Religion and political participation reconsidered: Understanding the role of religious civil society as political intermediaries

n this article, we expand the understanding of the role of religious civil society actors as political intermediaries by re-evaluating the meaning of political participation and power, and moving beyond a binary understanding of religion and political participation in liberal democracies. We present three key findings of our research on faith-based organizations (FBOs) in Flanders: (1) service delivery functions as a site for political participation, (2) ‘the society’ and ‘the people’ form an actor people try to influence to pursue ‘political’ aims, and (3) people develop subjectivities at the intersection between political participation and religiosity through engaging with forms of power governing both domains. These findings lead us to conceptualize the political intermediary function of religious civil society as forming a space where citizens negotiate political and religious subjectivities, and in doing so redefine the boundaries of religion and political participation.