THE PLACE OF RELIGIOUS KNOWLEDGE IN THE METHODOLOGY OF UNDERSTANDING OF NATIONAL-SPIRITUAL PROCESSES IN THE PAST AND PRESENT

Abstract

Abstract. The article clarifies the place of religious knowledge in the methodology of understanding the national-spiritual processes in Ukraine in the past and present, establishes the correlation of reli-gion and culture as the basis of cultural-religious approach in reli-gious studies and reveals the essence of national-spiritual processes, one of which is the development of inter-confessional relations, his-torically conditioned by the desire of a large part of the Ukrainian people to autocephaly of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. Over the last two decades, two parallel spiritual processes were taking place in terms of forming the social and religious mentality: the finalization of the autocephalous principles of Ukrainian Orthodoxy and the forma-tion of ideological doctrines of Ukrainian statehood. This is an impor-tant stage in the development of the Ukrainian national state as a subject of its own history and culture. Actual historical and sociological knowledge about religion and religious culture is an integral part of the formation of a metho-dology for understanding national-spiritual processes in the past and present. Outlining the contours of religious studies of national-spiri-tual processes in Ukraine, we consider the cultural role of the church, as well as the relation between religion and the state etc. The state-building processes in Ukraine are closely linked to denominational development, as the church can fully function and thus fulfill its high spiritual mission only in the case of statehood. The mission of Ukrai-ne and Ukrainians is connected with the idea of peace and harmony, with the symbolism of Tomos as a phenomenon of religious and se-cular, social and political culture of Ukrainians. Today, as in the past, religion and national identity are closely intertwined. Church and spi-ritual unity of Ukrainians is a guarantee of national and state unity, and hence the power and strength of Ukraine. The prospect of further research is the elucidation of the methodological foundations for the study of spiritual processes in the inter-confessional space of Ukrai-ne. The list of sources used contains 4 positions.