A series on ‘Turbulent Religions, Alternative Futures’ has been launched on the University of Notre Dame’s ‘Contending Modernities’ blog. The series is a result of a joint Queen’s University-University of Notre Dame workshop, which was hosted by the Mitchell Institute in August 2023.

The posts explore ‘turbulent religions’, including the study of how religious actors, institutions, and discourses disrupt societal and political norms and practices, whether by contributing to violence or peacefully challenging injustices and inequalities.  They analyse religion’s role in historical and contemporary currents of violence – most notably around the themes of race and nationalism – and their relation to apocalyptic and conspiratorial thinking. 

Mitchell Institute Fellow: Religion, Arts and Peacebuilding, Professor Gladys Ganiel, has written the first post: ‘Can “the Ghosts of Religion Past” Rest in Peace? The Churches and Alternative Futures on the Island of Ireland.’ It analyses the historic role of the churches in promoting sectarianism and cultures of abuse, suggesting ways that religion can come to terms with its ‘sins’.

https://contendingmodernities.nd.edu/theorizing-modernities/ghosts-religion-ireland/