The launch of the Horizon 2020 funded project RESILIENCE in September 2019 marked animportant step towards an established European Research Infrastructure on Religious Studies. Twelve academic institutions from ten countries have joined forces to undertake this two-year project with the ultimate aim of building a European response to the challenges of religious diversity .

Religious diversity presents a growing challenge for European society, resulting in anincreased need for mutual understanding. An infrastructure on religious studies will support this understanding through scholarly research, in the conviction thatknowledge is the best tool for a shared response to the spike in issues related to religious diversity.

In previous years, preparations have already been made for such a European infrastructurethrough the ReIReS project, also funded by Horizon 2020. Building upon this, twelveacademic institutions fromtencountries have joined forces in the RESILIENCE project, which had its kick-off meeting September 6/7 2019 in Bologna.

RESILIENCE (REligious Studies Infrastructure: tooLs, Expert, conNections and CEnters) will serve the academic community in the first place, and at the same time will, with its impact, extend significantly to the non-academic community: it offers the tools for an innovative approach of religious studies which can be used to build a European response to the challenge of religious diversity.

Currently, RESILIENCE focuses on the preparation of a proposal for an established research infrastructure in religious studies. The proposal will be submitted to the 2021 ESFRI Roadmap on the 5th of May 2020, aiming at becoming part of the ESFRI Roadmap 2021.

[“Resilience aspires to provide wide access to religious knowledge, thereby cultivating peaceful coexistence and respect for religious diversity.” Pantelis Kalaitzidis, Director of the Volos Academy for Theological Studies]

RESILIENCE started in September2019 and will last for two years. It has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 programme under Grant Agreement No 871127. Horizon 2020 is the European funding programme for research and innovation in Europe.

ESFRI is the European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures. It is a strategic instrument to develop the scientific integration of Europe and to strengthen its international outreach.

Early 2020 more information will be available via www.resilience-ri.eu

RESILIENCE Partners

● Fondazione per le Scienze Religiose Giovanni XXIII (IT)

● Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Muenster (DE)

● École Pratique des Hautes Études (FR)

● Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (BE)

● Leibniz-Institut für Europäische Geschichte (DE)

● Uniwersytet Warszawski (PL)

● Institut für Angewandte Informatik (DE)

● Theological University ofApeldoorn (NL)

● Sofiiski Universitet Sveti Kliment Ohridski (BG)

● Volos Academy for Theological Studies (GR)

● Universitet U Sarajevu (BIH)

● Albanian University UFO (AL)

Contact

Volos Academy for Theological Studies

Melissiatika, Volos- Greece, Zip Code 38001, P.O. 1308,

Tel: +30 24210-93553

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Nikolaos Asproulis: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Paraskevi Arapoglou: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.