This paper examines the recent history and current situation of the Armenian Catholic Church from the vantage point of its in-betweenness. The Armenian Catholics' liminal position in-between the particularity and exclusiveness of the Armenian Christianity and the inclusiveness and expansionism of the Roman Catholicism have created diverse, often contradictory, politics of identity construction and representation; of cultural absorption and resistance; and of belonging and alienation. The paper takes a closer look at these politics at work in formulating, negotiating, and challenging a distinct character of this strand of Christianity in post-Soviet Armenia and Georgia, where a large portion of Armenian Catholics live and where the Armenian Catholic Church came back to existence after it was banned for over six decades in the Soviet Union.
Keywords: Armenian Catholic Church, religious identity, national identity, in-betweenness, Armenia, Georgia.
This article is based on the results of the research project "Armenian Catholics in Armenia and Georgia: History, Memory and Identity", funded by the National Research Center of the Republic of Poland (grant N. 2012/07 / hs3 c / 00864) and implemented in 2013-2015. This research was further developed during my internship at the Center for Russian, Eastern European and Eurasian Studies at the University of Texas, with financial support from the Kosciuszkowska Foundation.
Sekerski K. "Intermediate Church": Armenian Catholics in Armenia and Georgia in the post-Soviet period // State, religion, and Church in Russia and abroad. 2016. N2. pp. 310-330.
Siekierski, Konrad (2016) 'The Church In-Between: Armenian Catholics in Post-Soviet Armenia and Georgia", Gosudarstvo. religiia, tserkou' v Rossii i za rubezhom 34(2): 310-330.
page 310In THIS paper, I examine the recent history and present situation of the Armenian Catholic Church in post-Soviet Armenia and Georgia from the point of view of the concept of "in-betweenness". In this a ...
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