Chaplain leadership may have played a pivotal role in shaping chaplains’ roles in health care amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. We convened an international expert panel to identify expert perception on key chaplain leadership factors. Six leadership themes of professional confidence, engaging and trust-building with executives, decision-making, innovation and creativity, building integrative and trusting connections with colleagues, and promoting cultural competencies emerged as central to determining chaplains’ integration, perceived value, and contributions during the pandemic.

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Mellan sekulära och religiösa förväntningar Civilreligion på individnivå i Sverige 1 In-between Secular and Religious Expectations: Civil Religion at an Individual Level in SwedenThis article responds to recent calls for reconsidering the concept 'civil religion' to advance the understanding of how both religious and secular authorities shape individuals' attitudes towards the religious. 'Civil religion' is defined as set of religious symbols and practices that can be studied at an individual level. The analysis utilized representative survey data collected in 2016-2017 in Sweden. Four basic forms of 'civil religion' were identified and justified in relation to expectations held by both religious and secular authorities in Sweden over time. The analysis showed that the identified forms of 'civil religion' differ in terms of social class, gender and age. The results are taken to raise further research questions about relationships between high socioeconomic status and criticism of religion and about low socioeconomic status and adherence to religious minorities in Sweden. In addition, it is stipulated that a civil religion approach to religious attitudes might shed new light on questions concerning contemporary covenants and shared ideas about the religious.

Research interest in hospital chaplaincy has increased, in part because it is believed to contribute to the development of just models of religious pluralism. This research note brings attention to hospital chaplaincy in Sweden, a country where religious diversity has substantially increased due to migration but where research in hospital chaplaincy is scarce. In order to advocate for future research, this research note describes the organization of hospital chaplaincy in Sweden, presents new analyses of official data showing its extent and religious composition, and proposes that the organization of hospital chaplaincy in this country needs to be reconsidered now that religious diversity is a given. Showing that hospital chaplaincy in this country is still under the overbearing influence of Christianity, this research note argues that there is a need for research that sheds light on the asymmetrical power relations that exist and that paves the way for innovations in religious pluralist models for health care chaplaincy.

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The demographical changes during the last decades have created a sit­uation where Sweden has become one of the most secular and one of the most multireligious countries at the same time. This situation stands in stark contrast to the country's modern history in which its population have been largely homogeneous, and its religious landscape almost completely dominated by state-church Lutheranism. The growth of Sweden's Muslim population is what has caused most debate. According to calculations made by the Pew Research Center, one fifth of the country's total population is likely to be Muslim by 2050. This change also has consequences for the former state church, which now finds that also Muslims take part in its activities. In this article we present and analyze a novel survey-investigation on Muslims who self-identify as members of the Church of Sweden. In our analysis we differentiate between Muslims and what we call post-Muslims. While the former of these categories refers to those who self-identify as Muslims, the latter refers to people who do not refer to themselves as Muslims but who come from a Muslim family. These categories are mirrored by the Christians and post-Christians, who are selected by equivalent criteria. We conclude that most Muslims and post-Muslims have no affiliation to organized religious communities in Sweden and that among those who do, Christian churches are as important as the Muslim congregations. Among the churches, the Church of Sweden is the one in which most Muslims and post-Muslims are members. The Muslim and post-Muslim members of this church, we find, differ from each other. The Muslims are mostly Swedish-born 50–65-year-old women. They do not take part in any religious activities, and they celebrate Christian, but not Muslim, holidays. In terms of beliefs, they believe in a life after death, but mostly not in God or hell. The post-Muslims are mostly 30–49-year-old men who have come relatively recently to Sweden from the Middle East. They take part in congregational activities and celebrate both Muslim and Christian holidays. They also largely believe in God, a life after death, and hell. In terms of representation, they feel represented, primarily, by Muslim communities.

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