Temporality and Geopolitics: The Case of Global Catholicism

This article explores the role of temporality in geopolitics, particularly in geopolitics of religion. It argues that the spatial dimension of politics is always connected to temporality, as temporal politics is essential to the actors´ spatial moves, since it legitimizes them and gives them meaning. To show the practical relevance of temporality in geopolitics, the article sheds light on the geo-temporal narratives of the largest religious actor in the world, the Catholic Church. Analysing the Catholic Church’s approach to three selected regions, Europe, Africa and the Middle East, it argues that the Catholic Church uses two distinct geo-temporal strategies, one of secularized temporality and one of geo-temporal sacralization. The article concludes by arguing that since these approaches have very different political consequences, Catholic geopolitics would be undecipherable if its temporal dimension were omitted.