Ulrich Schmiedel

Populism is a buzzword. This compilation explores the significance of religion for the controversies stirred up by populist politics in European and American contexts in order to understand what lies behind the buzz. Engaging Jewish, Christian, and Islamic political thought and theology, contributions by more than twenty established and emerging scholars explore right-wing and left-wing protests, offering critical interpretations and creative interventions for a polarized public square. Both methodologically and thematically, the compilation moves beyond essentialist definitions of religion, encouraging a comparative approach to political theology today.

Spätestens seit den Anschlägen vom 11. September 2001 steht Religion unter Generalverdacht. In der vorliegenden Studie untersucht Ulrich Schmiedel, wie in der englischsprachigen politischen Theologie auf die Terroranschläge reagiert wurde. Die auf den deutschen Staatsrechtler Carl Schmitt zurückgehende Freund-Feind-Unterscheidung erweist sich dabei als Kernkonzept in der Kontroverse um liberale und postliberale Religionstheorien, die Verfechter und Verächter des globalen Krieges gegen den Terror ausfochten. Unter Bezug auf Dorothee Sölles politische Theologie verwickelt Schmiedel beide in ein Gespräch mit muslimischen Rechts- und Religionsgelehrten. Daraus entwickelt er die Konturen einer koalitionären und komparativen politischen Theologie für pluralistische Gegenwartsgesellschaften.

The far right is on the rise across Europe, pushing a battle scenario in which Islam clashes with Christianity as much as Christianity clashes with Islam. From the margins to the mainstream, far-right protesters and far-right politicians call for the defence of Europe's Christian culture. The far right claims Christianity. "The Claim to Christianity" investigates contemporary far-right claims to Christianity. Ulrich Schmiedel and Hannah Strømmen examine the theologies that emerge in the far right across Europe, concentrating on Norway, Germany and Great Britain. They explore how churches in these three countries have been complicit, complacent or critical of the far right, sometimes intentionally and sometimes unintentionally. Ultimately, Schmiedel and Strømmen  encourage a creative and collaborative theological response. To counter the far right, Christianity needs to be practiced in an open and open-ended way which calls Christians into contact with Muslims.

This book explores the roles of religion in the current refugee crisis of Europe. Combining sociological, philosophical, and theological accounts of this crisis, renowned scholars from across Europe examine how religion has been employed to call either for eliminating or for enforcing the walls around “Fortress Europe.” Religion, they argue, is radically ambiguous, simultaneously causing social conflict and social cohesion in times of turmoil. Charting the constellations, the conflicts, and the consequences of the current refugee crisis, this book thus answers the need for succinct but sustained accounts of the intersections of religion and migration.

This study confronts the current crisis of churches. In critical and creative conversation with the German theologian Ernst Troeltsch (1865-1923), Ulrich Schmiedel argues that churches need to be “elasticized” in order to engage the “other.” Examining contested concepts of religiosity, community, and identity, Schmiedel explores how the closure of church against the sociological “other” corresponds to the closure of church against the theological “other.” Taking trust as a central category, he advocates for a turn in the interpretation of Christianity—from “propositional possession” to “performative project,” so that the identity of Christianity is “done” rather than “described.” Through explorations of classical and contemporary scholarship in philosophy, sociology, and theology, Schmiedel retrieves Troeltsch’s interdisciplinary thinking for use in relation to the controversies that encircle the construction of community today. The study opens up innovative and instructive approaches to the investigation of the practices of Christianity, past and present. Eventually, church emerges as a “work in movement,” continually constituted through encounters with the sociological and the theological “other.”

Studies on 9/11 could fill a library. In this short introduction, the editor explains the reason for overcoming the hesitation to add more studies to this library by contextualizing and charting the key concerns and the key concepts of the following contributions. These contributions suggest that 9/11 is not necessarily the watershed between a pre-and a post-9/11 order that politicians and pundits continue to write about. Instead, the attacks have served as a catalyst for trends and trajectories in the global governance of religion that continue to have a significant impact today. Returning to 9/11, then, the contributions take stock of these trends and trajectories in order to chart new ways of engaging with religion in the public square.

Both inside and outside the academy, identifications of Islam as a terrorist threat have gained traction during the ongoing War on Terror. William Cavanaugh's conceptualization and critique of what he calls "the myth of religious violence" claims to offer a critique of these identifications. This critique has been influential across a variety of disciplines. In this article, I assess both his more philosophicalcritical and his more theological-constructive accounts of religion to argue that Cavanaugh's myth is, essentially, apologetics. Cavanaugh's apologetics for the church camouflages the differential treatment of religions during the War on Terror. If it has been about a myth at all, then the War on Terror has been about the myth of Muslim violence. Christianity past and present has condoned and contributed to this very myth. What is needed, then, is a conception and a critique of "religion" that, in contrast to Cavanaugh's analysis, can account for the significance of Christianity for the differential treatment of religions in the public square, both descriptively and prescriptively.

This article assesses the tension between cosmopolitan and communitarian approaches to the ethics of migration by analysing how the Protestant Church in Germany (EKD) has responded to the current so-called migration crisis in Europe. I argue that the statements of the EKD frame people on the move either as migrants or as Muslims. These frames come with competing ethical consequences. Whereas migrants are presented as passive victims in need of some form of support by Christians, Muslims are presented as active victimisers in need of some form of suppression by Christians. However, when the then chairman of the EKD shook hands with people on the move who were arriving at Munich station in the summer of 2015, the surplus of meaning communicated in this encounter demonstrated that these people cannot be reduced to their respective framing, thus resisting the construction of both the cosmopolitan migrant frame and the communitarian Muslim frame. Accordingly, I advocate for a re-conceptualisation of the theological ethics of migration which takes multi-faith practices, such as these handshakes, as a point of departure.

This article interrogates the interpretation of Islam in the legacy of theological liberalism. Ernst Troeltsch (1865–1923) has been labelled the figurehead of such liberalism. Islam is a recurrent referent in his thought, running through his theological and philosophical writings. Whereas studies such as Tomoko Masuzawa’s immensely influential The Invention of World Religions contend that Troeltsch’s conceptualization of religion smuggles assumptions of the supremacy of Christianity from theological into non-theological research on religion, I argue that Troeltsch’s characterization of Islam clarifies how he both constructs and collapses the supremacy smuggling for which he is criticized. For the current controversies about Islam in the European and the American public square, Troeltsch is instructive because he captures both the problems and the promises of the theological thinking that came to be called “liberal” for the study of religion.

Taking the recent UN Report about extreme poverty in the UK as a point of departure, this article analyses and assesses William Cavanaugh’s political ecclesiology. Drawing on the interpretation of Martin Luther’s concept of creation in Scandinavian Creation Theology, I argue that creation destabilises the distinction Cavanaugh draws between what he considers to be church and what he considers not to be church. I account for creation as a web of vulnerability in which all creatures are vulnerable to both creature and creator. In contrast to Cavanaugh’s strong and stable church, I advocate for what I call “coalitional church”: a church that can enter into coalitions with Christians and non-Christians in order to call for conditions under which vulnerable life is liveable. The public and political task of churches is not necessarily to fight the state, but to hold the state accountable to its citizens, whether they are Christian or non-Christian.

As of 1 June 2018, the symbol of the cross has to be shown in all state offices of Bavaria in Germany. In order to chart the churches' reaction, I return to a conversation that Robert N. Bellah and Martin E. Marty had during the 1960s and the 1970s. Drawing on the core concepts of this conversation, I analyze and assess today's cross controversy as a case of what I call the 'populist predicament'. I argue that Marty's programme of public theology provides a path out of the populist predicament because it combines the celebration and the critique of identity. Ultimately, I advocate for a pluralist position of public theology in the post-migrant context.

Many ecclesiologists assume that pluralisation is a problem for churches. By drawing on Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s reception of Ernst Troeltsch, however, the author argues that pluralisation is instead a promise. Portraits which paint Bonhoeffer as ‘alternative’ to Troeltsch (and Troeltsch as ‘alternative’ to Bonhoeffer) have been proposed persistently. But in the ecclesiological explorations which Bonhoeffer elaborated in the 1920s and in the 1940s, Troeltsch’s impact on Bonhoeffer is neither simply negative nor simply positive – and should not be underestimated. The author aims to demonstrate that Bonhoeffer develops the ecclesiology which Troeltsch demanded in critical and creative discussion with him. Since it suggests that experiences of the other allow for encounters with God as much as encounters with God allow for experiences of the other, this ecclesiology provokes a re-thinking of pluralisation which might be important and instructive for the church in its current pluralised and pluralising contexts.

Whatever else it takes to drive a taxi, it takes trust. Day after day, the driver has to decide whether the other is or is not trustworthy. I take the taxi as a test case to analyze and assess Richard Kearney's diacritical hermeneutics of the other. I argue that Kearney functionalizes the concept of transcendence in order to connect the transcendence of the finite other to the transcendence of the infinite other. However, in his central critique of the deconstructionists following Jacques Derrida, Kearney counters his connection. While Kearney's critique of Derrida's account of absolute alterity is correct and compelling, I argue that Derrida's critique of a distinction between the trustworthy other and the non-trustworthy other might be more crucial than Kearney contends. Insisting on openness to the other's otherness, Derrida provokes any hermeneutic of the other to trust in transcendence. The taxi is taken as a test to illustrate the implications which diacritical and deconstructive drivers might have for evaluating the entanglement of ethics and eschatology—inside and outside the taxi.

Since the arrival, or the attempted arrival, of millions of refugees in Europe, the performances of the Center for Political Beauty – a Berlin-based collective of artists and activists – have had a huge impact on public and political debates about Germany’s migration policies. In this paper, I analyze the performance “The Dead Are Coming” in which the artists buried refugees who drowned in their attempt to enter the European Union. Drawing on Judith Butler’s political philosophy of performativity, I assess “The Dead Are Coming” as a “doing” rather than a “describing” of dignity. I argue that the integration of God into the practices of mourning enables both the activists and the audience to resist the differential distribution of dignity in Europe’s migration policy. Ultimately, I advocate a re-thinking of political theology in which art learns from theology and theology learns from art in order to promote dignity under de-dignifying conditions.

Churches are in crisis. The turn to praxis in ecclesiology appears to attend to the current crisis; yet, the appearance might be deceptive. Since post-liberal ecclesiologies – such as John Milbank’s – consider neither quantitative-empirical nor qualitative-empirical accounts of concrete churches, the turn might be assessed as a turn to talk about praxis instead of a turn to praxis. Confronting Milbank’s concept of praxis with the ecclesiology of Ernst Troeltsch (1865–1923), I argue that Troeltsch allows for accounts of concrete churches since he conceptualises the identity of Christianity not as a proposition but as a project. Hence, praxis is the criterion for the evaluation of concepts of identity. Both churches and reflections on churches are to be ‘elasticised’ in order to attend to the current crisis.

For theologians such as Karl Barth the support for Germany’s militaristic ambitions and actions voiced in the manifesto "An die Kulturwelt", published in 1914, was a consequence of the historicization of theology. Ernst Troeltsch (1865- 1923), whose interdisciplinary thinking revolved around the significance of history for theology, was labeled "the" theologian of historicism. Although he had not signed the manifesto, it continues to throw a smokescreen over Troeltsch’s theology.
Examining a selection of both his war writings and his post-war writings, I argue that Troeltsch conceptualized a political theology which led him to turn from a clash of cultures to a conversation of cultures. Troeltsch’s historicization of the concept of God allowed him to resist cultural relativism as well as cultural absolutism. Culminating in the concept of "Europeanism (Europäismus)", Troeltsch’s political theology is instructive for a variety of intra- and inter-cultural conversations in Europe today. But in order to unlock its potential, the smokescreen which the manifesto has thrown over Troeltsch’s theology needs to be lifted.

This extensive review explores the hermeneutics of religious and non-religious trust which is characteristic for the ›trilogy on trust‹ edited by Ingolf U. Dalferth and Simon Peng-Keller. I analyze the three compilations which investigate the constitution and communication of trust, trust in God, and trust in one’s life or life-world (basic trust). Finally, I discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the hermeneutics of trust which is developed in the trilogy. In critical conversation with this hermeneutics, I sketch that nonreligious trust has the potential to become religious trust, since both imply a recognition of the otherness of the other. Hence, a hermeneutics of trust has to be conceived and construed within both intra- and inter-religious dialogues.

This contribution to a Festschrift for Archbishop Antje Jackelén explores the theology operative in A World of Neighbours (AWoN), a multi-faith-based refugee relief network that collaborates with people on the move across Europe. I examine AWoN in conversation with the  work of the archbishop and the anarchist anthropologist David Graeber. Conversations between archbishops and anarchists are as rare as goosebumps in theology, but they might help to make sense of the theology that is operative in AWoN. Throughout, I suggest that goosebumps can be a sign of hope – a sign of the contagious hope that is at the core of AWoN’s theology.

Charting the conversation between Robert N. Bellah and Martin E. Marty in which the concept of public theology was coined, this chapter contends that public theologies have been haunted by a ghost – the ghost of theological liberalism, concretized in Paul Tillich. Instead of casting out the ghost, however, the chapter re-claims this legacy in order to carve out the contours of a criterion that allows for critical analyses and constructive assessments of theologies in the public square today: openness to otherness. If public theologies learn to open themselves to the other, they resist the interpretation and instrumentalization of theologies for the contagious construct of the clash of civilizations by calling for coalitions between Christians and non-Christians.

In what is commonly called the current refugee crisis, Christian values are claimed by both the defenders and the despisers of migrants coming from countries with Muslim majorities. The conflict between them has been captured using the category of “Christianism” which contrasts “honest Christianity,” which is hospitable to Muslim migrants, with “hijacked Christianity,” which is hostile to Muslim migrants. This chapter analyzes and assesses the category of Christianism as a contrast category, arguing that the contrast it constructs carries a logic of purity from the streets into scholarship. If scholars accept the category of Christianism, they can neither adequately study nor adequately shape the role of Christianity in the current migration crisis because they cannot “see” the ambiguity of any appeal to Christian values. Countering the clear-cut category of Christianism through ambiguous cases from Christianity's past and present, this chapter advocates for a methodological acknowledgment of the provocative and productive ambiguity of Christianity. The cracks in Christian values are crucial to countering the logic of purity where it is put to work. They offer public and political scholarship the chance to equip people to claim “Christian values” in a way that counters the distinction between the Christian West and the non-Christian “Rest,” identified with Islam.

In 2019, the federal government prosecuted Scott Warren, a volunteer with the humanitarian organization No More Deaths, for helping two migrants who had crossed the Sonoran Desert into the United States and for leaving water, food, and medical supplies in the desert. Warren challenged the charges against him, contending that under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), the government was substantially burdening the exercise of his religion. This chapter explores Warren’s prosecutions from legal and theological perspectives. Legally, the case highlights the criminalization of aiding migrants who are crossing the border into the United States and the use of RFRA to avoid criminal punishment for faith-based humanitarian acts. Theologically, the case draws attention to the public theology performed through such acts. The chapter shows how fragments of theology can be used to make a case against the state for civil initiatives that claim to uphold the law. For public theologians, the question is not so much whether Warren’s volunteering for No More Deaths is religious or nonreligious. The question is whether and which fragments of theology can help prevent the deaths of migrants at borders, both inside and outside the United States.

Migration challenges democracies characterized by the assumption that the citizens who are affected by the law are also its authors and that the citizens who are its authors are also affected by the law. Taking the “hijab affair” in France as a point of departure, this chapter aims to confront the constitution of the law in decisionist political theology and dialectical political theology with the figure of the migrant. The chapter argues that the migrant can be characterized as a theopolitical figure that resists the separation of citizen and noncitizen implied in the concept of strong and stable state sovereignty. Drawing on Seyla Benhabib’s account of democratic iterations, the chapter sketches the contours of a coalitional and comparative political theology in order to provide a theological reflection and a theological rationale for the theopolitics of the migrant already practiced across Europe.

Bei Migration geht es um die Ein- und Auswanderung von Menschen. Sie ist ein Dauerphänomen der Menschheitsgeschichte. Gegenwärtig wird Migration aber als Krise gedeutet. Die Migrationsethik steht im Spannungsfeld kommunitaristischer und kosmopolitischer Gerechtigkeitsvorstellungen. Die Frage nach der Geltung von Rechten, die unter Bezug auf vielfältige Fluchtursachen ausgehandelt wird, ist für die Ethik von entscheidender Bedeutung. Sie stellt die Trennung von Eingewanderten und Einheimischen, die in migrationspolitischen Debatten innerhalb und außerhalb der Universität reproduziert wird, neu zur Disposition.

The age of migration confronts churches with challenges. In this chapter, I analyze and assess the core concerns and the core concepts of ecclesiology under the conditions of modernity and under the conditions of migration. I argue for a coalitional church as a central category for ecumenical ecclesiology in the age of migration. By centering church on the “other”—the one who confronts people with difference—the category of coalitional church aims at overcoming the contrast between refugees and receivers in order to make church a church for all.

In der deutschsprachigen Theologie hat öffentliche Theologie - zumindest unter Liberalen - keinen guten Ruf. Dabei ließe sich im Rückblick auf die 1960er und 1970er Jahre feststellen, dass öffentliche Theologie von zwei liberalen Religionsforschern, Martin Marty und Robert Bellah, erfunden wurde. Das Programm einer liberalen öffentlichen Theologie, das diese beiden Religionsforscher entwickelten, kann heute genau die Auseinandersetzungen provozieren, die in postmigrantischen Gesellschaften gebraucht werden, indem es die Bedeutung christlicher und nichtchristlicher Religionen für die Aushandlung von Identität betont.

In seiner Studie Secularization: An Analysis at Three Levels, die sich auch als Synthese von Karel Dobbelaeres Arbeiten lesen lässt, definiert er Säkularisierung als einen Prozess, durch den Religion in Gesellschaften der Moderne mehr und mehr an Bedeutung verliert. Der Grundgedanke Dobbelaeres lautet, dass Säkularisierung nach makro-, meso- und mikrosoziologischer Ebene zu differenzieren ist. Die Säkularisierungsprozesse, die auf diesen Ebenen ablaufen, nennt Dobbelaere „societal secularization“, „organizational secularization“ und „individual secularization“. Seine Studie zeigt, wie sich diese Säkularisierungsprozesse (1) kontrastieren und (2) kombinieren lassen. Damit gelingt es Dobbelaere (3), die Debatte um Säkularisierung so zu systematisieren, dass man – auch wenn man sich mit guten oder weniger guten Gründen gegen die Säkularisierungstheorie ausspricht – nicht mehr an ihr vorbeikommt.

Ernst Troeltsch (1865-1923) gehört zu den Klassikern der Soziologie und der Theologie. In Die Soziallehren der christlichen Kirchen und Gruppen erforscht er das Christentum als „Praxis“, in der theologische Ideale auf soziologische Realitäten und soziologische Realitäten auf theologische Ideale wirken. In diesen Wechselwirkungen akzentuieren sich in der Geschichte des Christentums laut Troeltsch drei Typen von Gemeinschaft, die er mit seiner berühmt-berüchtigten Typologie auf den Begriff bringt: (1) Ekklesiastizismus, (2) Sektarianismus und (3) Mystizismus. Obwohl sich die Soziallehren nicht auf diese Typen reduziere lässt, ist die Typologie ausschlaggebend für die Rezeption Troeltschs in der Religionssoziologie.

Throughout Europe, the populist protests of PEGIDA (Patriotische Europäer gegen die Islamisierung des Abendlandes) have stirred up controversy during the current refugee crisis. Applying the political philosophy of Judith Butler to these protests, Ulrich Schmiedel analyzes the political performances as well as the political propositions of pegida, arguing that a tacit political theology underpins pegida’s populism: pegida conceptualizes “Christianity” in a way which allows the protesters to claim that “we” and “only we” are “the people.” In response to pegida’s populism, he advocates for a weak theology à la John D. Caputo.  Such a theology, Schmiedel argues, “weakens” the identity of Christianity so as to provoke the public and political controversies necessary to put a politics of livable life into practice.

In the conclusion, Ulrich Schmiedel and Graeme Smith summarize the role of religion in the current refugee crisis by suggesting that civil and not-so-civil theologies have taken over the public square. Their suggestion, inspired by Robert Bellah’s concept of civil religion, points to the significance of theologies that are always already operant in the controversies stirred up by immigration into Europe. Crucially, the operation of these theologies is independent of religion in the sense that it requires neither religious practice nor religious participation in institutions such as churches. If Europe’s public square has been taken over by theologies, the requirements for reflection on the role of religion changes accordingly. These are changes that scholars need to confront. Schmiedel and Smith sketch what such a confrontation could look like in order to point to the instructive and important avenues that the contributions to this compilation have opened up in terms of public scholarship in the current refugee crisis.

In the Introduction, Ulrich Schmiedel and Graeme Smith chart the context for the contributions to this compilation by scrutinizing the controversies stirred up by the conceptualization and characterization of the current situation of Europe as crisis. Are the refugees in crisis? Are the receivers in crisis? Whose crisis was—or indeed is—it? While religion is a resource for refugees on the flight, Schmiedel and Smith argue, the public and political discourse about the current refugee crisis tells a decidedly different tale: it is a discourse about the receivers rather than a discourse about the refugees. In this discourse, religion appears as radically ambiguous, causing both social cohesion and social conflict in times of turmoil.

What is Christianity? Ernst Troeltsch combines theological and sociological accounts of Christianity’s history in order to identify Christianity. But his interdisciplinary conceptualization(s) of Christianity continue to cause frustration and fascination alike, because he draws no clear-cut distinction between what is Christian and what is non-Christian. Countering the assumption that such a distinction is what Troeltsch is after, I analyze and assess Troeltsch’s “What Does ‘Essence of Christianity’ Mean?” (1903/1913) as a hermeneutics of identification which approaches the identity of Christianity by what it does rather than by what it describes. Through his hermeneutics, I argue, Troeltsch anticipates the theorizations of identity so characteristic of modern and postmodern thought which turn identity into a task. Troeltsch’s concept of Christianity, then, could be conceived of as a performative practice which radically resists any conceptual closure.

Paul Tillich conceptualised correlation as the unity of “dependence and independence” between situation and tradition. If theology conceives of situation and tradition as inter-in-dependent, the situation might contribute to the tradition as much as the tradition might contribute to the situation, without deducing or reducing what is asked to what is answered. But as John Clayton argues in his compelling critique of correlation, Tillich failed. Prioritising ‘independence’ over ‘dependence’, he was ultimately unable to mediate between situation and tradition. Thus, even theologians who adopt his correlational concern abandon his correlational concept. In this chapter, we address what the critics of correlation left unaddressed – the concept of experience. We argue that experience is crucial for both the critique and the construction of correlation. We aim to advocate a concept of experience through which correlation can be retrieved as a compromised correlation. By ‘compromised correlation’, we mean a correlation which concentrates on the experience of the encounter between the transcendent and the immanent. What theology can correlate, then, are the ambiguous experiences of the compromise between the transcendent and the immanent expressed in both situation and tradition.

Complaints about the collapse of community haunt the humanities. As the concept of experience allegedly announces the priority of the individual over the social, ‘experience’ is sidestepped by the theologians who complain about this collapse. However, I argue that the alternative between the individual experience of religion and the social expression of religion is a false alternative. I do so by exploring Ernst Troeltsch’s reception of William James’s concept of religion. In a first step, I analyze James’s psychology of religion in order to demonstrate that his definition of religion as trust in the transcendent prioritizes experience over expression. For James, religion is anchored in a solitary subject. In a second step, I analyze Troeltsch’s reception of James’s psychology of religion. It is not trust itself, but the ways in which James conceptualizes trust which Troeltsch criticizes. His critique pinpoints the (mis-)prioritization of experience over expression, drawing vital consequences for the concept of community. For Troeltsch, religion is not anchored in a solitary subject, but in-between sociable subjects. Finally, in a third step, I combine my analyses in conversation with Graham Ward’s account of (un)belief, outlining a concept of religion as trust in the transcendent which allows for the combination of experience and expression within what I call the open(ed) community. Since trust is rooted in openness to the other’s otherness, it causes trouble in communities. But the trouble with trust is a constructive as opposed to destructive trouble: it opens community to the transcendence of both the finite other and the infinite other.

The far right is on the rise across Europe. In Germany, the political party Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) has had striking success in several elections, establishing itself in parliaments across the country. Although Christianity comes up in the programmes and the politics of this party, theologians in Germany have been hesitant to engage the rise of the far right. In this review, I present two publications that put an end to this hesitation. Although I cannot cover each and every chapter, I aim to showcase the key concerns and the key concepts of both publications in order to stress the contrast between them. Both theologically and politically, the stakes are high. The question of how to respond to the rise of the far right, I suggest, cuts to the core of the conceptualization of the identity of Christianity.

The arrival of significant numbers of refugees in 2015 caused a European crisis of identity, including over religion, says German theologian Ulrich Schmiedel. He explains how Christianity became the motive to “save Europe” for both those for and against refugees.

The postdoctoral position is connected to the project “Faith-Based Refugee Relief in Europe: Connecting the Empirical and the Ethical (FABRIC)”, funded by a European Research Council Starting Grant. FABRIC aims to understand and utilize the moral insights and the moral ideas that faith-based refugee relief organizations develop in practice for the cross-disciplinary debate about the ethics of forced migration in Europe.