of Cultural Change in the Modern Era by Colin Campbell
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14. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Carole M. Cusack Patterns of Secularization: Church, State and Nation in Greece and the Republic of Ireland by Daphne Halikiopoulou
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15. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Sarah Balstrup The Red Book/Liber Novus by Carl Gustav Jung. Preface by Ulrich Hoerni. Edited and introduced by Sonu Shamdasani. Translated by Mark Kyburz, John Peck and Sonu Shamdasani
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16. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Markus Altena Davidsen Handbook of New Age by Daren Kemp and James R. Lewis, eds.
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17. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Tatiana B. Koval V Poiskakh Bessmertiya. Fedorovskoye Religiozno-Filosofskoye Dvizhenie [In the Search for Immortality. Fedorov’s Religious-Philosophic Movement]
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18. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
David Robertson Graven Images: Religion in Comic Books and Graphic Novels by A. David Lewis and Christine Hoff Kraemer, eds.
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19. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Jessica Moberg Practicing the Faith: The Ritual Life of Pentecostal-Charismatic Christians by Martin Lindhardt, ed.
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20. Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review: Volume > 2 > Issue: 2
Bernadette Rigal-Cellard Blackfoot Religion and the Consequences of Cultural Commoditization by Kenneth Hayes Logensgard
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