The Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies of the University of Iceland A New Social Reality

Abstract

The Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies at the University of Iceland faces difficult challenges. The faculty’s largest problem is attendance which has steadily decreased in the last two decades. In view of the wide-ranging social shifts taking place in the religious field in Iceland in the last two decades, this article seeks to explain the position in which the faculty now finds itself. These shifts entail, most importantly, increased pluralization in the religious field and the completely changed position of the Lutheran majority church, the Icelandic national church, which does not enjoy the same hegemony as before, and therefore and for other reasons mentioned in the article, is dealing with its own crisis. Because of the historical, cultural, and practical connection between The Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies and the national church of Iceland, the article argues that the crises of these two institutions are strongly connected and overlap. In the article’s final section can be found suggestions about how to react to the challenges the faculty is facing.