코로나19 위기 상황에서의 종교 지도자 담화문 연구

A Study on the Statement of Religious Leaders in the COVID-19 Crisis

This paper analyzes the contents of seven statements of religious leaders published in the COVID-19 crisis from the perspective of disaster humanities. The summary of the analysis are as follows. First, all statements recognized and defined COVID-19 as a disaster and crisis. Second, as a response to COVID-19 they prioritized cooperation with government policies and emphasized religious response methods, namely helping and praying for their neighbors. Third, in the message to believers and officials(priests, monks, pastors, and etc.), the request for religious life occupies the main content, and tried to give the belief that COVID-19 can be overcomed. Fourth, the attitudes toward the government are mostly positive, and only Protestant pastoral letters show a negative attitude towards strong preventive measures such as the closure of religious facilities. Each religious statement uses the vocabulary of the religion in greetings, titles, and year marks. The closing remarks of all the statements end with asking for prayers to overcome COVID-19. In the end, it can be said that the biggest content characteristic of religious discourse is that humans, who are weak beings, pray to the absolute being in the face of disaster.