Religious situation in the Armed Forces

Religious situation in the Armed Forces


Veremchuk V.I.

Military University, Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, Moscow, Russia

Krutilin D.S.

Sociological Research Center, Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, Moscow, Russia krutilin_dc@mail.ru

ID of the Article: 6145


For citation:

Veremchuk V.I., Krutilin D.S. Religious situation in the Armed Forces. Sotsiologicheskie issledovaniya [Sociological Studies]. 2016. No 4. P. 79-88




Abstract

The article reveals specific social interaction of religions with military domain of the society on the basis of investigation of current religious situation in the Armed Forces of Russia. The article draws attention to the fact that the basis of attraction for a majority of Russian serviceman to religion lies in social cultural tradition which determines their orientations to traditional confessions, first of all to Orthodox Church. Empirically, authors substantiate the thesis that religious identification of overwhelming number of servicemen who consider themselves believers is determined mainly by outside factors connected with positive social appraisal of the religious institution in the society, by high level of confidence in it on the part of considerable number of Russian citizens. Authors point out several types of servicemen depending on the degree of their religiousness, assess interconfessional tolerance of servicemen, and show an increasing level of proneness to conflict on the part of servicemen professing Islam vs. believers of other confessions. The article pays attention to the fact that the servicemen who consider themselves as believers display a degree of satisfaction with military service sufficiently higher than that of respondents who consider themselves unbelievers. Authors discuss effectiveness of newly introduced post of military priests (assistants of commanding officer to work with believing serviceman in formations and military units (ships)), and outlook for military-confessional cooperation.


Keywords
religion; religious situation; religious institution; religiousness; Armed Forces; servicemen
Content No 4, 2016