Religion Watch Archives

Monitoring Trends in Religion - From February 1990 to January 2016

New models of guru–disciple relationships

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In the American context, the traditional model of guru has frequently given way to a new type of spiritual masters having a non-exclusive relationship with their disciples, Lola L. Williamson (Millsapas College) explained at the Montreal conference of the American Academy of Religion (Nov. 7–10), which RW attended. During what Williamson described as “phase one,” […]

On/File: September/October 2009

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Willigis Jäger, a former Benedictine monk and highly successful Catholic meditation teacher in Germany, has recently created his own Zen Buddhist lineage, after leaving the Sanbô-Kyôdan Zen school in January. In recent years, Jäger had trained thousands of people at his center (since 2003) called Benediktushof, in Holzkirchen (Germany), a former Benedictine monastery bought by […]

Findings & Footnotes: September/October 2009

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01: The new book Holy Mavericks (NYU Press, $20) casts a wide net in its study of evangelical innovators, profiling charismatic televangelists Joel Osteen and Paula White, megachurch pastors Rick Warren and T.D. Jakes, and “emerging church” pioneer Brian McLaren. Co-authors Shayne Lee and Phillip Luke Sinitiere see these evangelical innovators as helping to create […]

Hindu extremists target Nepal’s Christian institutions

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Christian institutions in Nepal are getting regular threats from Hindu extremist groups since the May bomb attack against a Roman Catholic church, which killed three people and severely wounded 15 others, reports Eglises d’Asie (Sept. 1). This represents a case of non-Muslim terrorist activities claiming a religious background. A number of prominent Hindu leaders, including […]

Hizbut Tahrir movement makes progress in Malaysia

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The Islamic Liberation Party, Hizbut Tahrir (HT), is becoming increasingly prominent in Southeast Asia, especially in Indonesia and Malaysia, reports Mohamed Nawab Mohamed Osman (Nanyang Technological University, Singapore) in Studies in Conflict and Terrorism (July). The article focuses especially on HT in Malaysia, a country where it had never been researched before. A truly transnational […]

Sufi orders an unlikely alternative to political Islam in North Africa

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In Morocco and Algeria, Sufism is increasingly seen as an alternative to political Islam, either because it plays that card, such as the Alawiyya in Algeria, or because Sufi orders are politically instrumentalized by the regimes in power, as it is by the Moroccan monarchy and the Bushishiya order. But such hopes could prove to […]

Denmark’s “late modern” form of Theosophy draws seekers

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After decades of quasi-hibernation, the Theosophical Society (TS) in Denmark has started growing again. The number of its members quadrupled over the past twenty years, from 300 to nearly 1,200, writes René Dybdal Pedersen (University of Aarhus, Denmark) in the latest issue of Aries: Journal for the Study of Western Esotericism (9(2), 2009). Many TS […]

Portugal’s Catholic way of secularization

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While Portugal shows signs of secularization, the pattern of religious decline is far from uniform, with the Catholic Church enjoying greater social and media influence, according to Steffen Dix. Throughout its history, the trajectory of secularization in Portugal has been anything but unidirectional, according to Dix, who presented a paper at the ASR conference in […]

Current Research: September/October 2009

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01: Although more Americans are joining the ranks of the unchurched, most of the movement away from organized religion took place earlier than 1991, according to a study by Michael Hout and Claude Fischer presented at the meeting of American Sociological Association in San Francisco (held the same time as the ASR). Reports that the […]