Papal Geopolitics: The World According to Urbi et Orbi

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F48546054%3A_____%2F17%3AN0000025" target="_blank" >RIV/48546054:_____/17:N0000025 - isvavai.cz</a>

Alternative codes found

RIV/61384399:31120/17:00051146

Result on the web

<a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15570274.2017.1392167?scroll=top&needAccess=true" target="_blank" >http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15570274.2017.1392167?scroll=top&needAccess=true</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15570274.2017.1392167" target="_blank" >10.1080/15570274.2017.1392167</a>

Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Papal Geopolitics: The World According to Urbi et Orbi

Original language description

The Catholic Church (or the Church, in this article) is, despite appearances, one of the most influential geopolitical actors in the world. Its leaders are seen as moral and political authorities by the believers as well as many others and the dominant ecclesial narratives about space and politics have a tremendous impact on the geopolitical imaginations of humanity. While there are a multiplicity of different voices coming from the Church, its hierarchical structure makes the position of the Catholic Church more intelligible than, say, the position(s) of Protestantism which is split into a great number of individual denominations, or that of other religious traditions where a formal head comparable to the Pope is missing. This clear hierarchy also applies Church documents. From the point of view of Catholic theology, certain papal pronouncements and the documents issued by the cumenical councils are considered the most relevant among the many texts produced by the Church (cf. the reference in First Vatican Council: Aeternus 1870). However, from the point of view of society at large, other pronouncements may gain an even wider media coverage and thus influence the public even more strongly. Among these, the papal messages Urbi et Orbi which are delivered every Christmas and Easter constitute the most influential series of regular media appearances which are followed by millions of people all across the globe. And the interest in these messages is strong and stable: For instance, the Christmas Message of 2004 was broadcast to 72 countries with 114 television networks (CathNews 2004), in 2006 it was beamed to 63 countries (Deutsche Welle 2006), and the Message of Pope Francis at Christmas 2013 was broadcast to 70 countries (Rai 2013). Although the intended contents of the Messages are primarily religious, they also reveal a substantial amount of information about the geopolitical views of the Popes and, by extension, the Church under their leadership—which areas are relevant, which are not, what parts of the world are worth focusing on, where is the center and what constitutes the periphery, who is powerful and who is weak. Focusing on this geopolitical context of the Messages, we will compare the contents of the Messages delivered by Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis. We will proceed in three steps. First, we will introduce our approach to the study of geopolitics of the Catholic Church, which, following Ó Tuathail, builds on the three pillars of exploring the discursivity, perspectivalism and hegemony in the Church’s discourse. Second, we will briefly describe our research design. Third, our findings will be presented. We will assess the spatial relevance, spatial agency and spatial closeness expressed in the Messages, followed by a short conclusion.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

J_imp - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the Web of Science database

CEP classification

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OECD FORD branch

50601 - Political science

Project

—

Continuities

I - Institucionalni podpora na dlouhodoby koncepcni rozvoj vyzkumne organizace

Publication year

2017

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Name of the periodical

The Review of Faith and International Affairs

ISSN

1557-0274

e-ISSN

1931-7743

Volume of the periodical

15

Issue of the periodical within the volume

4

Country of publishing house

GB - UNITED KINGDOM

Number of pages

14

Pages from-to

79-92

UT code for WoS article

000418768000008

EID of the result in the Scopus database

2-s2.0-85034241363