Humanization is a frequently invoked goal of interfaith dialogue—but what does it mean to dialoguers to be “human,” let alone to make each person more human? This article takes a close look at the common discourses of interfaith dialoguers, and how those discourses are translated into action. Drawing on observed vignettes and reflections from ethnographic interviews across geopolitical contexts, the article conceptualizes humanization as a discursive object of the interfaith society that dialoguers invoke to enhance group solidarity and express collective identity in the form of their sacred values. By frequently invoking the concept of humanization, interfaith dialogues signal to each other that they are uniting around a common goal. Specifically, the article investigates normative discourses regarding “humanization” of the religious other and how the practice of exchanging narratives facilitates humanization and the cultivation of empathy. Through this data we can see that “humanization” is a common discursive goal of dialoguers. In Italy, humanization is a matter of disconfirming stereotypes and alleviating ignorance across social divides, whereas in the Middle East humanization intensifies into a commitment to not physically harm the other, who is recognized through the course of intergroup engagement as sharing a common ground of experience and complexity with the other. Dialoguers say humanization can be achieved through non-discursive relational practices such as artistic collaboration, shared silence, humor or cognitive re-framing, but most often through narrative storytelling.

The majority of the world’s refugees do not live in refugee camps, but in cities around the world. Realities for urban refugees are vastly different from the conditions of a refugee camp. Urban refugees lack the institutional supports of official refugee camps and often have minimal legal covering in their host cities. Without government support and the limited capacity of UNHCR to provide adequate help, it is left to citizens of the host cities to provide help. Kuala Lumpur (KL) is home to more than 150,000 refugees and even more asylum seekers. These population numbers could be overwhelming to a city without help from its citizenry. This paper will examine ways in which Christian churches have welcomed and helped this large refugee population when few others would help. Guided by a biblical command to welcome “the stranger”, churches have sacrificed greatly to impact the lives of refugees in several key areas: education, employment, health care, and spiritual vitality. Because faith communities operate outside of governmental and non-governmental bureaucratic structures, their work often goes unnoticed. The work of these faith communities in KL is not an isolated event but serves as one case study of similar work happening in cities all over the world.

“Better is to live one day virtuous and meditative than to live a hundred years immoral and uncontrolled” (The Buddha) Bhakti movement in India has been a path-breaking phenomenon that provided a solid shape and an identifiable face to the abstractions with the help of vernacular language. As a religious movement, it emphasized a strong personal and emotional bond between devotees and a personal God. It has come from the Sanskrit word Bhaj- ‘to share’. It began as a tradition of devotional songs, hagiographical or philosophical – religious texts which have generated a common ground for people of all the sects in the society to come together. As counterculture, it embraced into its fold all sections of people breaking the barriers of caste, class, community, and gender. It added an inclusive dimension to the hitherto privileged, exclusivist, Upanishadic tradition. It has provided a very critical outlook on contemporary Brahminical orthodoxy and played a crucial role in the emergence of modern poetry in India. This paper elaborates on the positioning of the Bhakti Movement in the context of Protest narratives in India.

Pura Agung Surya Bhuvana in Jayapura is the eastern part of Padma Buana temple. Its establishment was initiated by Balinese Hindus and has become the center of Balinese Hindu socio-cultural activities and an important icon of Jayapura. This article discusses the establishment of Pura Agung Surya Bhuvana from the beginning and its development into the center of Balinese Hindus’ social and cultural-religious activities in Jayapura of Papua. This article based on qualitative research, in which all data was collected through observation, document studies, interviews, and FGD with several members of the pengempon (the temple’s servants) as informants and observers of Papuan culture. Data analyzed descriptively by applying symbol theory and structural-functional theory. The results showed that Hindus established the Pura Agung Surya Bhuvana at Jayapura in 1962. Before, the Hindus of Papua, whose dominantly Balinese migrant, carried out religious activities at Matra’s house. I Made Matra was a civil servant at the Papua Province government office. Over time, the number of Hindus who migrate to the city of Jayapura continues to increase. Therefore in 1979, Hindu leaders in Jayapura built the Pura Agung Surya Bhuvana for the needs of Hindus. Pura Agung Surya Bhuvana was built on Skyline hill in 1982 and it was inaugurated in 1990. In 2012, the Pura Agung Surya Bhuvana was renovated to be more majestic than before, and later on became a center of Hindu worship, the center of Balinese socio-cultural activities, arts center, Hindu religious education centers, and tourist attractions in Papua.

This study aims to reveal the sustainability of Balinese traditional residential architectural practices which are based on the provisions of traditional ethnic Balinese social stratification and refers to the capital ownership in Generative Structural Theory from Pierre Bourdieu (economic, cultural, social and symbolic). At present, there are dynamics ownership and capital conversion in the traditional social strata which affect the sustainability of traditional residential architecture practices. The traditional Balinese residential architecture in this study is understood to be the spatial layout and traditional residential buildings of the Middle Bali era. Its sustainability today is seen from the concept of capital in the perspective of Bourdieu’s theory. The basic assumption of Bourdieu’s theory is basically that humans are in the field of social struggle to emerge victorious by competing with one another. This study is a qualitative research with interpretative descriptive method. Primary data were obtained from selected informants (purposive) and from field observations, as well as secondary data from the literature. The study findings show that traditional residential architecture practices in the Middle Bali era were strongly influenced by capital ownership (economic, cultural, social, and symbolic) with various forms of conversion to traditional Balinese aristocratic (triwangsa). Development at this time has opened the opportunity to control various capital for ordinary community (jabawangsa), so that the realm of Balinese traditional housing becomes a medium of struggle as well as a symbol of success in social struggle. On the other hand, the contestation of Balinese traditional residential architectural practices is a sustainability in the arena of social struggle within Balinese society today.

This article aims to analyze the dynamicity of Tri Hita Karana implementation in South Denpasar regarding the causing factors, the dynamic forms, as well the implication on the Hindus community life. This research was conducted using qualitative methods. The data were collected through document study, observation, and in-depth interviews with 25 informants. The collected data were analyzed by the theories of hegemony, social change, socio-cultural system critical, and adaptation. The results showed: First, the factors causing the dynamicity of Tri Hita Karana in the residential area of Hindus are urban modernization, population growth, spatial planning policies and settlement development, and rationalization in building construction. Second, the dynamics of Tri Hita Karana in these residentials are: (a) In the palemahan area, land conversion has displaced the subak and Ulun Suwi temple, violation of the principles of Balinese Traditional Architecture (ATB), displacing the existence of the open space; b) The pawongan area is characterized by increasingly heterogeneous, multi-ethnic and multi-cultural citizens.; (c) In the parahyangan area where the building layout was not reconstructed, the holy place Merajan was built on the upper floor of the residence. Third, the implications of the dynamics of Tri Hita Karana in the residential area of Hindus in the South Denpasar, include: (a) The palemahan area implies the use of land space based on the principles of effective, efficient, and economical, but the concept of ulu teben and kaja-kangin as the Balinese sacred orientations is still maintained; (b) The pawongan area is characterized by the behavior of city dwellers looking for Social space and spiritual recreation; (c) The Parahyangan area is characterized by praying activities at Merajan and Padmasana on the upper floor of the residence. To enforce the Tri Hita Karana, the misuse (disorientation) of spatial planning needs to be anticipated.

Democratization is a globalized agenda of development that needs to be developed by the Indonesian society to achieve a just and prosperous country that is referred to as ‘baldatun toyyibatun wa robbun ghofur’ (Arabic, literally, “good country under God forgiveness”). Within this framework, Islamic community (Islamic social organization) and other religious organizations are expected to behave kindly as an equal citizen that observe humanistic, pluralistic and tolerant religious social life. In this context, the situation of reciprocal trust, social solidarity, tolerance, equality, social networking even intra and extra-collective cooperation among socio-religious religious communities are expected to be more natural and sustainable. However, citizenship social capital still need to be develop through internalization and socialization. This research is based on the theories of Habitus of Bourdieu and Gellner’s Typology of Social Organization and Kymlicka’s Multicultural Citizenship. This research also use other sociological theory namely the social capital theory of citizenship from Putnam, Coleman, Uphof, and religion-state relations theory from Boland, Menchik and Riaz Hassan. This research is qualitative with a multidisciplinary approaches of Sociology, Political Science, and History. The research findings show (1) the cosmopolitanism of the Bogor society is the factor that the various Islamic social organizations are accepted; (2) The social capital type of citizenship of Islamic social organizations is formed due to differences in religious and political orientation which are the resultant understanding of the texts and its religious culture; (3) Nahdhatul Ulama and Muhammadiyah with a moderate religious orientation (washitiyyah) have citizenship social capital that is persistent with democracy, while Hizbut Tahrir Indonesia and Front Pembela Islam with a fundamentalist religious style (ushuliyyah) have civic social capital that is resistant to Pancasila democracy.

This paper focuses on Muslim initiatives on saving the environment. It examines various attempts, commitments, statements, and declarations by Muslims around the world to see how these have affected two mass Muslim organizations in Indonesia, namely Nahdhatul Ulama and Muhammadiyyah. This paper describes initiatives that have been proposed by international and national Muslim organizations on the environment and analyzes how these initiatives have been implemented by Nahdhatul Ulama and Muhammadiyah organizations in Indonesia based on their two publications about plastic waste. In addition, this paper explores various initiatives in the world that commit to protect nature, carried out in numerous ways ranging from theological to practical. In particular the efforts to overcome plastic waste in An-Nur mosque in Bantul by reducing the use of plastic waste in several mosque events as well as conducting training on organic and non-organic waste sorting. In addition, practical paths are carried out by several environmental activists in Yogyakarta who make several environmentally friendly products and trash banks as an alternative to advocating for waste. Various commitments were built to lead to a clean environment free of garbage. It is important to see aspects of the faith that play a strong role in the awareness of the importance of protecting the earth in the future.

This article look at how to become a Balinese in Bolaang Mongondow, North Sulawesi. As a trans-migrant group from the eruption of Mountain Agung Karangasem 1963, they left the Island of Gods since March 11, 1964, anchored in Makassar later arrived in Bolaang Mongondow March 26, 1964 through Inobonto port and build of Pakraman Kembang Mertha Village November 1, 1965 with permission of Dumoga indigenous peoples. The Balinese expression of faith shaping of intersubjective relation. In contrast to Geertz’s thesis about the absolute monism of Hinduism, the Balinese in Bolaang Mongondow instead used of religious pluralism perspective. They convert to Muslim and Christian without conflict. In 1970, the Bali farmers start to planting corn, soybean, cassava and rice based on family ties. They have a trade networks with Chinese ethnic descendants. In presidential election 2019, Joko Widodo-Ma’ruf Amin became the winner in Kembang Mertha (84.56%) in comparison to Prabowo-Sandi (15.44%). The loyalty of Balinese to PDIP can be survived from money politics and identity politics because of the cross-blood and ideology. Thus, Balinese migrants can be classified as one of the strongest civil society in contemporary Bolaang Mongondow.