Public lecture by Sebastian Rimestad: Ortho-Bros and the Political Cleavage in the USA

On February 14 and 19, everyone is welcome to attend public lectures by Sebastian Rimestad from the University of Leipzig. He will explore topics such as Orthodox Christianity and religious authority in Western Europe, as well as the "Ortho-Bros" movement and political cleavage in the USA.

Ortho-Bros and the Political Cleavage in the USA

19 February 2025, 16:15 at Lossi 36-214. The lecture can be followed also via Zoom.

The political developments in the USA remain tense, both because of increasing social cleavages and a coarsening of what counts as civilised debate. The second presidency of Donald Trump is just the pinnacle of a much larger phenomenon, threatening the political foundations of what was once the beacon of liberal democracy. This development also includes religious aspects, as the moderate Christian Churches are losing their hegemony to more radically conservative confessional variants of Christianity, such as Roman Catholicism and Evangelicalism. An alarming development in this regard is a surge of conversions to the Eastern Orthodox Church, often accompanied by a naïve understanding of the unchanging truth of Orthodoxy and of Russia’s messianic role in current global politics. The new converts, predominantly educated and male, have been given the name “Ortho-Bros” by many analysts and have even applied it themselves. The Ortho-Bro movement is characterised by a reactionary conservatism that is fuelled by the culture wars raging in most contemporary western societies.

The lecture will analyse the Ortho-Bro scene in current American society on the background of culture wars, political cleavages, and international geopolitics.

Public lecture on Februrary 14: Orthodox Christianity and Religious Authority. The Case of Western Europe

Dr Sebastian Rimestad, Leipzig University

Sebastian Rimestad studied political science international relations, and religious studies in Aberdeen, Tartu, and Erfurt. His PhD-dissertation covered the Orthodox Church in the first Estonian and Latvian republics (1917-1940) and his second book was about religious authority among Orthodox Christians in Western Europe. Since 2021, he has a grant from the German Research Foundation (DFG – Heisenberg), working for the Institute for the Study of Religion at Leipzig University (Germany). His research topics are religion in modern societies, contemporary Orthodox Christianity, religious conversion, as well as religious pluralism in North-East Europe.

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