FreeMediaOnline.org Religion & Media
FreeMediaOnline.org arranges multimedia placement of articles and reports on the media coverage of religion. We focus on such issues as religious tolerance, inter-religious dialogue, and religious radicalism.
Useful Religion & Media Links
The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom
http://www.uscirf.gov
USCIRF Saudi Arabia Policy Brief on Saudi exportation of religious intolerance
Link
USCRIF Materials on Religious Freedom in Arabic
Link
International Religious Freedom Report 2005 from U.S. State Dept.
Link | Fact Sheet
Overview of U.S. refugee policy in religious freedom cases
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Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication Religion and Media Interest Group
Link | AEJMC Home
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We also work with journalists worldwide to distribute their reports on topics related to religion.
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Religion & Media News
Dialogue among faiths key to understanding U.S. State Department public diplomacy chief Karen Hughes says
interfaith iftar teaches community, religious leaders about Islam more story...
Condoleeza Rice Describes the Impact of Religion on Her Job as Secretary of State Interview with John Revell, Editor, SBC Life, June 14, 2006 "I've always thought that one of the real lessons of our faith, of the central tenet of our faith -- the Resurrection -- is that Good Friday is followed by Easter Sunday. And I think we experience that personally time and time again, and I think as a country we've experienced that because you come out of these difficult times, if you use them to strengthen yourself, you come out of these difficult times more committed, and out of your own tragedies, to try and do great things. And I think that's what America has done. America has come out of September 11th not self-absorbed but rather, through our President, with a renewed mission to spread liberty and freedom and to stand for the cause of those who've been denied liberty and freedom." Full Text of the Interview... | Remarks at the Southern Baptist Convention Annual Meeting, Greensboro, North Carolina, June 14, 2006
Members of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCRIF) urge President Bush to raise the religious freedom issue with China "The Tibetan Buddhist community continues to be severely repressed. The Chinese government acknowledges that more than 100 Tibetan Buddhist monks and nuns are in prison - and according to human rights groups, they are subject to torture and ill treatment." More from USCIRF... | USCIRF Home | China Policy Brief from USCIRF
Interviews and Articles on Religion
New Europe Review interview with Mustafa ef. Ceric, religious leader of one of the largest Islamic communities in Europe — the Muslims of Bosnia, and a recipient of the UNESCO Felix Houphouët-Boigny Peace Prize in recognition of his furthering of inter-faith dialogue, tolerance and peace. I hope that the generation of Muslims born in Europe will be able to reinterpret Islam. I think that we, together with Turkey — on the condition that Turkey opens itself to theological debates — should offer an alternative to the current interpretation of Islam.
Paul Goble's Window on Eurasia
Some in Moscow Patriarchate Seek Orthodox-Catholic ‘Alliance’ Against Islam Vienna, September 29, 2006 – Despite President Vladimir Putin’s bow to anti-Catholic sentiments among many Russians and repeated repeated calls by Patriarch Aleksii II for Muslim-Orthodox concord, senior churchmen within the Patriarchate itself are pursuing an Orthodox-Catholic alliance against Islam, according to a leading Russian historian. more story...
French Minority Policies Show Moscow What Not to Do, Muslims Say Vienna, September 6, 2006 – France, “one of the few countries of the world which does not recognize ethnic minorities officially,” offers some important, if largely negative, lessons to Moscow and the minorities of the Russian Federation, according to a group of Muslim analysts in Nizhniy Novgorod. more story...
Dalai Lama Sees Russia’s Buddhists Helping Tibetan Faith Survive Vienna, September 5, 2006 – The Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of the world’s Buddhists, says that because of conditions in his homeland, “Mongolia and Buddhist Russia will play the predominant role” in the preservation and growth of Tibetan Buddhism in the future. more story...
Clashes in Karelian City Said to be a Wake Up Call for Russia Vienna, September 4, 2006 – Clashes over the last week between Russians and immigrants from the Caucasus in the Karelian city of Kondopoga which have left at least three dead, many injured or detained, and some property destroyed and on which Moscow sought to impose a news blockade until yesterday must be a wake up call for Russia. more story...
Moscow’s Efforts to Play Islamic Card Said Likely to Backfire Vienna, September 4, 2006 – The Russian government’s efforts to win favor in the Islamic world by providing arms to Iran and Sudan, meeting with the leader of Hamas, and denouncing Israeli’s actions against
Hezbollah not only are unlikely to work in the way Moscow hopes but are certain to backfire against Russia in the future. more story...
Russian Orthodox Say Non-Christians Must Study Orthodoxy Vienna, September 1, 2006 – The increasingly successful efforts of the Russian Orthodox Church to make the study of the Foundations of
Orthodoxy a compulsory subject in Russian schools even for non-Christians is generating a backlash among Muslims and has sparked a debate over the proper relationship of state and church. more story...
Russian Supreme Court Refuses to Block Demolition of Astrakhan Mosque Vienna, September 1, 2006 – The Russian Federation Supreme Court has rejected an appeal by members of the Muslim community of Astrakhan against orders from the city government there to tear down a mosque they had built not only with the approval but the support of the previous city government. more story...
Russians Risk ‘National Suicide’ by Turning Away from Traditions Vienna, August 31, 2006 – According to the scholar who helped to develop President Vladimir Putin’s new demographic program, the Russian nation and consequently the Russian state as well risk committing a kind of collective suicide if they continue to turn away from their national traditions. more story...
Russia’s Muslims Need to Open ‘Gates of Interpretation’ on Organizational Issues Vienna, August 31, 2006 – Like their fellow believers elsewhere, Russia’s Muslims have no need to open “the gates of interpretation” (“ijtihad”) on fundamental questions of faith, according to a leading Islamic commentator. But if they are to be true to their beliefs, they must reopen those gates on organizational and communications questions. more story...
Russia’s Muslims Urged to Unite to Block Orthodox Offensive Vienna, August 30, 2006 – Russia’s Muslims must come together in a single institution in order to be in a position to block Orthodox Church’s unconstitutional and potentially extremely dangerous efforts to dominate the country’s public schools, its military and security services, and its penal institutions, according to the mufti in Krasnoyarsk kray. more story...
Soviet-Style ‘Punitive’ Psychiatry Reappears in Russia Vienna, August 29, 2006 – Russian prosecutors are reviving a discredited practice of the Soviet past -- the use of psychiatric expertise for political purposes – but now as part of a broader effort to find a
justification for banning Islamic texts that officials view as
incitements to terrorist violence. more story...
Putin Plenopotentiary Calls for Expanding Muslim Training System Vienna, August 29, 2006 – Aleksandr Konovalov, the Presidential plenopotentiary representative in the Volga Federation District, said earlier this month that he and the Russian government would like to see a dramatic expansion in schools training Muslim leaders and are prepared to do what they can to help make that possible. more story...
Is Russian Opposition to Expansion of Mosque Actually Growing? Vienna, August 28, 2006 – More than 10,000 Russians have signed an Internet petition against the refurbishment and expansion of Moscow’s Cathedral Mosque, but at least one Muslim leader believes that many of these are made-up names and reflect not popular attitudes but “a planned provocation” by unnamed anti-Muslim forces. more story...
Russia’s Human Rights Community Denounced for ‘Seven Sins’ Vienna, August 25, 2006 – Human rights activists in the Russian Federation have only themselves to blame for their declining influence in broader society and the crisis in which their community finds itself, according to a commentary published this week in a leading Moscow business newspaper. more story...
Russia’s Muslims Recapitulate Pre-1917 Developments Vienna, August 25, 2006 – The Muslim community (“umma”) of the Russian Federation is recapitulating many of the developments – organizational, ideological, and political -- of its predecessor at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries, according to a leading Russian specialist on the recent history of Islam in Eurasia. more story...
Russia’s Muslims View Regional Policies in EU as Possible Models Vienna, August 23, 2006 – Muslim scholars in Nizhniy Novgorod are examining the regional and ethnic policies of European Union countries with an eye to incorporting that experience in their own political demands, the latest indication of the extent to which the EU is having an impact well beyond its own borders. more story...
Culture, Not Cash Driving Demographic Trends in Russia Vienna, August 21, 2006 – Differences in continuing attachment to traditional culture explain far more of the variance in demographic behaviour among national groups in the Russian Federation than do variations in material well-being, according to a factor analysis of post-Soviet census data. more story...
Ethnic Russian Converts to Islam Turning Up in Terrorist Groups Vienna, August 21, 2006 – Although the total number of ethnic Russians who have converted to Islam in recent years is not large – certainly fewer than 20,000 – the participation of a small number of them in terrorist actions against Moscow is attracting ever more Russian media attention and concern. more story...
Why ‘Islamism’ Remains a Taboo Term for Russian Elites Vienna, August 2, 2006 – Most of the leaders of Russia’s Muslim community and a significant share of that country’s political elite are reluctant to use the term “Islamism,” lest they be misunderstood by domestic and international audiences, according to a Russian political commentator. more story...
Russian Democracy Must Reflect National Traditions, Metropolitan Kirill Insists Vienna, August 2, 2006 – Russian democracy, understood “in the first instance as the harmonization of interests,” must reflect the
specific features of the country’s history and culture or it will be rejected by the Russian people, according to one of the most senior hierarchs of the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church. more story...
Many of Russia's Muslims Back Moscow on Hezbollah and HAMAS Vienna, August 2, 2006 – Muslims in the Russian Federation generally `back Moscow’s decision not to include Hezbollah and HAMAS on a list of terrorist organizations, some because they support the programs of these two groups but most because of deference to the government, according to an informal survey conducted by a Muslim news agency. more story...
A Russian ‘Paradox’ -- A Monastery Opens in a Closed City Vienna, August 1, 2006 – Patriarch Aleksii II this week opened a monastery in the closed city of Surov, better known by its Soviet-era designation as Arzamas-16, a location barred to outsiders where the Russian Federation has developed and continues to produce some of its most
advanced nuclear weapon systems. more story...
Some Russian Officials Want to End Jury Trials in Hate Crime Cases Vienna, July 31, 2006 – A recent spate of high profile trials in which Russian juries have refused to convict individuals charged with hate crimes against ethnic and religious minorities has prompted the Social Chamber’s Commission on Tolerance and Freedom of Conscience to call
for an end to jury trials in such cases. more story...
‘Foundations of Orthodoxy’ Taught in Many Russian Schools, Muslim Leader Complains Vienna, July 31, 2006 – In violation of the Constitution and despite debates in Moscow over how religious issues should be handled in public schools, education officials in numerous Russian oblasts already have introduced a “Foundations of Orthodoxy” course, and in some cases, Russian Orthodox priests are serving as instructors. more story...
Is Kazan Playing the Religious Card Back Against Moscow? Vienna, July 28, 2006 – Tatarstan President Mintimir Shaimiyev says his government will provide funds for the reconstruction of an Old Believer Church in Kazan, a step many Tatars and Russians are certain to view as Kazan’s response to increasing Russian Orthodox efforts to play up
distinctions between the Kryashens and Muslim Tatars. more story...
Has the Moscow Patriarchate’s Chaplin Finally Gone Too Far? Vienna, July 28, 2006 – Over the last several months, Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin, the deputy chief of the Moscow Patriarchate’s External Relations Department, has departed from his normal diplomatic style and lashed out at Muslims, journalists writing about religious issues, and others he considers to be “enemies of the Church.” more story...
Russia’s Muslim Leadership Greet End to Deferments for Religious Vienna, July 27, 2006 – In a move reflecting the longstanding position of the Union of Muftis of Russia (SMR) but also one calculated to please the Kremlin, a senior SMR official has welcomed the end of draft deferments for those studying in religious schools and those already serving as religious leaders. more story...
St. Petersburg Focuses on Ethnic, Not Religious Intolerance Vienna, July 26, 2006 – Officials in St. Petersburg have announced the first ever city-level program in the Russian Federation to combat xenophobia and intolerance, but the program, slated to run until 2010, devotes almost all its attention to relations among ethnic and national groups rather than to those among the city’s religious communities. more story...
Buddhists Defeat Buryat Government in Court Vienna, July 26, 2006 – For the first time anyone can remember, the Buddhist community of Buryatia has won a case in court against the authorities
there, a measure of the growing confidence of that religious group in its power and its increasing willingness to rely on the Russian Federation’s legal system. more story...
Where Beria Still Walks the Halls in Moscow… Vienna, July 24, 2006 – Every city has its legends and traditions, often believed in by one or another group in the population regardless of their plausibility or even possibility. And thus it should be no surprise that the city of Moscow, given its complicated history, has more than its share of such beliefs. more story...
Russian Officials, Muslim Leaders to Boost Ties in North Caucasus Vienna, July 24, 2006 – The Coordinating Center of Muslims of the North Caucasus – the only Muslim body in the Russian Federation explicitly created to fight extremism – has announced plans to expand the level and intensity of its cooperation with Russian officials in the Southern Federal District. more story...
Officials Mistreat St. Petersburg’s One Million Muslims, Leader Says Vienna, July 21, 2006 – Dzhamaleddin Makhmutov, the deputy head of St. Petersburg’sAl-Fatkh Muslim Organization, said this week that police and other officials in Russia’s northern capital now practice “systematic discrimination” against the one million Muslims living there. more story...
Provincial Cities Said to Hold the Key to Russia’s Spiritual Future Vienna, July 18, 2006 – Sixty percent of the residents of the Russian Federation now live in its provincial cities, more than twice as many as those who reside in rural areas and more than four times the number who live in the the megalopolises of Moscow and St. Petersburg. more story...
Orthodox Better Off under Islamic Rule Rather than Catholic, Muslim Says Vienna, July 17, 2006 – However counterintuitive it may seem, Orthodox Christians have often been treated better and had their faith protected when they have lived under Muslim rule than when their community has been part of a state dominated by Catholicism, according to a Muslim commentator from Tatarstan. more story...
Russia’s Muslims Urge Legalizing Waqf System to Support Islamic Activities Vienna, July 13, 2006 – Muslims in the Russian Federation are pressing for new laws that will allow for the extensive development in their country of “waqfs,” the Arabic term for properties Muslims turn over to their parishes to support mosques, religious education and other community needs. more story...
‘Religious Rebirth’ Programs Seen Threatening Russia’s Unity, Modernization Vienna, July 13, 2006 – A turn to religious belief is playing a positive role in helping individual Russians recover from the Soviet period, but calls by the leaders of the country’s traditional faiths for the government to promote a national “religious rebirth” threaten Russia’s unity and modernization, according to a leading Moscow analyst. more story...
Moscow Fails to See Politics Behind Terrorism, Analyst Argues Vienna, July 12, 2006 -- Moscow’s reaction to the killings of Russian diplomats in Iraq and the death of Chechen militan Shamil Basayev highlights the failure of senior Russian officials to grasp the political nature of terrorism, a shortcoming that will limit the Russian government’s ability to combat it, according to a senior Moscow analyst. more story...
Editor Who Broke Soviet Anti-Religious Taboos Dead at 77 Vienna, July 11, 2006 – Vladimir Shevelyov, the Russian writer and editor who helped to open the pages of Moscow’s leading publications to honest discussions of religious life at the end of Soviet times, died last Friday and was eulogized by religious leaders yesterday as “the founder of Russian secular journalist on religion.” more story...
Putin Questioners Divided on Orthodoxy’s Role in Russian Life Vienna, July 11, 2006 – An analysis of the 1130 questions about religious affairs sent in to President Vladimir Putin for his Internet press conference on July 6th suggests that Russians are deeply divided over the role the Moscow Patriarchate should play in political and social life. more story...
Orthodox Academic Details What Every Russian Must Know About Islam Vienna, July 7, 2006 – Russia’s Christians understand the country’s Muslims better than the latter understand the former, according to a leading Russian Orthodox specialist on Islam and other non-Christian faiths. But there are many aspects of Islam that Russian Christians must know more about if they are to deal with the challenges Muslims present. more story...
Russian Orthodox Official Calls for Blacklisting Church’s Enemies Vienna, July 6, 2006 – Archpriest Dmitriy Smirnov, who heads the Moscow Patriarchate’s Department for work with the Russian military, police and other force structures, has called for the compilation and publication of a list of “enemies” of the Russian Orthodox Church. more story...
Bombing of Mosque Near Moscow Denounced as ‘Provocation’ July 5, 2006 – Less than a day after President Vladimir Putin told a Moscow meeting of international religious leaders that “tolerance” forms “the basis of civil peace in contemporary Russia,” a person or persons unknown attempted to blow up a Muslim prayer hall in a city near the Russian capital. more story...
Moscow’s Actions in Chechnya, Islamic World Reflect ‘Double Standards,’ Analyst Says Vienna, July 4, 2006 -- Moscow often complains about what it calls the West’s “double standards” on Chechnya, but it is equally inconsistent in its approach to the Muslim world, simultaneously seeking out friends among Islamic radicals abroad while cracking down against them in the northern Caucasus, a leading Russian analyst argues. more story...
Russia Will Soon Disappear From the Map, German Filmmaker Says Vienna, July 4, 2006 – A German filmmaker has predicted that Russia will soon disappear from the map of the world, the victim of demographic change – declining ethnic Russian population and rising Muslim population -- and international competition for access to its natural resources. more story...
‘Iranians Love Russians with an Almost Irrational Love’ Vienna, July 3, 2006 – Iranians “love Russians almost irrationally,” according to a Moscow journalist who travelled to several cities there. But many of the residents of that country know little about their northern neighbor, and the images of it they now get on television are increasingly contradictory. more story...
Russia’s Muslims Remain Divided on Idea of Chaplaincy Corps Vienna, July 3, 2006 – Muslims in the Russian Federation remain deeply divided about the idea of creating a new chaplaincy corps in the country’s military, something that reflects both fears about the ways in which the Russian Orthodox Church might exploit that situation and the absence of a clergy as such within Islam. more story...
Moscow’s Plan to Close Religions Museum Angers Muslims Vienna, June 30, 2006 – Moscow’s announced plans to eliminate the Museum of History of Religions in St. Petersburg by combining it with Russian Ethnographic Museum there into a single Museum of Civilizations will destroy a unique institution and work against the interests of Russia’s Muslims, a leading Muslim broadcaster says. more story...
Moscow’s Ties to Islamic World Could Make Russia a ‘Russistan,’ Chudinova Says Vienna, June 29, 2006 – The Kremlin’s ongoing efforts to form alliances with countries in the Islamic world might under certain conditions help Moscow to win a kind of victory over the United States, but such a victory, however welcome, would be Pyrrhic because it would help convert Russia into a “Russistan,” Elena Chudinova warned last week. more story...
Russian Officers Denounce ‘Clericalization of the Military’ Vienna, June 29, 2006 – A group of Russian officers has denounced what it calls the unconstitutional “clericalization” of the Russian armed forces and says that by promoting that development, the Orthodox Church and some in the higher command are spreading Islamophobia and thus undermining the military’s cohesion. more story...
Baku Blocks Young Azeris From Studying at Islamic Universities Abroad Vienna, June 28, 2006 – The Azerbaijani authorities reportedly are prohibiting young people there who want to study in Islamic universities in Iran, Egypt and other Muslim countries from going abroad as part of Baku’s broader campaign to prevent the spread of political Islam in that south Caucasus republic. more story...
Putin Said Exploiting Religion to Control Electorate Vienna, June 27, 2006 – Religion plays a major role in Russian elections, not so much by energizing the population to vote for one or another
candiate but rather by “sacralizing” the existing power structures and thus reducing the chances that Russian voters will select someone that those in power do not approve. more story...
Muslim Leader Decries Patriarchate’s Violations of Russian Constitution Vienna, June 23, 2006 – A leading Muslim leader last week condemned the Moscow Patriarchate for violating the Russian Constitution’s provisions calling for the separation of church and state and for the equality of religions, criticism that many Orthodox Christians say is wrong but the ever more Muslims argue is long overdue. more story...
Russia’s Religious Oppose Ending Deferments for Seminarians Vienna, June 21, 2006 – The leaders of Russia’s largest religious communities – Orthodoxy, Islam, and Protestantism – are individually and collectively speaking out against Defense Ministry plans to end existing draft deferments for those studying in their respective religious training institutions. more story...
Moscow Urged to Mobilize CIS Muslims Against U.S. Vienna, June 19, 2006 – Moscow should mobilize Muslim groups in the countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States in order to block the expansion of American influence in that region, according to Geidar Dzhemal, the head of the Islamic Committee of Russia who has often allied himself with Russia’s most anti-Western politicians. more story...
Russia’s Muslims Shift from Building Mosques to Training Mullahs Vienna, June 16, 2006 – Russia’s Muslims have built more than 7,000 mosques over the last 15 years, but many of them lack either a congregation capable of supporting them or well-trained mullahs who can lead these communities. As a result, the country’s Muslim leaders are shifting their attention away from the construction of mosques to the training of mullahs. more story...
New Site Helps Muslim Women in Russia Find Muslim Husbands Abroad Vienna, June 16, 2006 – Muslim women in the Russian Federation who would like to marry Muslim men abroad can now turn to the first such website that seeks not only to facilitate marriages of this type but also to promote Islamic family values, acccording to one of its organizers. more story...
Ethnic Russian Converts Seen Threatening Tatar Dominance of Islam in Russia Tallinn, June 15, 2006 – Even as Tatars this week marked the 1,117th anniversary of the adoption of Islam by their forefathers in the Middle Volga, some of their number expressed concern that a recent wave of ethnic Russian conversions to Islam could reduce Tatar sominance of the Islamic community in the Russian Federation. more story...
Baku’s Approach on Radical Islam Said a Model for Post-Soviet States Tallinn, June 15, 2006 – Baku has blocked the rise of a radical Islamist movement there despite the fact that Azerbaijan has many of the preconditions „essential” for such a movement, and that very success should make it „a model” for Russia and other post-Soviet states, according to a leading Moscow analyst. more story...
Orthodox Church Fights Internet Dependence in Yekaterinburg Tallinn, June 14, 2006 -- Following a tragic incident in which a Yekaterinburg schoolboy suffered a fatal stroke after play video games twelve hours a day, the rehabilitation center operated by that city's Russian Orthodox Church eparchate is now working to combat a rising tide of Internet dependence there. more story...
Patriarch’s Decoration of Vodka King Outages Russia’s Muslims Tallinn, June 13, 2006 – Patriarch Aleksii II’s decision to decorate senior officials from one of Russia’s largest vodka producers has outraged many Russian Muslims not only because of Islam’s prohibition of the use of alcohol but also because of the cozy relationship between the Russian Orthodox Church and big business that this award calls attention to. more story...
'Moderate Islam' Is Not Equivalent to Islamic Moderation, Writer Says Tallinn, June 13, 2006 – „The difference between Islamic moderation and ‚moderate Islam’ is approximately the same as that between a water pipe and a sewer,” according to a leading Muslim commentator in Russia. And those who confuse the two, he says, are consciously or not undermining the Islamic faith. more story...
Islamic Revival in Russia Less than Meets the Eye, Muslim Leader Says Tallinn, May 29, 2006 -- Over the last 15 years, the head of the Nizhniy Novogorod Muslim Spiritual Drectorate (MSD) said last week, Russia’s Muslims have opened a large number of new mosques but they have done far less to transform either themselves or their community than Islam requires. more story...
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