Clearly the theocratic government of Iran has been employing religion to establish a nationalistic and popularist political position for years, allowing it to manipulate events well outside its territory as well as its citizens. There are similar aspects to Pakistani politics. United States politics has always been subject to supposedly Christian overtures by politicians as various as Bush Jnr, Reagan, and a host of others-invariably right wing. Putin wisely made friends with leaders of the Orthodox Church-a nationalistic group prone to violence. The Sultan of Brunei, his rule subject to internal pressures, established sharia law as a means of control and has recently (my god, in this day and age!) instituted stoning for homosexuals.

Religion never dies but creeps around the hem of civilisation!

Dear Stanley, I agree completely. What about Hugo Chávez, Evo Morales and Fidel Castro's governments? They seemed to create a cult around themselves, even they somehow rejected catholic religion. In the case of Chavez, he was perceived as a sent of God, while Evo appealed to the pre-hispanic cults and Castro supported santeria. Is interesting...

Stanley and Pablo's exchange corroborate my disagreement with the statement " Modernity seemed to have overcome the religio-political dichotomy". Or I would like to larn more what do you mean.

Certainly religion does play an important role as a political tool. Especially when used against another religion.

I would suggest Pablo to make a list of states/governments that do use/abuse religion and compare them. It might be worse a proper academic paper!

Dear Michal, thanks for your reply. Actually Im finishing a paper on the process of political and religious sacralization that some dictators and presidents in Latin America generated, to feed the cult of their person. I have decided to divide this study into three parts because I consider that the most important vehicles for sacralization had a variable intensity and depth. These divisions are:

1 historical continuity,

2 civil mitification,

3 sacred elevation.

From Trujillo, Somoza, Carias Andino to Peron, Rojas Pinilla, Stroessner and Chávez

My idea is in a near future gather people to do the same in other continents -even Latin America- and propose a huge research on sacralization of politics

Religion should be removed from politics and this does not mean that the politician should be away from religion but on the contrary we wish that the politician senses religion within him and reflects his religious commitment to his actions and his dealings with people without making his religion a media and false slogans that are not related to the reality he deals with With

Interesting topic

The concept of political religion is closely linked to modernity, that is, to modern dictatorships, especially to communism and nazism. It is about a totalitarian dictatorship whose ideological bases and popular following are so strong that reminds of a religion in terms of faith, believers, harsh punishment of heresy, annihilation of non-believers and above all the infallibility of the supreme leader. Not to be confused with a theocracy, in which the state is led in a authoritarian manner by a religious organization which claims to have divine guidance.

Dear Pablo,

thanks for your reply. No I understand what you are interested in. I think you should focus more on the term you use in your answer, namely: sacralization. Those dictators, of both ideological colours (black and red) to enforce their profane power and to impose on citizens minds use sacral atributes. But this has very little to do with religion.

You might find comments above - by Dragos P. - very useful, indeed.

Wish you best success in your research

Michal