Svetlana Janković, 2024
CONFLICT IN THE BALKANS THROUGH THE PRISM OF RELIGION – THE BASE OF THEINVALUABLE VALUE OF PEACE
In: Religion in the International Conflicts of the Modern World – Annual International Scientific Conference, 2024
Ed: Goran Bašić, Institute of Social Science, Belgrade 2024
ISBN 978-86-7093-278-4
In the modern society, religious conflicts rarely occur in their pure form and often have a political and ethnic form, content, and background. This has been the cause of a significant change in the theoretical and political reception of religion as a factor in social conflicts, so at the end of the 20th century the essential question became that of the relationship between religion and politics, religion and society. In the initial causes, contents, and motives of the conflict on the territory of the SFRY (Croatia, Bosnia, Kosovo and Metohija, Macedonia), the religious component was slightly present. These conflicts were not fought because of religion. Still, religion primarily served as the only visible difference through which ethnically related peoples could articulate deeper and more complex reasons for their conflicts more easily. And after every conflict comes a truce (current state), or peace (a more permanent state). Although three decades have passed, the contemporary activities of peacebuilding, reconciliation, and dealing with the past have been gaining importance today. We encounter practices of war veterans’ group visits to places of suffering, and places of detention, marked (but also unmarked), regardless of who the victims and who the perpetrators were. The culture of remembering the victims, regardless of ethnicity, and acknowledging the suffering of every person is the primary function of those events. They are organized in different environments, of different religions and cultures. They are regularly accompanied by appropriate religious rites. Their goal is to continuously point out the importance of the culture of dialogue and tolerance in the context of growing national and religious affiliation. And it is crucial to spread the message that every conflict can be overcome, that diversity in faith is an asset, not a deficiency, and that peace is an inestimable value.
Key words: conflict, reception of religion, culture of memory, victims, dialogue and tolerance, peace