PLURITANS will consider the spectrum of meanings and manifestations of living with differences—from ‘toleration’ understood in the thinnest sense to ‘toleration’ embodied and enacted as a virtue; from the expressions of ‘deep pluralism’ understood as an agonistic and transformative encounter of religious and secular differences, to the ideals and practices of ‘covenantal pluralism’ understood as a capacity to freely affirm one’s religious tradition, while having a sense of solidarity with those outside one’s community.
These ideas and ideals of living with differences will be probed in the context of intra-religious, interreligious, and religious-secular pluralisms in the Balkans.
1—The notion of intrareligious pluralism will be examined along theological and national lines within various types of Christianity, and in terms of internal pluralism that exists within each distinctive religious tradition and community in the region—Jewish, Christian, and Muslim.
2—The analysis of interreligious pluralism will attend to the rich resources of everyday experiences of interreligious engagements—consider how these engagements help engender religious literacy, how they are influenced by or resist the anti-pluralist impetus of political currents, and how they are shaped by or escape the rigid logic of nation-states.
3—The examination of “religious-secular pluralism” will reflect on the history of communist atheism in the region but will especially inquire into the new meanings of secular, secularity and secularism. The latter includes the relationship between secularism and different configurations of religio-national identities, as well as the manner in which religious-secular pluralism frames the dialogue between faith and science or fosters democratic arrangements needed for a robust, pluralistic public life.
PLURITANS’ activities have three objectives: academic, pedagogical, and public.
Pursuing these mutually connected goals, PLURITANS seeks to transform the conversations about the Balkan interreligious, intrareligious, and religious-secular pluralism in three ways:
1—By building an interdisciplinary network of scholars who will work together toward an understanding of the range of ideas and ideals of pluralism in the region as these emerge in scholarly conversations and in the practices of everyday life. The project will involve scholars representing philosophical, theological, ethical, anthropological, historical, sociological and religious studies perspectives.
2—By organizing workshops and a conference that will produce academic papers as well as frame the range of pedagogical tools for teaching classes on religious and religious-secular pluralism, especially in the context of higher education and lifelong learning initiatives.
3—By organizing public events that will bridge the academic-public divide, initiate informed conversations about interreligious, intrareligious, and religious-secular pluralism in the Balkans societies, and help foster public partnerships among academics, religious leaders, journalists, public intellectuals and NGO representatives.
