Shared Religion but Still a Marginalized Other: Middle Eastern Christians’ Encounters with Political Secularism in the United Kingdomстатья из журнала
Аннотация: But I think one of the biggest shocks for many Copts coming from Egypt who are not familiar with the West, is that when they come to the West they think that they are immigrating to a Christian land. And it is a cultural shock for them to discover that it is nothing like that. (Coptic Orthodox male, 40s, 1st generation) Middle Eastern Christians have historically identified with a secular approach to politics as a means of promoting values such as freedom, equality, and tolerance, which would allow them to be fully accepted by Muslim majority societies and able to participate in all aspects of political and societal life.1 In part, this attachment to parties and regimes espousing a secular narrative has been a reaction against the apparent alternative of Islamists wishing to increase the public role of Islam, which would appear to restrict the rights of non-Muslims.2 The use of the term minority is contested when referring to Middle Eastern Christians in the region. On one hand, the term is applicable in a numerical sense due to their religious difference from the Muslim majority. On the other hand, it is problematic because it connotes a group that originated elsewhere, yet Middle Eastern Christian communities are indigenous to the region.3 However, as a consequence of their migration to the West starting since the mid-nineteenth century but primarily since the mid-twentieth century, the communities have found themselves in a minority context due to their Middle Eastern roots. Lise Paulsen Galal et al. have explored how Middle Eastern Christians in Europe belong ethnically and nationally to immigrant groups and can be seen as a “minority within the minority.”4 While concerns regarding misrecognition as other minority groups, most notably Muslims, are certainly important to Middle Eastern Christian migrants, this paper focuses upon the communal reaction to political secularism experienced in the United Kingdom.5 Claire Mitchell’s concept of religion as a boundary marker between an in-group and out-groups is helpful in explaining why a group may adapt different strategies depending upon the context.6 For Middle Eastern Christians, there was a perception that the Christian heritage of Western countries would lead to them becoming part of the majority due to shared religious identity. However, in this context, the discourse of equality and tolerance results in a secularism that disallows preferential treatment based upon religious identity and presents challenges to practicing Christianity. Thus, political secularism as a strategy to protect the rights of the community does not seem as productive in the diaspora context as it is in the Middle East. The disillusionment on perceiving that they have retained their status as a marginalised Other if framed in different terms will be explored using the case study of the United Kingdom, which has around 30,000-40,000 Middle Eastern Christians. The paper is based on research conducted with Coptic, Iraqi, and Assyrian communities in London and Scotland.7 The study locates the Middle Eastern Christian case study in a discussion on political secularism, church-state relations, and migration. The narratives of Middle Eastern Christians’ encounters with political secularism are explored in three parts. The first discusses perspectives on the notion of Britain as a Christian country; the second examines the impact on societal and political interactions of subsequent disillusionment with the place of religion in general and Christianity in particular in modern British society; and the third assesses the implications of these experiences for the involvement of younger generations in British society.
Год издания: 2018
Авторы: Fiona McCallum
Издательство: Oxford University Press
Источник: Journal of Church and State
Ключевые слова: Religion and Society Interactions, Religious Freedom and Discrimination, American Constitutional Law and Politics
Другие ссылки: Journal of Church and State (HTML)
St Andrews Research Repository (St Andrews Research Repository) (PDF)
St Andrews Research Repository (St Andrews Research Repository) (HTML)
St Andrews Research Repository (St Andrews Research Repository) (PDF)
St Andrews Research Repository (St Andrews Research Repository) (HTML)
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Том: 61
Выпуск: 2
Страницы: 242–261