In post-Soviet Georgia, the relationship between the Georgian Orthodox Church [GOC] and the politics manifest itself in two ways: the instrumentalization of GOC by the political parties and the government, as well as the attempts by GOC to strengthen its political infuence. This paper tries to go beyond a purely institutional level and explores the deeply internalized perception of Christian Orthodoxy as a core element of Georgian identity. Such perception leads to formation of diferent societal groups consolidated around diferent religious beliefs and political views. This article analyzes controversies and clashes between these groups during a confict occurred on May 17, 2013, when a small antihomophobic event was attacked by a big group of counter-protestants. The study focuses on this case and uses, as its core methodology, in-depth interviews, participant observation and interpretive analysis.

Keywords: religion, politics, secularization, modernity, traditional, national identity, public space, social confict, confrontational sides.

Dzhanelidze B. Religion, Politics and modernity in Georgia: Debates around the events of May 17, 2013.Gosudarstvo, religiya, tserkva v Rossii i za rubezhom [State, Religion, Church in Russia and Abroad]. 2016. N2. pp. 92-106.

Janelidze, Barbare (2016) "Religion, Politics and Modernity in Georgia: The Case of May 17th, 2013", Gosudarstvo, religiia, tserkov' v Rossii i za rubezhom 34(2): 92-106.

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The forest blooms elegant,
The swallows in the sky are singing,
Vine leaves
Spring tears are pouring down.
The mountains are getting more and more beautiful,
Meadow multicolored prigozh.
Our dear motherland,
You?when will you bloom?

Ilya Chavchavadze, "Spring" (1861)

(Translated by N. Zabolotsky)

May seventeenth

ON the morning of May 17, 2014, in a small park located on Freedom Square in the Georgian capital Tbilisi, about a hundred pairs of shoes could be found on the ground. There wasn't a soul around. Silence. The name of the installation - "Protest in support of the invisible and against invisibility" 1-quickly gained popularity on the Internet and in the media. On the same day, at about 10 a.m., a large group of people gathered in front of the Concert Hall of the Tbilisi Philharmonic and headed for the parliament building. Some carried crosses, while others carried placards that read: "May 17 is Family Day"; "Sodom and Gomorrah are still burning"; "People rose up to defeat Satanism"; "No to the anti-discrimination Law" .2
1. Protest in support of the unseelie and against invisibility [http://identoba.com/2014/05/18/invisible/, accessed 01.05.2015].

2. [Parallel to the Identoba protest, a counter-protest was held] // News.ge. 13.05.2013. [http://news.ge/ge/news/story/54474-identobis-aqtsiis-paralelurad-misisatsinaaghmdego-aqtsia-chat ardeba, accessed 01.05.2015]; [Growing protest movement against abnormal sexual relations] // Geonews.ge. 15.05.2013. [http://geonews.ge/geo/news/story/40132-arasamtavrobo_organizaciebi_aqcia, accessed 01.05.2015]; 17 [May 17-the battle against homophobia and equality in Georgia] // Netgazeti.net. [http://www.netgazeti.ge/GE/105/News/19670/, accessed 01.05.2015]. The Anti-discrimination law is part of an Action Plan to liberalize the visa regime between Georgia and the EU: "In 2013, Georgia committed to adopt a law aimed at eliminating various forms of discrimination." New Anti-Discrimination Law: Challenges and Achievements // Transparency International Georgia. 17.06.2014 [http://transparency.

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These two actions, which took place on May 17, 2014, symbolically reproduced a major social clash a year earlier, in 2013, when a modest anti-homophobic action organized by the LGBT organization "Identoba" ("Identity") was attacked by a crowd of protesters. The protest was organized by various socio-religious groups and was also attended by several representatives of the Georgian Orthodox Church (GOC). Since then, the day of May 17 has become a subject of deep reflection: some liberal publicists have called it "the birthday of Georgian fascism"3. For some of the society, it has become a warning signal about the establishment of a theocracy. A protest action "No to theocracy" was held, and a petition was sent to the Parliament, signed by about fifteen thousand residents of Georgia, demanding an objective investigation and appropriate punishment for everyone who violated the law. Another part of the society, on the contrary, was concerned about the "undermining of morals" among the younger generation and the violation of Georgian traditions. Some perceived May 17 as a provocation aimed at destroying the good reputation of the GOC, while others saw the anti-homophobic action as signs of the Antichrist.

This article covers two topics. First, the actual events of May 17 as a vivid example of a social clash between different actors; second, the accompanying narratives about "authentic identity" and what it means to be Georgian. More precisely, I am interested in whether conflicts and narratives about identity overlap, whether they are part of the meta-discourse about "modernity" in Georgian society. The problems that this study addresses are complex, but I am primarily addressing two questions: what narratives related to the May 17 conflict have become part of political discourse, and who are the participants in this conflict, and therefore who produces and reproduces the relevant discourses in Georgian society.

Conflicts based on identity and human rights, especially with regard to the rights of sexual minorities, are not uncommon in the former Soviet Union. As Amartya Sen has pointed out, the concept of identity is influential.-

ge/en/blog/new-anti-discrimination-law-challenges-and-achievements, accessed on 23.05.2016].

3. Maisuradze G. [The origin of Georgian fascism from the spirit of Orthodoxy]. Radiotavisupleba.ge. 17.05.2013 [http://www.radiotavisupleba.ge/content/blog-giorgi-maisuradze-georgian-fascism/24989629.html, доступ 02.05.2015].

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it affects our consciousness and actions in various ways. The identities of different groups can come into conflict with each other, and this has happened in the course of many political and social conflicts. 4 "May 17" should be understood as a clash of two different narratives about traditional and modern, as well as as an example of a conflict based on different social perceptions of identity, religion and human rights. The mentioned event can be considered as a "focal point": first, because it focused different views on identity, and secondly, because the result of this event was the articulation and consolidation of "new meanings"in society.

Of course, the events of May 17 should not be considered the end of a social conflict between different groups, because we live in a reality in which identity fragmentation continues and social heterogeneity increases. However, the events of May 17 are one of the most prominent and major social events in Georgian society, where all the controversies surrounding the topic of minorities, not only sexual, but also religious and other issues, have manifested themselves. Therefore, the analysis of the events of May 17 is important for understanding other conflicts and / or controversial topics that reflect the dichotomy of religious and secular in Georgia.

The inheritance of the Blessed Virgin Mary

"Do you know who was the first liberal? Lucifer!", said one of the members of the Union of Orthodox Parents of Georgia (interview with me, March 24, 2015).5."We have believed for almost two thousand years that our country was chosen by the Blessed Virgin Mary, and during these two thousand years we have not been able to get one step closer to the Supreme Being," 6 Parliament Speaker David Usupashvili said on May 13, 2014, in a speech on state-church relations in Georgia which was delivered at the symposium "The Tradition of the Glorification of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Orthodox Christianity" organized by the Russian Orthodox Church.

4. Sen, A. (2007) Die Identitatsfalle: Warum es keinen Krieg der Kulturen gibt, p. 8. Bonn: Bundeszentrale fur politische Bildung.

5. All quotes are part of in-depth interviews; translations are made by me, unless otherwise indicated.

6. (Usupashvili: Governing the state according to the Bible instead of the constitution is also evil [video]) // Netgazeti.net [http://www.netgazeti.ge/GE/105/opinion/31372/, accessed 11.05.2015].

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In Georgia, the relationship between religion and politics and conflicts like the one that occurred on May 17, 2013, cannot be viewed in isolation from either the internal Georgian debate about the meaning of modern versus traditional, or the scholarly debate about secularism and modernity.

Citing the events of May 17 as an example of the politicization of the clergy and the prominent presence of the GOC in the public sphere, Silvia Serrano, author of a study on church-state relations in Georgia, writes that it is still unclear how to determine the outcome of this event. How to strengthen the position of religious extremists who seek revenge? Or should we rather pay attention to the words of the Speaker of the Georgian Parliament, who criticized the Georgian patriarch for supporting thousands of homophobic demonstrators?7 The tension that arose and increased during and after the events of May 17 should certainly be considered as an indicator of tension in relations between various social actors, as well as between the church and the State. This tension first made itself felt in the early 2000s and then only intensified.

Nevertheless, it may be worth asking whether it is really necessary to look for a" winner " in this confrontation? Even if we described, for example, one of these positions as dominant, this would not lead to an end to the conflict. To understand why some conflicts can escalate and become public, we need to understand who or what is the "other" that the participants in the conflict are opposing. Only by analyzing and describing these different narratives will we be able to understand why conflicts involving religious issues become part of political discourse, and what kind of discursive knowledge is reproduced in society as a result of these conflicts.

According to Yu. According to Habermas, the public sphere is the most significant space for a liberal democracy, where conflicting actors can engage in rational arguments and where each group has the opportunity to express its interests in order to finally come to an agreement.8 In this case, it seems possible to move away from this definition of the public sphere. By opinion

7. Serrano S. The Georgian Church: The Embodiment of National unity or an oppositional force? // Pro et Contra. 2013. N5 (60). pp. 66, 76.

8. Habermas, J. (2008) Between Naturalism and Religion. Philosophical Essays. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press.

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Talal Asada, an agreement between opposing narratives cannot be reached in the public sphere, because it is always a space, "out of necessity (and not by chance) determined by power relations. And everyone who enters it must take into account the location of people and things in terms of power, the dependence of some and the good will of others."9. Public space is not a space dominated by a single narrative. As Assad writes: "The public sphere is remarkably diverse. People do not adhere to a single moral system; moral heterogeneity is one of the defining characteristics of modern society. " 10
During the post-Soviet transformations, the political and religious spheres were closely linked, and the religious-political narrative gained great influence. In modern Georgia, the relationship between the GOC and politics develops in accordance with a double logic: on the one hand, the GOC is used by political parties and the government as an instrument of political power, and on the other hand, the GOC tries to increase its influence on politics in order to occupy a stable monopoly position in the public space. As S. Serrano correctly noted, despite the fact that the GOC's desire to strengthen its monopoly position in the public sphere has very real grounds, it would be superficial to reduce the complex perception of its national identity by society to institutional features, and also try to explain this collective perception of the church's monopoly. Along with weak state institutions and a weak bureaucracy, which are Serrano considers 11 explanatory factors, and I also suggest that we look at society's perception of its national identity and the social contradictions that arise from these perceptions from the point of view of discursive analysis. In other words, to trace how different social actors simultaneously articulate their positions in a constant dispute 12.

9. Asad, T. (2003) Formations of the Secular. Christianity, Islam, Modernity, р. 18. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press.

10. Ibid., p. 186.

11. Serrano S. The Georgian Church: The Embodiment of National unity or an oppositional force? С. 66, 68; Serrano, S (2010) "De-Secularizing National Space in Georgia", Identity Studies 2: 37-58.

12. Keller, R. (2011) Wissenssoziologische Diskursanalyse: Grundlegung eines Forschungsprogramms. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag. (3rd. ed.).

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The actors who participate in the debate about modern and secular are not only the GOC and the state, but also opposing "secular" and "religious" groups - for example, the Union of Orthodox Parents of Georgia and the public organization Identoba, as was the case on May 17.

The Union of Orthodox Parents is one of the oldest religious and public organizations in Georgia with a clear organizational structure. It was founded in the early 1990s. One of the founders of the Union says:

Although our organization was founded in the nineties, we registered more officially only in 2002 as a non-governmental organization. What is the difference between us and other non-governmental organizations? We are a union based on the church, a church brotherhood. This is a different kind of union. We are a non-profit organization, we exist at the expense of donations. But the most important difference is that our members are not required to register, and we do not have a list of members who need to pay membership fees. Our member is anyone who shares our views and, of course, is an Orthodox Christian and our like-minded person (interview dated March 24, 2015).

But there are many similar organizations, sometimes smaller and with a different political agenda, whose formation we have mainly observed since the early 2000s. Among them, for example, are the Union of the Orthodox Parish of St. King David, the Union of St. King Vakhtang, the Union of the Great Martyr Ketevan, the National Religious Institute, Iverieli, the National Front, and the Georgian Idea. It is even more interesting that these organizations are sometimes interconnected and even perceived as "signalers", transmitting an "alarm signal" - this is how one of the members of the Union of Orthodox Parents called one of these small organizations (interview of March 24, 2015). Quite often, almost all these socio-religious organizations can unite on the basis of common values, the most striking example of which is the events of May 17. The joint statement of May 15, 2013 is an example of such cooperation, when approximately twelve organizations jointly announced a counter-protest on May 17 to condemn "LGBT propaganda" and "start a public movement".-

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for the legislative prohibition of "unnatural sexual relations" 13.

On the other hand, we are seeing the emergence of a wide range of secular actors. But, as in the case of the public movement "Identoba", which is primarily an organization that unites members of the LGBT community, other actors that can be designated as secular did not initially have a clear political program directed against the dominant religious narratives or aimed at developing and spreading secular values.14 Rather, it can be argued that the "secularists" first established themselves as a retaliatory force in conflicts that became increasingly frequent in the public space, starting with the coming to power of the " United National Movement "(M. Saakashvili's party), and which continued during the rule of the "Georgian Dream" (after 2012). Только Later, especially after the events of May 17, secularists developed a clear secular program, which consists, for example, in monitoring violations of the rights of religious minorities by studying the religious situation in Georgia or organizing discussions on religious topics in the public space with the participation of religious minorities, representatives of science and social activists. Among them there are such organizations as "Women's Initiative Support Group", "Center for Education and Monitoring of Human Rights", "Association of Young Lawyers of Georgia", etc. Not only non-governmental organizations and various communities, but also representatives of science and intellectuals actively participated in the creation of the "secular narrative" in the public sphere.

Many of these actors - both "secular" and "religious" - saw May 17 as a turning point in relations between the GOC and the state, which naturally led to the realization of the need to develop a more structured strategy.

13. [Growing protest movement against unnatural sexual relations].

14. Of course, there are some exceptions, as in the case of the Institute for Tolerance and Diversity, which was founded after 17 May-26 August 2013. As stated on the organization's website, its main goals are to support religious freedom and develop a culture of tolerance, protect and spread the idea of a secular state, and so on. For more information, see the organization's website: TDI Georgia [https://tdigeorgia.wordpress.com, accessed from 21.03.2016].

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a future-oriented program. One of the members of a non-governmental organization from the "secular camp" stated::

The events of May 17 demonstrated that the church seeks to impose its teaching in the public space. I have various explanations for what happened on May 17, and one of these explanations is that the church has clearly shown that it is against the democratic system and openly opposes the state. I do not know if there is a real confrontation, but we can see that after May 17, the church definitely entered the public space as a political actor. It can organize people on an ideological level, the police miss counter-demonstrators and are not able to protect LGBT activists. After May 17, we saw many events in which the church acted as a political actor. For example, this was the case during the events related to the anti-discrimination law (interview from 04.11.2015).

After May 17, public intellectuals published a number of open letters and Internet posts with very eloquent titles: "What is a theocracy and why the Georgian people do not need it" 15, or: "Why May 17 can be defined as a mini-holocaust" 16.

What we clearly see in the events during and after May 17 is not only the articulation of views on Georgian identity, but also the reproduction and dissemination of this new knowledge on a broader level. What exactly is new here - after all, similar disputes about identity were conducted before May 17?

The paper "Social Construction of Reality" by Peter Berger and Thomas Lukman analyzes not only "empirical variations of knowledge" in different societies, but also "processes during which any body of knowledge can be socially approved as reality".17. Thus, these authors offer a theoretical justification for understanding how institutional-

15. Andronikashvili Z. [What does "No theocracy" mean?] / / Radiotavisupleba.ge. 25.05.2013 [http://www.radiotavisupleba.ge/archive/zaal_andronikashvili/20130501/1022/15904.html, accessed from 20.03.2016].

16. Maisuradze G. [Banality of evil]. [http://www.radiotavisupleba.ge/archive/giorgi_maisuradze/20130504/1022/3492.html, доступ от 20.03.2016].

17. Berger, P., Luckmann, Т. (1967) The Social Construction of Reality, p. 3. New York: Anchor Books.

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both the process of knowledge production and its everyday assimilation and use of "stocks of knowledge"18. The essence of my approach is to analyze specific social conflicts and identity issues on a discursive level, to view actors not as dependent on certain institutions, but rather as dependent on each other. This proposal calls for considering the confrontation that occurred during and after the events of May 17 in the tradition of the "Sociology of Knowledge Discourse Analysis" (SKAD) and describing it in the paradigm of discursive-definitional disputes.19
"Warehouses of knowledge" on identity issues, attempts by both conflicting parties to define each other in the categories of "otherness" and/or" alienness "with the use of such definitions as" fascism"," holocaust"," Satanism"," undermining moral foundations " - all this was before May 17. But while "knowledge warehouses" exist in every society before any conflicts occur, it is at the moment of conflict - especially such significant ones as the May 17 conflict - that discourses become reality and are not reproduced. An important consequence of the events of May 17 was a clearer justification of different views on the essence of Georgian culture and on "threats" to the future of the Georgian nation, as well as the emergence of clearly defined opposing groups. These opposing actors today continue to act and express themselves from within the dichotomy of "secular" and "religious"; and by expressing themselves from within this dichotomy, they simultaneously realize and reproduce the knowledge of secular and religious.

The right path to a brighter future

In his article on secularism in the post-Soviet space, Alexander Aghajanyan made an interesting observation: post-Soviet secularism, once established, simultaneously became more and more vulnerable, as the dominant religion became an important political and cultural force; and at the same time, the increase in the number of religious actors led to the "further development of secularism", the manifestation of consistently secular tendencies. groups, and hence the appearance of a more direct

18. Keller, R. Wissenssoziologische Diskursanalyse: Grundlegung eines Forschungsprogramms, p. 49.

19. Ibid., p. 51.

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and deliberate confrontations between secular and religious groups 20.

In Georgia, the rise of public religion, paradoxical as it may sound, took place in parallel with the establishment of a secular discourse. This trend became especially noticeable after 2003, that is, after the "rose revolution", during the rule of Mikhail Saakashvili, when such concepts as modernization, secularization, and the rights of religious and sexual minorities became part of the political discourse. At the same time, the influence of religious nationalism, largely formulated by the Georgian Orthodox Church, was growing.

Along with the formation of the dichotomy of "modern" and "traditional" in the confrontation between the Saakashvili government and the GOC, a scientific discourse on secularism has also emerged in Georgia. In his study of the contemporary discourse on Islam as a fundamentalist and anti-modern religion, Jose Casanova notes that Islam has actually "replaced Catholicism as the 'other' of Western secular modernity, " 21 since until recently secularization was considered part of a purposeful process of modernization and progress. 22 In the Georgian scientific discourse on secularization, it is Orthodoxy that appears as the "other" in relation to the "Western secular modernity", which should become the bright future of Georgia. If you look at the Georgian literature on the relationship between the state and religion and / or the process of secularization, a huge amount of materials will relate to the period starting from the 2000s.It can be said that the scientific discourse on secularization in Georgia itself originated as part of political discourse. He sees secularization precisely as part of"progress." Some members of the scientific elite have taken a distinctly anti-clerical stance, seeing the rise of religiosity as a hindrance to the country's modernization.23
Thus, since 2003, amid the rapid and sometimes harsh reforms of the Saakashvili government, conflicts between the religious and the secular have become constant. As examples

20. Agadjanian, A. (2015) "Vulnerable Post-Soviet Secularities: Patterns and Dynamics in Russia and Beyond", in M. Burchardt, M. Wohlrab-Sahr, M. Middell (eds) Multiple Secularities Beyond the West. Religion and Modernity in the Global Age, pp. 248-255. De Gruyter.

21. Casanova, J. (2008) "Public Religions Revisited", in H. de Vries et al. Religion: Beyond a Concept, p. 108. New York: Fordham University Press.

22. Ibid., p. 109.

23. For comparison, see Andronikashvili, Z., Maisuradze, G. (2010) "Secularization and Its Vicissitudes in Georgia", Identity Studies 2.

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Such conflicts include the conflict related to the law on the status of religious minorities (July 2011), or the construction of mosques in Georgia (2008), or the introduction of new identification cards (starting in 2011), and, finally, the clashes on May 17, which we discussed in this article. All these confrontations, regardless of their specific contexts, have a common basic element, which can be called the "construction of fear of the other". Since the 1990s, "we-they" constructions have been the main catalysts for conflicts in Georgia.24 Both religious and secular groups viewed their relationship with the" other "in the spirit of opposing good and evil, light and darkness; it was in these categories that the" otherness " on both sides was constructed by both religious and secular groups. If for religious radicals homosexuality (especially after May 17) was a symbol of the antichrist and a direct threat to the survival of the Georgian nation25, then secular radicals perceived the GOC itself and its narratives (and also especially after May 17). as a threat to Georgia's European integration and the existence of Georgia as a democratic state 26. "May 17" and subsequent events suggest that, on the one hand, discursive knowledge about what is" true "Georgian identity and what is alien to it (for example," traditional family " or Orthodoxy as an integral part of identity and homosexuality as an alien element for it) was expressed and reproduced again. On the other hand, knowledge about the "secular state" and "fundamentalism" was simultaneously being formed, and the experience of criticizing the church appeared. According to Aghajanyan, we are witnessing a trend common to many post-Soviet countries, including Georgia: the emergence of" social groups and movements "of a" secular orientation " that oppose the dominant religious narratives. 27
24. Khutsishvili, K. (2015) "Religion and Politics: Introduction", in A. Agadjanian, A. Jodicke, E. van der Zweerde (eds.) Religion, Nation and Democracy in the South Caucasus, p. 60. Routledge.

25. For comparison, see: Ungiadze A. [Antisodomy or against homosexuality as a sin and pathology]. Tbilisi, 2013. p. 11.

26. See, for example: Zedaniya G. 79 [Iran 79] // Radiotavisupleba.ge. 20.05.2013. [http://www.radiotavisupleba.ge/content/blog-giga-zedania-iran/24991995.html. accessed 11.05.2015] Mindiashvili B. 17 [Events of May 17. The Seven Deadly Sins Parade] // Tabula.ge. 27.05.2013 [http://www.tabula.ge/ge/story/7l529-shvidi-momakvdinebeli-codvis-aglilumi, доступ 11.05.2015].

27. Agadjanian, A. "Vulnerable Post-Soviet Secularities: Patterns and Dynamics in Russia and Beyond", p. 258.

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"The public sphere is not an empty space for debate," it is riddled with " memories and aspirations, fears and hopes."28. As we have seen, the discourse on secularism was created in parallel with the strengthening of religious attitudes and practices. The emergence of groups with a secular agenda, in turn, led to a new activation of radical religious groups. Finally, the conflict caused by their clash in the public space was often interpreted as a dispute about what is traditional and what is modern.

In conclusion, it should be noted that the symbolic repetition of "May 17" a year after the events, in 2014, was an attempt by both sides to confirm two discursive trends that had developed a year earlier. In the words of Sigmund Bauman, it was an attempt to "exorcise" the "frightening specter of uncertainty" by "driving a select category of "outsiders" out of their homes and shops. " 29 Both sides consider each other outsiders. Both secularists and representatives of radical religious groups argue about what modernity is. As Charles Taylor noted, modernity, by generating alternatives, makes it possible not only to be non-religious, but also, on the contrary, to become religious.30 Paradoxically, both secularism and fundamentalism turn out to be modern phenomena.31 At the same time, the conflicting parties are united by the same declared goal - the right path forward to a bright future and prosperity for the Georgian people.

Translated from English by Daria Blinova

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