Christianity and Tolerance: A Genealogy of European Identity
Dublin Core
Title
Christianity and Tolerance: A Genealogy of European Identity
Description
In the process of European constitutionalisation, the European Union continues to struggle for an identity that can generate widespread support amongst its peoples. Against this background it has been suggested by some that a European identity should embrace the Christian values that underpin Europe’s national traditions and cultures. In this paper I shall argue that, instead of relying on a communitarian vision of a ‘Christian Europe’, a European identity should build on a culture of religious tolerance. A European culture of religious tolerance draws on the enduring of difference and the acknowledgement of persisting and intractable conflict as essential experiences of Europe’s Christian past. Thus understood, tolerance lies at the roots of a European identity. At the same time, and through the conditional inclusion of religious diversity in the European Nation-States, a European culture of religious tolerance creates over time new commonalities between Europe’s religiously permeated national traditions. Thus understood, tolerance only brings about the conditions for the development of a supranational European identity that amounts to more than (the sum of) its national counterparts.
Full text available at: https://doi.org/10.22215/rera.v4i2.195
In the process of European constitutionalisation, the European Union continues to struggle for an identity that can generate widespread support amongst its peoples. Against this background it has been suggested by some that a European identity should embrace the Christian values that underpin Europe’s national traditions and cultures. In this paper I shall argue that, instead of relying on a communitarian vision of a ‘Christian Europe’, a European identity should build on a culture of religious tolerance. A European culture of religious tolerance draws on the enduring of difference and the acknowledgement of persisting and intractable conflict as essential experiences of Europe’s Christian past. Thus understood, tolerance lies at the roots of a European identity. At the same time, and through the conditional inclusion of religious diversity in the European Nation-States, a European culture of religious tolerance creates over time new commonalities between Europe’s religiously permeated national traditions. Thus understood, tolerance only brings about the conditions for the development of a supranational European identity that amounts to more than (the sum of) its national counterparts.
Full text available at: https://doi.org/10.22215/rera.v4i2.195
Creator
Augenstein, Daniel
Source
Canadian Journal of European and Russian Studies; 2008: RERA V4:2 Summer 2008 (backfile abstracts)
2562-8429
10.22215/cjers.v4i2
Publisher
Centre for European Studies, Carleton University
Date
2008-08-01
Type
info:eu-repo/semantics/article
info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion
Peer-reviewed Article
Identifier
Citation
Daniel Augenstein, Christianity and Tolerance: A Genealogy of European Identity, Centre for European Studies, Carleton University, 2008, accessed September 21, 2024, http://igi.indrastra.com/items/show/2735