Nordic Network of Intimacy Research (NNI) (External organisation)

Description

Public acknowledgment of same-sex intimacies is a contested issue not only in contemporary political discourse in Denmark, but also within the majority religious community, Evangelical-Lutheran Protestantism, institutionalized as the Danish People's Church. Among theological scholars, the clergy and members of the Church there are intense deliberations about how the community ought to regard same-sex sexual/intimate relations and behaviors; and about whether the community and its individual members should oppose, support, or take no public position on civil rights protections and other legal rights, including same-sex marriage and parenting, for gays and lesbians. The project aims at analyzing these church debates, as well as their impact on the formation of laws and policies on same-sex relations in light of the relationship between state and church in Denmark. The main objective is to contribute to the present debate about the place of religion in the public domain; and to point out ways to foster a dialogue and translation between reasoning based on secular and religious premises within the framework of liberal democracies.