ADAM BAUDIŠ
POLITICAL RELIGIONS AND NEW RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS: EXAMPLE OF NAZISM
Abstract: Political religions are a specific type of religiosity which is usually not reflected outside of
academia because our society (unlike in e.g. the ancient civilizations) perceives politics primarily
as a secular entity. Although the members of the political parties also don’t see their ideology as
religious (not even partially), we can find many examples of religious elements and ritual behaviour
in them. The most accentuated are the typical characteristics of the new religious movements and
most importantly, the millennial ones. The most reflected political religions are totalitarian regimes;
that’s why Nazism is used here as an example. The paper defines the political religions in general
and then shows the particular millennial characteristics of Nazism and deals with the difference
between political religions and new religious movements.
Keywords: political religions; new religious movements; Nazism; Fascism; totalitarianism;
millennialism; politology; history of the 20th century
THEOLOGICAL REVIEW, Vol. 92, 2021, No. 3, Number of Article 6, p. 311 – 321.
DOI: 10.14712/12117617.92.3.6