The article explores three seminal approaches to the study of religion and media: mediatization theory, mediation theory, and religious-social shaping of technology (RSST). The overview gives a comparative analysis of these approaches considering the relation between the genesis and conceptual frame of each approach and the scope and boundaries of its application. Firstly, we focus on the difference in the conceptualization of the relation of media and religion. The theory of mediatization emphasizes the transformation of religion by media, the theory of mediation studies media as a part of religious practices, and RSST is concerned with shaping of media technologies by religious communities. Secondly, we outline that the discussed approaches differ in their interpretations of religion, which is crucial in defining the level of the analysis. While the conceptual frameworks of institutional tradition of mediatization theory and RSST address the institutionalized forms of religions, other approaches are suitable for the study of religious institutions as well as individual “lived religion”. The general optic, the scope and the boundary of each approach is defined by the way religion is related to the media, and by the level of analysis.

The text is a translation of the chapter by Stig Hjarvard from the edited volume “Media and Religion: The Nordic Perspectives”. Hjarvard develops a typology of the mediatized religion: (1) “religious media”, (2) “journalism on religion”, and (3) “banal religion”. While the first type corresponds in part to organized religion and may serve to project religious narratives into the public realm, the other two forms are driven primarily by various media considerations. Because of the mediatization of religion, he argues, “religious media” play only a marginal role in the construction of the public image of religion. “Journalism on religion” and “banal religion” may stimulate criticism of the religious institutions and produce more individualized and more bri-colage-like forms of religion.

Media as a context for shaping religion in modern society has generally been overlooked in the mainstream sociology of religion. This article discusses the relevance of the thesis of a mediatisation of religion presented by Stig Hjarvard for studying religious transformation in a modern, Western society. Though the theory contributes to sociology of religion through its focus on how the characteristics of modern mass media relate to the processes of secularisation, the narrow approach to religion and to the interplay between modernisation and religion in the thesis so far limits its validity. This article suggests two starting points for the development of a theory to better grasp the implications of mediatisation of religion in the contemporary world; first, an understanding of religion that better acknowledges the complexities of modern religion and second, an understanding of media-tisation that also acknowledges the agency of religious actors to take part in the shaping of media as well as modern society.

When various media in their entirety mark how we articulate our social worlds, we need an approach of mediatization research that reflects this transmediality. To develop such an approach, the article first discusses the “institutionalist" and “social-constructivist” traditions of mediatization research. Both traditions concur in their understanding of mediatization as being a concept to capture the interrelation between the change of media and communication on the one hand, and the change of culture and society on the other hand. Taking this as a foundation it becomes possible to reflect on the role of certain media as “moulding forces”, i. e. as certain institutionalizations and reifications of communication. Such a conceptual reflection offers the chance to view the mediatization process as the change of trans-medial communicative figurations by which we construct our mediatized worlds. Based on this theoretical foundation, the article subsequently reflects a twofold operationalization, i.e. as diachronous and synchronous mediatization research.

The following text is a chapter from the book When Religion Meets New Media. The aim of the book is to develop a systematic exploration of how religious communities engage with a variety of new media technologies. This chapter provides a background to the guiding methodology of the book - the “religious social shaping of technology” approach. It is argued that previous studies of religious communities’ relationship to new forms of media have often seen media as a “conduit,” as a neutral tool, or as a “mode of knowing”, suggesting media is all powerful and laden with a specific worldview that works independently of the moral and spiritual life of the community. These approaches often do not recognize that religious user communities are active participants negotiating and shaping their technologies in light of their values and desired outcomes. The religious social shaping of technology approach is offered as an alternative, suggesting four distinctive areas that should be explored and questioned in order to fully understand a religious community’s relationship towards new forms of media.

This text presents theoretical premises of how to study the reception of media content by the religious audience. The author looks first at how media and mass communication scholarship developed along with the emergence of the media sphere as a technological and social phenomenon. One of the results of these developments is that, within the multiplicity of sources available, specifically religious channels and services, and channels and services that can accommodate religious and spiritual interests and uses, are increasingly possible and available. Secondly, the nature of contemporary religion is undergoing significant change as well. Following the works of W.C. Roof and R. Wuthnow the author considers a religiosity or spirituality of “seeking” as a major dimension of the contemporary religious landscape. The next step of the analysis is considering how various categories of seekers might be positioned vis-a-vis religious history, religious practice, religious and social experience, orientation toward religious tradition and authority, and religion/spirituality in media culture. The author argues that the evolving religious/symbolic marketplace would be a place where new, more focused mediated symbolic and practical material would be made accessible to interested receivers.

The article discusses how Old Believers create the space of a new visibility of their religion in social media. The author analyzes online and offline practices as complementing each other, examining Facebook pages of those communities and settlements in which field anthropological studies were previously conducted (the NorthWestern Black Sea region). Based on Heidi Campbell's theoretical approaches and using materials from online observations and field research as sources, the author analyzes two ways of self-representing Old Believers in social media: 1) digital narrative on behalf of the religious community that is an institutionally encouraged and authorized way to make religion visible in public space, 2) digital narrative about the community's everyday life and Old Believers' lived religion. Despite all the differences, in both cases visible religion is being constructed online for both internal and external users.

Drawing upon a few “ask the priest” websites, this article studies the mediatization of pastoral care in the Russian Orthodox Church. The study is based upon the theory of mediatized worlds in the framework of social constructivism. Various forms of communication between the priest and the audience are analyzed, as well as the reasons why both sides choose the online communication. The analysis leads to the conclusion that the mediatization of the pastoral care is due to a combination of two types of motivations: developing new forms of comfortable communication within the parish or overcoming crises that may occur in the parish. Overall, there is a certain general crisis of communication in the Russian Orthodox Church, and the actors are looking for new forms to cope with it. The use of new media is one of such strategies.

Analyzing the visual content from Instagram, the article addresses the phenomenon of “holy selfie" as a way of expressing religious identity used by Orthodox and Catholic adepts. Selfie as a technique of online self-presentation allows believers to report about their connections to sacred places, persons, events and objects. Despite the disapproval of Orthodox and Catholic priests, taking a selfie is a way to consolidate religious communities around offline religious experience. The articles draws upon the conceptual and methodological analysis of studies focused on selfies and the representation of religion in the media and uses content analysis of 200 selfies presented in the open Instagram segment, as well as the opinions by Catholic and Orthodox priests about selfie. The analysis shows, firstly, that, in the holy selfie, the memorial and communicative functions are merged together. Secondly, we can distinguish between the two fundamentally different “visual canons of selfies" elaborated by Orthodox and Catholic users. Both “canons", despite their spontaneous origins as expressing existential and communicative needs of the believers, are shaped by the media policies of the respective religious institutions.

The article focuses on the media practices of the Russian-speaking Orthodox Jews seeking patterns of observance relevant to secular modernity. The author applied the conceptual framework of “communicative figurations" for describing the process of everyday Torah observances in post-Soviet countries, Israel, the USA, and Western Europe. The empirical research of media repertoires revealed that the members in the post-Soviet Orthodox communities use Facebook and Instagram platforms to maintain closed women groups and rabbis’ blogs focused on observance. Women’s groups are framing everyday observance in terms of modesty, family purity, kosher home, etc. Personal rabbis’ blogs introduce the practices of “digital Judaism" that include Torah lessons, the daily page of the Talmud, questions and answers exchange, etc. The content-based textual analyses uncovers thematic intersections, circulation of stories, and reciprocal hyperlinks between both types of groups. Media practices of women’s groups and rabbis’ blogs provide a linkage of the local Russian-speaking Jewish communities with the transnational Orthodox constellation.

The article discusses the motif of bodily mutilation in connection with the punishment in an ancient Egyptian tale, in the story of the ferryman Nemti. This narrative is compared with similar Egyptian plots about the loss of body parts and their replacement/transformation into gold. Based on the works of Vladimir Propp, the author builds a model of the event which triggers the development of action in the fairy tale and in the myth. In addition, the paper refers to the philosophical aspect of the mutilation motif as addressed in the works of Mikhail Bakhtin, Georges Bataille and Rene Girard. While stating the universality of the rite de passage narrative model, the author reveals, drawing upon archaeological findings in the tombs of the New Kingdom, some additional semantic load in the Egyptian version of the narrative.

This article analyzes an almost unprecedented religious situation, which emerged after the 1905 “Edict of Toleration.” The Edict set in motion a number of processes in Russian religious landscape and created a legal foundation of what may be called a situation of multiOrthodoxy. The author explores the legal co-existence of two church hierarchies who called themselves Orthodox: Russian Synodal Orthodox Church and Old Believers’ Church of Belokrinitsa agreement. The Edict and the following Circular no. 4628 marked a turning point for religious seekers who considered conversion from one church to another. A number of requests for re-affiliation, sent to Belokrinitsa’s archbishop from representatives of various religious groups, mostly from the Synodal Church, sheds light on how this situation of multiOrthodoxy operated, how it was regulated and what were the contradictions emerging on the boundaries of these two canonical domains.

The article discusses Tolstoy’s faith in the unity of its two sides: as the state of mind of its carrier, and in terms of its content and life principles that flow from it. It is shown that at the same time and in the same respect Tolstoy was the bearer of a faith and its investigator; therefore, its adequate interpretation is possible only if the principles established by him for himself are taken into account instead of abstract and outward interpretation of what faith should be. The article considers Tolstoy’s expression of the essence of his faith in numerous works, letters, diaries, etc. during the last thirty years of his life. The article shows the equivalence of Tolstoy’s state of mind and the content of his faith, as well as its purely individual character. The conclusion is made about the significance of Tolstoy’s understanding of faith for us today.