ABSTRACT
This chapter explores some of the linkages and tensions between religion and cosmopolitanism which remain largely unelaborated in the literature. It discusses the question of whether young volunteers invoking particular religious orientations as reasons for volunteering actually develop cosmopolitan ways of imagining the world and engaging the otherness of other people and cultures. The chapter addresses the question of how young people who carry on work on volunteering programmes of cooperation and development in Africa make use of cosmopolitan ideas and values as cultural resources to account for their volunteer experiences. International volunteering of young people developed outside the scope of religious organizations and without particular religious orientations is much less prominent in the Portuguese context. The recruitment and training of young volunteers is strongly anchored on a range of social networks and organizational memberships that supply information, make contacts, foster trust, and create obligations.
