@misc{crossref1951book,
    title = "Book One: A Spiritual Legacy",
    year = "1951",
    booktitle = "Tertullian: Treatises on Marriage and Remarriage",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.5040/9780809170555.0005",
    doi = "10.5040/9780809170555.0005",
    pages = "10-22"
}

@article{hoaas1982noh,
    author = "Hoaas, Solrun",
    title = "Noh Masks: The Legacy of Possession",
    year = "1982",
    journal = "The Drama Review: TDR",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.2307/1145522",
    doi = "10.2307/1145522",
    number = "4",
    pages = "82",
    volume = "26"
}

@article{rogers1983luther,
    author = "Rogers, Patrick",
    title = "Luther and his Spiritual Legacy",
    year = "1983",
    journal = "Irish Theological Quarterly",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1177/002114008305000437",
    doi = "10.1177/002114008305000437",
    number = "2-4",
    pages = "291-292",
    volume = "50"
}

@misc{beyerstein1985neuropathology1,
    author = "Beyerstein, B. L",
    title = "Neuropathology and the Legacy of Spiritual Possession",
    year = "1985",
    howpublished = "Skeptical Inquirer, v. 12, no. 3, p. 248-262",
    note = "talkorigins\_source = {true}; raw\_reference = {Beyerstein, B. L., 1985, Neuropathology and the Legacy of Spiritual Possession: Skeptical Inquirer, v. 12, no. 3, p. 248-262.}"
}

@article{doi101007bf02968363,
    author = "Shaw, T.",
    title = "The contemporary plundering of Africa’s past",
    year = "1997",
    journal = "African Archaeological Review",
    url = "https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/d7d4157aeb55e60d5ca0e3bcd7a99203f23f17c5",
    doi = "10.1007/BF02968363",
    is_oa = "true",
    number = "1",
    pages = "1-7",
    semanticscholar_citation_count = "18",
    semanticscholar_id = "d7d4157aeb55e60d5ca0e3bcd7a99203f23f17c5",
    volume = "14"
}

@article{doi101017s0018246x02002856,
    author = "Willis, J.",
    title = "VIOLENCE, AUTHORITY, AND THE STATE IN THE NUBA MOUNTAINS OF CONDOMINIUM SUDAN",
    year = "2003",
    journal = "The Historical Journal",
    abstract = "While British colonial rhetoric consistently identified tradition as the basis of legitimate authority, colonial practice actually produced far-reaching changes in the nature of government in Britain's African possessions. New institutions, and new holders of power, emerged in African societies in response to the particular needs of colonial administration. This article explores this transformation in one part of Condominium Sudan, which was effectively a British possession but which has often been excluded from historical discussions of the impact of colonialism because of its unique status. The Nuba Mountains have recently gained notoriety as a particularly bloody theatre of Sudan's long post-colonial civil war; while some have sought to explain this as the result of British policies which encouraged racial antagonism, the article suggests that here, as elsewhere in Africa, the real legacy of colonial rule was the creation of new kinds of local government which sat uneasily with enduring local ideas of spiritual power and proper authority.",
    url = "https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/preview/1599625/207.pdf",
    doi = "10.1017/S0018246X02002856",
    is_oa = "true",
    number = "1",
    pages = "89-114",
    semanticscholar_citation_count = "18",
    semanticscholar_id = "f163e9c31c55aa03652c77578d9a5cdac488687b",
    volume = "46"
}

@misc{s2deed488f26d27fee6b9a4ef9ed3fc796e268de36,
    author = "Dudková, J.",
    title = "The Slovak film The Border and the Problem of the Construction of Collective Identities",
    year = "2010",
    url = "https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/deed488f26d27fee6b9a4ef9ed3fc796e268de36",
    is_oa = "true",
    semanticscholar_id = "deed488f26d27fee6b9a4ef9ed3fc796e268de36"
}

@incollection{crossref2011spiritual,
    title = "“Spiritual Remedies” for Possession and Witchcraft",
    year = "2011",
    booktitle = "Witchcraft and Inquisition in Early Modern Venice",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1017/cbo9780511894886.007",
    doi = "10.1017/cbo9780511894886.007",
    pages = "96-132"
}

@article{doi102979reseafrilite42420,
    author = "Diala, I.",
    title = "Esiaba Irobi's Legacy: Theory and Practice of Postcolonial Performance",
    year = "2011",
    journal = "Research in African Literatures",
    url = "https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/7bc367c12da298c9f6b1c556da7dff2bb0cd71cf",
    doi = "10.2979/RESEAFRILITE.42.4.20",
    is_oa = "true",
    number = "4",
    pages = "20",
    semanticscholar_citation_count = "2",
    semanticscholar_id = "7bc367c12da298c9f6b1c556da7dff2bb0cd71cf",
    volume = "42"
}

@article{andshevchenko2014pirogovs,
    author = "Shevchenko, Yu.L. and Kozovenko, M.N.",
    title = "Pirogov's Spiritual Legacy",
    year = "2014",
    journal = "Istoriya meditsiny",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.17720/2409-5583.t1.1.2014.06v",
    doi = "10.17720/2409-5583.t1.1.2014.06v",
    number = "1",
    volume = "1"
}

@article{doi101057s412960180211x,
    author = "Caraccioli, Mauro J",
    title = "A problem from hell: Natural history, empire, and the devil in the New World",
    year = "2018",
    journal = "Contemporary Political Theory",
    url = "https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/05dc2dac1bc7fa48105a23b42950b7d86d1a1d3f",
    doi = "10.1057/s41296-018-0211-x",
    is_oa = "true",
    number = "4",
    pages = "437-458",
    semanticscholar_citation_count = "1",
    semanticscholar_id = "05dc2dac1bc7fa48105a23b42950b7d86d1a1d3f",
    volume = "17"
}

@misc{crossref2020possession,
    title = "Possession, Spiritual",
    year = "2020",
    booktitle = "The SAGE Encyclopedia of the Sociology of Religion",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.4135/9781529714401.n339",
    doi = "10.4135/9781529714401.n339"
}

@article{doi1017159tlv57i26424,
    author = "Namirembe, T. and Wanjala, A. and Muleka, Joseph",
    title = "Narrating the Ugandan nation in Mary Okurut’s The Invisible Weevil",
    year = "2020",
    journal = "Tydskrif Vir Letterkunde",
    abstract = "Introduction In this article, we investigate the concept of nationhood in the novel The Invisible Weevil (1998) and how the author, Mary Okurut, wrestles with the question of what constitutes a nation, in particular from a gendered perspective, thereby writing women into the history of Uganda. Nationhood and nationality have been famously explored by Ernest Renan who argues that: A nation is a soul and spiritual principle. Two things which, in truth, are but one. One lies in the past, another in the present. One is the possession in common of a rich legacy of memories; the other is present-day consent, the desire to live together, the will to perpetuate the value of the heritage that one has received in an undivided form [...] The Nation, like the individual, is the culmination of a long past of endeavours, sacrifice, and devotion. Of all cults, that of the ancestors is the most legitimate, for the ancestors have made us what we are. A heroic past, great men [and women], glory, this is the social capital upon which one bases a national idea. (19)",
    url = "https://letterkunde.africa/article/download/6424/10537",
    doi = "10.17159/tl.v57i2.6424",
    is_oa = "true",
    number = "2",
    pages = "57-66",
    semanticscholar_citation_count = "1",
    semanticscholar_id = "48e799416f0b50b2bf87232a0f7a5378009f6695",
    volume = "57"
}

@incollection{crossref2022china,
    title = "China: Demonic Possession and Spiritual Vampires",
    year = "2022",
    booktitle = "Global Perspectives on the Liminality of the Supernatural",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.5771/9781666907421-17",
    doi = "10.5771/9781666907421-17",
    pages = "17-34"
}

@article{tursunovna2022spiritual,
    author = "Tursunovna, Sharipova Oygul",
    title = "spiritual legacy of Yusuf Hamadani",
    year = "2022",
    journal = "International journal of health sciences",
    abstract = "This article provides a philosophical analysis of the spiritual heritage of Yusuf Hamadoni, the teacher of Abdukhalik Gijduvani, the founder of the Khojagon Sufi sect.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.53730/ijhs.v6ns1.7053",
    doi = "10.53730/ijhs.v6ns1.7053",
    pages = "9036-9043"
}

@article{doi1018254s2079878400287627,
    author = "Zhantiev, D.",
    title = "Emir Abd al-Qadir al-Jazairi and the legacy of Ibn Arabi in Ottoman Damascus",
    year = "2023",
    journal = "ISTORIYA",
    abstract = "The article analyzes the late period of the life of the hero of the anti-French struggle in Algeria, Emir Abd al-Qadir al-Jazairi (1808—1883) in Ottoman Damascus in 1855—1883. Refusing to continue the fight against the French colonialists after being released from captivity and moving to Ottoman possessions, Abd al-Qadir devoted his later life to charity and teaching the mystical teachings of Muhyi al-Din Ibn Arabi (1165—1240). The activities of Abd al-Qadir in Ottoman Damascus were inscribed in the moral, religious and political context of his era, when the Ottoman Empire was subjected to increasing pressure from the European powers. Abd al-Qadir sought to find an Islamic response to this external challenge through spiritual perfection based on the teachings of Ibn Arabi. Abd al-Qadir al-Jazairi from a young age belonged to the followers of Ibn Arabi and therefore perceived his life in Damascus not as an exile, but as a way of approaching the comprehension of the mystical insights of Ibn Arabi, who at one time also lived for many years in Damascus where he was buried. In Damascus, Abd al-Qadir enjoyed great spiritual authority and provided patronage to his countrymen — immigrants from Algeria and other countries of the Maghreb. The circle of his chosen disciples was also replenished with local Syrian ulama. Under the influence of Abd al-Qadir, close relations were established between immigrants from Algeria and local Sufis on the basis of Islamic mysticism. The intellectual activity of the circle of followers of Abd al-Qadir in Damascus contributed to the strengthening of the position of Sufism in Ottoman Syria on the basis of the spiritual convergence of the beliefs of the followers of various Islamic mystical teachings.",
    url = "https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/2ff36fc338052e3feee9195ffe92fb0375c42617",
    doi = "10.18254/s207987840028762-7",
    is_oa = "true",
    number = "10 (132)",
    pages = "0",
    semanticscholar_id = "2ff36fc338052e3feee9195ffe92fb0375c42617",
    volume = "14"
}

@article{doi1014738assrj11717137,
    author = "Pezzani, Fabrizio",
    title = "History’s Legacy: Human Nature Is Unchanging",
    year = "2024",
    journal = "Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal",
    abstract = {Today we ought to be in a completely different situation from that of Plato and Raphael during " italian renaisance ", thanks to the progress and power of technical knowledge. A knowledge which has become an end in itself for the modern world, one that should have provided answers to satisfy our primary needs, releasing us from our “shackles”, reducing inequalities, freeing us, at least in part, from a life of fatigue and suffering in physical terms. Scientific knowledge should have helped to create a situation in which our free, inventive mind could once again be the driving force of life, leading us to that dimension of spiritual joy we admire in splendid works of art. This is what Keynes thought would happen. In his essay Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren written in 1930 he said: ‘Thus for the first time since his creation man will be faced with his real, his permanent problem – how to use his freedom from pressing economic cares, which science and compound interest will have won for him [...]. The love of money as a possession – as distinguished from the love of money as a means to the enjoyments and realities of life – will be recognised for what it is, a somewhat disgusting morbidity, one of those semi-criminal, semi-pathological propensities which one hands over with a shudder to the specialists in mental disease’.},
    url = "https://zenodo.org/records/11658748/files/Volume\%2013\%20Issue\%205\%20Paper\%203.pdf",
    doi = "10.14738/assrj.117.17137",
    is_oa = "true",
    number = "7",
    pages = "01-06",
    semanticscholar_id = "1823856128ba184d3902fb832da435eb9c53a440",
    volume = "11"
}

@article{doi1063095nbseh25548874,
    author = "Boora, Shailendra",
    title = "The Enduring Moral Legacy of Pope Francis",
    year = "2025",
    journal = "Natural Built Social Environment Health",
    abstract = {Pope Francis — the first pope from the Global South, the first Jesuit, and the first to bear the name of St Francis of Assisi — carried into the papacy a disarming humility and an uncompromising moral conscience, shaped by the struggles and hopes of South America. For twelve years, he was not only a reformer within the Church but one of the world’s most trusted moral voices — confronting poverty, injustice, war, and exclusion without flinching.
The farewell he received on 26 April 2025 bore witness to the breadth of his impact: over 250,000 mourners filled St Peter’s Square, with thousands more lining the streets of Rome. Leaders from across political and ideological divides gathered, and even groups historically opposed to the Church, such as Hamas and Hezbollah, issued condolence messages. It was not diplomacy that drew them together, but a shared recognition of a conscience that refused to be silenced by politics or prejudice. Francis’s life invites us to walk the path of justice, compassion, and peace. He did not merely point to a better way — he walked it first.
A Papacy Rooted in Simplicity 
From the moment he chose the name Francis — invoking the saint of poverty and peace — Pope Francis challenged the world’s notions of power, wealth, and status. His papacy stood as a living reminder that leadership, at its best, is rooted not in spectacle but in service.
His decision to forgo the Apostolic Palace for the modest Domus Sanctae Marthae, to wear plain cassocks, and to travel in a Ford Focus rather than a papal limousine were not mere gestures. They were reflections of a spirituality that placed humility and human dignity at the centre of public life. His drive for Vatican reform — demanding transparency, enforcing financial accountability, and insisting that the Church embody justice in its structures — reflected the same moral clarity. In an age obsessed with image and dominance, Francis modelled a radically different path: true authority flows not from grandeur, but from solidarity; not from distance, but from closeness to the vulnerable. His life challenges all leaders to rediscover the moral power of simplicity, integrity, and authentic service.
A Voice for Our Common Home
In ‘Laudato Si’ (2015), Pope Francis offered one of the most radical teachings of modern papal history — an ecological encyclical grounded in the conviction that "the cry of the Earth and the cry of the poor" are one and the same. He challenged the world to see environmental destruction not as a distant scientific concern, but as a moral failure intimately tied to economic injustice, corporate greed, and indifference to the vulnerable.
For Francis, ecological degradation was inseparable from the exploitation of the poor. He refused the false choice between development and preservation, insisting instead on an "integral ecology" — a vision where environmental, social, and spiritual health must rise together, or fall together. ‘Laudato Si’ is an appeal to build an economy of care, a politics of stewardship, and a spirituality of interconnection that honours life in all its fragile, interwoven forms.
Voice of the Marginalised
Pope Francis warned consistently against the "globalization of indifference" — a world numbed to suffering and blind to injustice. He sought not merely to advocate for the poor, but to reposition them at the moral centre of global conscience. This vision came alive through initiatives like the World Meeting of Popular Movements (WMPM), launched in 2014, which gathered slum dwellers, farmers, fisherfolk, and informal workers across continents. Francis affirmed their struggles as sacred rights — championing "Techo, Tierra, Trabajo" (Housing, Land, and Work) as essential pillars of dignity. In a world that discarded its most vulnerable, he called for a universal basic income and condemned economic systems that idolized profit.
His solidarity extended beyond economics. He embraced LGBTQ+ persons, prisoners, the differently abled, and those battling addiction — not as exceptions, but as integral members of the human family. His gestures, like washing the feet of migrants and prisoners, proclaimed that the Church must kneel before the wounded, not preach from a distance. Francis’s legacy leaves a challenge far greater than philanthropy: to uphold justice for those underprivileged.
Listening to Indigenous Wisdom
Although many previous papacies emphasized mission and conversion, Pope Francis reoriented the Church’s relationship with Indigenous peoples. He recognized them as custodians of ancestral wisdom and long-denied rights.  In 2015, standing on Bolivian soil, he offered one of the Church’s most direct acknowledgements of colonial violence: “Many grave sins were committed... in the name of God,” he said — seeking forgiveness not just for history’s wrongs, but for patterns of exploitation that still endure. This reckoning deepened with the Amazon Synod of 2019, where bishops, theologians, and Indigenous leaders gathered in Rome to address deforestation, extractive industries, cultural erasure, and climate collapse. Indigenous voices — often speaking in native languages — were treated not as ceremonial participants, but as witnesses reshaping the Church’s moral vision.
Francis did not simply advocate for Indigenous rights; he repositioned their wisdom at the heart of the Church’s moral vision. He leaves behind an appeal — to governments, corporations, and religious institutions alike — to move from gestures of repentance to structures of shared responsibility, and to recognise that humanity’s future survival is inseparable from the survival of its first peoples.
Welcoming the Stranger: Refugee Crisis and Syrian Appeal
Many leaders hardened their borders and their rhetoric during the refugee crisis, but Pope Francis stood for openness, compassion, and shared humanity. His response — especially to the plight of Syrian refugees — was grounded in the radical belief in every person's dignity.
In 2015, as millions fled violence, he issued an urgent appeal: "May every parish, every religious community, every monastery, every sanctuary in Europe take in one refugee family." It was not a gesture of sentiment, but a call to convert empathy into shelter, compassion into policy. His visit to the Greek island of Lesbos in 2016 became a global symbol. Amid the desperation of refugee camps, he welcomed twelve Syrian Muslim refugees onto the papal plane, offering not a photo opportunity, but protection and care. It was a quiet yet forceful rebuke to rising nationalism and fear. He warned that societies which close their doors to migrants risk closing their hearts to humanity itself.
His life leaves us a test: will we continue to view the displaced as burdens to be managed, or will we dare to see them as neighbours?
Bridges Across Faith and Humanity
At a time when religious divisions were deepened by some, Pope Francis chose a different path — one of dialogue, humility, and fraternity. In 2019, he became the first pope to visit the Arabian Peninsula, signing the Document on Human Fraternity with Grand Imam Ahmed el-Tayeb of Al-Azhar in Abu Dhabi. "God does not want religions to fight each other," he declared — offering a vision of shared dignity over supremacy.
His 2021 visit to Iraq carried the same spirit. In Najaf, he met Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, one of Shia Islam’s most revered clerics, in a quiet but powerful gesture of theological respect. In 2024, Pope Francis kissed the hand of Grand Imam Nasaruddin Umar, the leader of Jakarta’s Istiqlal Mosque, in a gesture of mutual respect and interfaith solidarity.​ "Istiqlal Joint Declaration 2024," a document promoting religious harmony, environmental protection, a stand against violence and extremism was signed by both the leaders. In Bangladesh (2017), he broke protocol to name and embrace Rohingya refugees — affirming their humanity where political leaders remained silent. Whether in Egypt, Jordan, Turkey, Morocco, or Bahrain, his message was unwavering: dialogue is not weakness, but an act of moral courage.
Francis’s outreach was not confined to religious divides alone. He addressed an extraordinary letter to La Repubblica, an Italian secular newspaper, affirming that conscience — not dogma — is the first guide for those seeking the good. “God’s mercy has no limits if one turns to Him with a sincere and contrite heart,” he wrote — an invitation that extended beyond believers to all who strive for justice and compassion.
His passing was mourned not only within the Catholic Church but across the broader human family — by Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, atheists, and agnostics alike. In life and in death, he stood as a rare moral voice who spoke across the fractures of faith and ideology. Will we continue to build walls of fear, or will we dare to see in every stranger a fellow bearer of sacred dignity?
Moral Stand Against War and Violence
Pope Francis consistently raised a deeper moral alarm — refusing to normalise war, the arms trade, and militarised politics. He condemned the global arms industry, branding weapons manufacturers “merchants of death.” He exposed how militarism perpetuates poverty and displacement, warning that every bomb dropped is a meal not served, a home not built. During the war in Ukraine, he called the invasion “a cruel and senseless war,” urging moral clarity alongside humanitarian compassion. Yet he also warned: peace without justice is unsustainable, and justice without mercy risks becoming vengeance.
His stance remained uncompromising during the violence in Gaza and Israel. In his Easter messages of 2024 and 2025, he called for humanitarian corridors, an immediate ceasefire, and diplomacy grounded in human dignity. “Enough,” he declared. “War is always a defeat.” In Nagasaki, he declared that not only the use but even the possession of nuclear weapons is morally unacceptable. Will the world’s powers continue worshipping the machinery of destruc},
    url = "https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/6a37ee4672683fa800f0bcdb24760e955488ab9b",
    doi = "10.63095/nbseh.25.548874",
    is_oa = "true",
    semanticscholar_id = "6a37ee4672683fa800f0bcdb24760e955488ab9b"
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@inproceedings{woo2025efficient,
    author = "Woo, Anna P. Y. and Ozdemir, Alex and Sharp, Chad and Pornin, Thomas and Grubbs, Paul",
    title = "Efficient Proofs of Possession for Legacy Signatures",
    year = "2025",
    booktitle = "2025 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (SP)",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1109/sp61157.2025.00080",
    doi = "10.1109/sp61157.2025.00080",
    pages = "3291-3308"
}