The way in which media discusses religion has changed over time. Due to the separation of state and church in 2000, the Swedish state to a lesser extent legitimizes its political ruling with references to religious concepts. As a result, a higher tolerance towards religious minorities can be said to have taken place. This is an ambiguous change however, where critique raised towards religious practices and expressions of minorities also occurs to a higher extent. The public debate is in large part conducted through the media, but is also seen to be produced and reproduced through the media?s discourse.

In the aftermath of September 11, 2001, issues related to religion and violence has beenactualized in the media. Do Islamic texts and sources legitimate violent actions? In responseto these questions, some professional scholars of Islam argued that the 11 September terroristswere not really Muslims, but hijackers of Islam. According to other scholars, such argumentsreflect a common sui-generis discourse in Religious studies which stresses the autonomy ofreligious phenomena, the priority of faith over cultural production, interior experiences andbeliefs over social practice. The scholars in favor for a naturalistic approach in religiousstudies argues that, in order to approach religion in a naturalistic way, we have to be critical ofrepresentations of religion ? and in this case representations of Islam ? drawing on a suigenerisdiscourse.

Since 2007 the American sitcom the Big Bang Theory has spread throughout the world. With its twenty million watchers it is one of the most popular sitcoms of our time. The starting point for this essay is that the humourus series with the more or less geeky main characters is more than just entertainment - it is a part of the mediatization of religion. This means that media is affecting the recipients? view on religion in general and the personal religion.

The history of books and libraries in the Philippines starts after the arrival of the Spaniards in 1521. During the Spanish era, most of the libraries were established through the religious orders to support their own religious mission. The Americans came in the beginning of the 20th century and have had a decisive influence on the education system and the development of libraries in the Philippines. For the analysis, I have used the models of Michael H. Harris and Magnus Torstensson in their studies of library development.

The aim for this essay is to investigate the importance of studying religion in an upper secondary school in Närke county, this is done by distribution of a questionnaire. The importance is studied both on the individual level and on the societal level. The result shows that although the students do not have a big interest in Religious studies still the subject has an importance on both an individual and a society level..

The aim of this study is to make a comparative study between the grievances during the Dacke Warand the German Peasant´s War. These two conflicts may have occurred separately, regarding bothgeographical and chronological distances but also share common issues for this comparative study.Less than two decades separates these two conflicts and they were all by their own serious insurrectionsduring their time. While the German Peasant´s War was the greatest uprising in Europe up tothe French Revolution, the Dacke War was the biggest Peasant Rebellion in Scandinavian history.While the German Peasant War has been studied and researched by historians for a relative longtime, the Dacke War has been neglected in research history. If it were not for the Swedish professorLars-Olof Larsson?s studies during foremost in the 1960s, the Dacke War would have been a historicallyuncharted territory of research indeed.

In January 2004 two members of the Pentecostal community Knutby Filadelfia in Uppsalamunicipality, Sweden, were shot by their fellow member Sara Svensson. With a qualitative hermeneutic case study as the principal method this essay takes on the task of not only investigating if and how Stockholm Syndrome can be used as a model for interpreting and understanding the violent incident in Knutby Filadelfia, but also to see if the unique characteristic of the Knutby incident can tell us something about Stockholm Syndrome as a model for understanding violence in religious movements. The material shows Stockholm Syndrome as having been present in Knutby because of among other things, a mileu, leadership and theology that supported the normalization of abuse and the enabling and maintaining of self punishment in the community. While Stockholm Syndrome still is a controversial theory this study shows that it can be used as a powerful tool in the understanding of violence in religious contexts..

The essay is about islam in swedish prisons. Problems and restrictions from the view of muslim inmates, prison imams and the swedish muslim counsil..

The fact that animals have feelings is something that is commonly agreed. Many authors showhow animals' views of their environment is quite similar with human views. Animals, whichare slaughtered without prior stunning, find the moment of slaughter unpleasant and stressing.This is shown in numerous of scientific studies. The cognitive ability of animals can becompared to how they experience feelings and scientists have shown how the structures in thebrain that involves feelings and cognitive behaviours in animals are very much the same asthe structures in human brains. Because of this, some scientists consider that behaviour inanimals can be directly interpreted into human feelings.Halal- and kosher slaughter comes from traditions.

Sweden  has  been  characterized  as  one  of  the world?s most  secular  countries, even though  it is  becoming  increasingly more multicultural.  This,  combined  with  the fact that pupils do  not  feel  they  have  enough  time  in  school  for  Religious  Education and that the requirements are increasing made me interested in how they talk about religion in upper secondary school. The aim of this study is to see if there are any differences between how pupils in vocational programs and academic programs are talking about religion and Religious Education. The main questions that were raised revolved around 1)  how  pupils  talk  about  what  religion  is,  2)  how  they  talk  about  religion  in  the Swedish  society  and  3) how  they  talk  about  Religious  Education  in  upper  secondary school. The questions were also about what similarities and differences I could find in the way they talked about these subjects.

In this essay, I research and discuss new spirituality (or what is commonly known as New Age) within some congregations in the Church of Sweden, Gothenburg. I question how and why this new spirituality has come to be accepted in parts of the Church. My hypothesis is that the church is a part, and a reflection, of a larger change throughout society, and I claim that this change depends much on the individualization and globalization during the last decades.The research is conducted through interviews with representatives from the Church ofSweden who are in charge of new religious activities. During these interviews we discuss their views on the change that has already taken place and is going on today.The interviews are then analyzed by applying rational choice theory on them. I discusswhether the Church can be seen as a producer of goods and services and if the churchgoers canbe seen as consumers of these goods and services.

  AbstractAnne Reese: Under oändliga lovsånger sannerligen med rinnande tårar ?  sångerna vid den heliga Katarinas translation. Uppsala universitet: Institutionen för musikvetenskap, uppsats för 60 p. 2005.The aim of this essay is to contribute to the knowledge about one of Sweden's greatest religious events during the late Middle Ages, the translation of Catherine of Sweden. By collecting and examining the chants used at Catherine's translation it is possible to see what kinds of music was used at this occasion and also to determine some thing about how and why these chants were chosenBy using manuscripts containing the chants which are close to the occasion in time and place, the melodies and texts are presented in the versions most likely to have been those used in the translation.

This is a qualitative research paper, which aims to examine how religion classes are conducted in inner-city and suburban schools. Interviews have been performed with two religion teachers, one at Grindtorp School in Alby and one at the English Gymnasium in Södermalm. There have been performed interviews with eight students, four from each school. The students have a different age, sex and religious beliefs. With these interviews we can get a better understanding how the students of today?s school think about the religious education.

Encounters between students and religious believers is common in the subject of Religious Education in Swedish schools. For pedagogical reasons teachers arranging these encounters hoping that exciting things will happen. But which qualities and experiences arise out of these encounters?In this study representatives of eight different religious communities are interviewed who regularly receive pupils coming to their respective communities. The proposed theoretical framework is related to Phenomenology and Hermeneutics and the methodological approach is interpretive.

In this essay I want to investigate how the Viking aristocratic warrior elite in Scandinavia used religious mythology for the construction of their identity. The essay also takes up the concept of honor, which was important for the warriors. Honor was central to all people during Viking age and for the warriors it was absolute. In the religious myths, the aristocratic warriors justify their position in society and legitimate their acts of war. Religion continues to have importance to the warrior elite even after the arrival of Christianity.