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Copyright of Collected Papers of Zagreb Law Faculty / Zbornik Pravnog Fakulteta u Zagrebu is the property of Sveuciliste u Zagrebu, Pravni Fakultet and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article explores the principle of civil religion and the failure of American civil religion. The author emphasizes that there are citizens who fought for human dignity, freedom of speech, equal opportunity, and separation of church and state. He notes that the U.S. can rescue its civil religion by eliminating the religious part and retaining the civil part. He explores the history of American civil religion and four events that brought complexity to the American civil religion, the Founding, the Civil War, the Cold War, and the Culture Wars. He highlights the three factors that threaten American civil religion, the religious pluralism, the sectarianization, and the idolatry.

The article discusses the differences and similarities of approaches to religious diversity in the U.S., Canada, and France. It states that the American approach provides free exercise of religion, the French approach relegates religion to private domain, and the French approach recognizes religious diversity by accommodating it. It explains the concept of equality as a replacement to tolerance in addressing religious diversity. It also emphasizes that Canada has the capability to balance the interests of various religious institutions in an egalitarian manner.

The article discusses the connection of globalization of American religion and religious diversity in the U.S. It was stated that as the country become more internationalized, with the increasing populations of Asians, Africans,. and Latinos, so to as the American religious life. The author reveals that the impact of the changing demographics and ways of communications on religion is immense, in which it transformed the manner the Americans think about religion. In addition, the author suggests that educated discussion and debate are needed to address various issues in the strengthening religious pluralism.

In any given time and place, religious pluralism reflects a set of cultural attitudes about the nature and role of religion in society. Prior to World War II, religious pluralism in the United States was conceived as a two-tiered system, with nondenominational Protestantism in the top tier and other legitimate religious groups—Catholics, Jews, Eastern Orthodox, Mormons—relegated to a second tier. Since the war, American society has experimented with several different models, each of which derives from an approach to religious pluralism rooted in a particular region of the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The increase in religious diversity in the United States since the early 1970s has led to concerns about American national identity and the health of American civil society. Part of this concern emerges from the recognized, but usually unarticulated, parallel between the organizational forms dominant in American civil society institutions and those found among Protestant religious organizations. These organizational forms have an accompanying discourse and institutional logic, premised on voluntarism, individual authenticity, and localism. The question facing civil society from the diversification of the American religious landscape is the extent to which civil society can expand its repertoire of languages and/or traditionally non-Western religious traditions can adapt to these cultural forms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, the author attempts to show how provisions in the U.S. Constitution enhance religious pluralism in the United States. Furthermore, religious pluralism arguably leads to religious vitality, which has a number of consequences for public life in the United States. Religion in the United States serves as a source of social capital, as a check against the conformist tendencies of U.S. public opinion; religious pluralism ameliorates the tendency to identify the nation with a particular set of religious traditions. The presence of religious ideas in public discourse also may render religious values less particularistic and more publicly accessible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents information on the impact of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in the 1990 religious case Employment Division versus Smith on religious freedom exercise in the U.S. History of the court decision on Employment Division versus Smith case; Influence of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and its ability to counteract the decision; Potential effects of the court decision on religious involvement and plurality in the U.S.

Deals with the diversity of religion in a democratic institutional pluralism. Theories of politics in which strict separation of church from a presumed religion-blind and strictly neutral state is preferred; Processes in associative democracy; Characteristics shown in debates on the relationships between religion and society, politics and the state in the political philosophy in the U.S.