The religious in responses to mass atrocity : interdisciplinary perspectives / edited by Thomas Brudholm, Thomas Cushman.
Publisher: Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 2009Description: 1 online resource (xiii, 281 pages) : digital, PDF file(s)Content type:- text
- computer
- online resource
- 9780511575730 (ebook)
- 201/.76332 22
- BL65.V55 R56 2009

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 05 Oct 2015).
Religious rhetoric in responses to atrocity / Jennifer L. Geddes -- The limit of ethics, the ethics of the limit / Arne Grøn -- The intolerability of meaning : myth, faith, and reason in philosophical responses to moral atrocity / Peter Dews -- Can we punish the perpetrators of atrocities? / Antony Duff -- The ethics of forgiveness and the doctrine of just war : a religious view of righting atrocious wrongs / Nigel Biggar -- On the advocacy of forgiveness after mass atrocities / Thomas Brudholm -- Making whole : the ethics and politics of "coming to terms with the past" / John Torpey -- When faith meets history : the influence of religion on transitional justice / Daniel Philpott -- Genocidal rupture and performative repair in global civil society : reconsidering the discourse of apology in the face of mass atrocity / Thomas Cushman -- Violence, human rights, and piety : cosmopolitanism versus virtuous exclusion in response to atrocity / Bryan S. Turner.
A peculiar and fascinating aspect of many responses to mass atrocities is the creative and eclectic use of religious language and frameworks. Some crimes are so extreme that they 'cry out to heaven', drawing people to employ religious vocabulary to make meaning of and to judge what happened, to deal with questions of guilt and responsibility, and to re-establish hope and trust in their lives. Moreover, in recent years, religious actors have become increasingly influential in worldwide contexts of conflict-resolution and transitional justice. This collection offers a critical assessment of the possibilities and problems pertaining to attempts to bring religious - or semi-religious - allegiances and perspectives to bear in responses to the mass atrocities of our time: When and how can religious language or religious beliefs and practices be either necessary or helpful? And what are the problems and reasons for caution or critique? In this book, a group of distinguished scholars explore these questions and offer a range of original explanatory and normative perspectives.