ABSTRACT
Religious festivals are often used by institutions, both secular and religious, as an occasion for sending official greeting messages to the respective faith community. This chapter discusses the typical features of the genre religious greeting message for both “religious to religious” and “secular to religious” communication. Drawing on the approach of politolinguistics, it will be argued that greeting messages can be understood as a part of public diplomacy communication that aims to establish good relations with a target audience. Religious greeting messages are marked by standardized expressions and tend to be repetitive across the years. Rather than an accidental feature or weakness of the genre, familiar patterns can serve to establish trust and emphasize the continuity and reliability of the relationship in focus. Repetition within and across texts underscores the ritualized nature of this form of communication. At the same time, greeting messages can provide institutions with a channel to selectively address more sensitive and pressing inter-group issues. The challenge that institutions face lies in balancing the pursuit of institutional goals with the requirement for general politeness and standardized formulations that is expected for religious greeting messages.
