CONFERENCE: Religious Dynamics in Contemporary Conflicts

Religious Dynamics in Contemporary Conflicts

The Armed Forces’ Chaplaincy Centre, Beckett House, Defence Academy of the United Kingdom, Faringdon Road, Shrivenham, Swindon, SN6 8LA

The annual Religion and Defence conference is sponsored by the Armed Forces’ Chaplaincy Centre (AFCC), part of the UK Defence Academy, and is hosted at Beckett House within the Defence Academy’s Shrivenham campus. The conference is organised in conjunction with the International Network for the Study of War and Religion in the Modern World, which was established to promote greater communication and collaboration among academics, practitioners, and military professionals working in the field of war and religion.

The conference programme will consist of plenary addresses, panel discussions, and the presentation of papers from delegates. Each year the organisers identify themes of topical interest within Defence and academia and we encourage participants to reflect on these in relation to their submissions and contributions throughout the conference.

Plenary Addresses:

• ‘Russia, Ukraine and the Geopolitics of Orthodoxy- the return of religion to war in Europe’
• ‘Imperial Fallout: Perspectives on the aftermaths of Nuclear Weapons’
• ‘Artificial Intelligence in Cyber Operations: The religious and ethical implications of new military technologies, and broader issues of war and peace’

Discussion Panels:

• ‘Religion, War and Politics’
• ‘Tactics, Weapons and Religion’
• ‘Conflict Related Moral Injury – The Role of Chaplaincy’

The conference will be hosted by the Principal and staff of the AFCC and will be co-ordinated by Canon Professor Michael Snape (Michael Ramsey Professor of Anglican Studies, Durham University), Dr Alastair Lockhart (Faculty of Divinity, University of Cambridge, Associate Professor, MF Norwegian School of Theology, Religion and Society, and Academic Co-Director, Centre for the Critical Study of Apocalyptic and Millenarian Movements, Bedford, UK) and Dr Gina Palmer (Assistant Professor, US Naval War College, Newport RI).

Key participants

• Revd Nicola Frail, Royal Army Chaplains’ Department
• Revd Canon Professor James Hawkey, Westminster Abbey
• Dr Alastair Lockhart, Faculty of Divinity, University of Cambridge and MF Norwegian School of Theology
• Dr Gina Palmer, US Naval War College, Newport, Rhode Island
• Dr Maria Power, Blackfriars Hall, University of Oxford
• Professor Gregory M. Reichberg, Peace Research Institute Oslo

Call for Papers

For this year’s conference there will two different formats for the presentation of papers by conference delegates. There will be the opportunity for six main papers to be presented over two sessions plus shorter ‘Lightning Papers’, in a distinct session, which will be delivered following a visit to the Royal Army Chaplains’ Museum – Faith in the Forces.
The main papers will be of fifteen minutes’ duration – three in each session followed by forty-five minutes of discussion. The ‘Lightning Papers’ are five-minute papers, each focused on one item in the collection of the Royal Army Chaplains’ Museum – Faith in the Forces. (Note: for these five-minute presentations a select catalogue of the Museum’s collection can be obtained from the Museum Curator, Mr David Blake: David.Blake@da.mod.uk).

Whether they are fifteen-minute or five-minute papers, the Conference welcomes presentations which engage with religious and spiritual traditions understood in the widest sense, and scholars of all relevant disciplines and all traditions of religion and belief (including humanism and atheism) are warmly invited to contribute. There is no constraint on geographical or national range and the conference encourages scholarly discussion of all subjects that can illuminate the conceptual, ethical, pastoral and historical aspects of the relationship between religion and war.

Abstracts (300 words for fifteen-minute papers, 150 words for ‘Lightning Papers’) should be copied, along with a one-page CV, to michael.snape@durham.ac.uk, gina.palmer@usnwc.edu and asl21@cam.ac.uk by Friday 28 April 2023.