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The Making of a Cosmopolitan Quarter: Sha’laan in the 20th Century
Get PDFIn 2001, the French Institute in Damascus (IFPO), in collaboration with the Maison de l’Orient de la Méditerranée/Université de Lyon 2 (GREMMO), and the Faculty of Architecture and Geography at the University of Damascus, began a multidisciplinary study of Damascus which undertook to examine the architecture, and the socio-economic development of Sha’laan. Dr Anne-Marie Bianquis, a geographer at GREMMO, began the scoping study of the Sha’laan quarter in that year. This included an examination of cadastral surveys, satellite photographs and detailed descriptions of the quarter by French bureaucrats, visitors’ reports and private diaries. In June 2006, with the mission of Dr Françoise Metral, some of the notable families of this quarter were identified and interviewed. Dr Metral’s survey highlighted the fact that the extended family of the Ruwalla Bedouin tribal leader, Emir Nuri Sha’laan, had played a significant part in establishing this once late Ottoman agricultural settlement into an important political and economic centre of Damascus. My role in the project was to contribute to the ethnographic history of the quarter through the personal testimonies of its inhabitants. With the support of a grant from the Council for British research in the Levant (CBRL), I made three research trips to Damascus between May 2008 and April 2009 seeking out a representative sample of the oldest living residents of the quarter who could contribute to an anthropology of this quarter. I engaged a research assistant, Jihad Darwaza, who ably sought out and negotiated informed consent with potential interviewees. Over three two-week periods I conducted a total of 22 interviews with a wide range of current and former residents in the quarter from the grandson of the Emir Nuri Sha’laan to a retired geography teacher turned bookseller. We interviewed shopkeepers and merchants who had maintained business in the quarter for over a half century and others who had been present in the quarter for decades but had recently sold up and moved to outlying suburbs of the city to take advantage of soaring real estate prices in Sha’laan
Civil Society and the State in Syria: The Outsourcing of Civil Responsibility
Get PDFIn reent years, Syria has transfered many responsibilities for welfre functions to private charities and NGOs, while at the same time attempting to control these organizations. In this context, the authors of Civil Society and the State in Syria focus both on Christian charities and on the regime-sponsored NGOs that are attracting secular, urban Syrians.
How a Microfinance Network Could Have Preempted the Syrian Uprising.
Get PDFThe story shared below sheds light on a hitherto unknown prelude to the Syrian Uprising of March 2011. It is a story of a microfinance network of sanadiq, or village funds, that was first established in an area known as Jabal al-Hoss, southeast of Aleppo, and was eventually disseminated throughout rural Syria. The story begins in 1996, when Syria hosted its first conference on poverty, and it ends in 2009, after the Syrian government shut down the sanadiq established at Jabal al- Hoss. For a brief period of time, over 7,000 inhabitants of Jabal al-Hoss were directly involved in an institutional setup, which empowered them politically and financially, and which constituted a model that was emulated not only in other parts of Syria, but in Lebanon and Jordan as well. In attacking and eventually dismantling this network, the Syrian government inadvertently lost an important opportunity to deflate the sense of political and economic marginalization of Syria’s rural inhabitants, which eventually found expression in the Arab spring
Church, state and national identity: Some historical and theological reflections from a Catholic perspective
Get PDFAfter tracing Scottish identity from its earliest beginnings to the Reformation and its aftermath, Mario Conti considers present-day discussions about the nation at a key point in its history. Observing how social, democratic governance at an appropriate level is of profound value, Rev Dr Conti argues for the pressing need for coherent vision and concludes with two personal recollections in which he reaffirms the contribution of faith, culture, and social ties to the wider issues of identity
"Christianity and the Political Order: Conflict, Cooptation, and Cooperation" by Kenneth R. Himes
No full textReview ofKenneth R. Himes, Christianity and the Political Order: Conflict, Cooptation, and Cooperation (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 2013
Holy Communion, a sign and seal of salvation
Get PDFDavid W. Torrance offers a brief but comprehensive examination of the Reformed doctrine of the Lord’s Supper. He examines the foundations of the sacrament in the five great sacrificial offerings of Israel’s worship, as ordained by God. He then presents a picture of Holy Communion in the New Testament as a feast of thanksgiving commemorating God’s atonement in Christ for the sins of the world, and demonstrates how it is inextricably linked with the Cross, the Resurrection and the Great Commission
The realist and onto-relational frame of T. F. Torrance’s Incarnational and Trinitarian theology
Get PDFIt is almost a truism to say that Torrance’s theology is incarnational and Trinitarian, so central were these two foci to his entire theological work. What is perhaps not as readily recognized is that this incarnational and Trinitarian theology takes place within a surrounding two-dimensional framework that can be identified as realist and onto-relational. Gary Deddo argues that these two aspects are essential to understanding Torrance’s framework for pursuing the theological task. After exploring these themes theologically he considers their implications for practical theology and for Christian ministry
T. F. Torrance: Reflections of a parish minister
Get PDFReflections by a former student of T. F. Torranc
Belief and unbelief: Two sides of a coin
Get PDFGrace Davie writes regarding the nature of religion in modern Europe, and addresses factors of key significance. She identifies five significant factors affecting contemporary religion in Europe: the cultural heritage, the historical role of the state church, new models of the growing market in religion, the arrival in Europe of new religious groups, and the growth of the secular lobby. All of these subsist alongside each other. Davie makes the interesting case that the same factors are equally present in unbelief.[This paper originally appreared in Approaching Religion, vo. 2, no. 1 (2012), published by the Donner Institute. It is reproduced here by kind permission of the Editor.
Seeking the truth: Relating theological scholarship and new models of church
No full textTheological engagement with ‘fresh expressions of church’ tends either to take the form of a presentation of different models to be followed or the development of overarching theological concepts. Paul Hammond’s paper however suggests a third way. He points out that current analysis of the development of fresh expressions of church seeks to identify implicit theologies; moreover, the further development of practice-derived theological reflection will require the active participation of those who are directly engaged with fresh expressions of church.[The full text of this article is not available online