Religion-Based Resilience among Lapindo Mudflow-Affected Communities

Abstract

This article examines the role of religion and religious institutions in strengthening community resilience among vulnerable residents affected by the Lapindo mudflow disaster in Glagaharum, Sidoarjo. The study responds to the tendency of disaster management to prioritize physical relocation, compensation, and technical mitigation while underestimating religious interpretation, local social capital, and faith-based institutions as resources for recovery. Using a qualitative community-based research design, the study involved affected residents, religious groups, and local community actors through interviews, participatory mapping, storytelling, focus group discussions, and logical framework analysis. The findings show that religion operates ambivalently in disaster contexts: it may reinforce fatalistic acceptance when disaster is interpreted only as divine destiny, yet it may also become transformative when religious meanings are reinterpreted as ethical motivation for collective action, livelihood recovery, environmental concern, and social solidarity. Majlis taklim and jamiyah tahlil functioned as social spaces where residents negotiated meaning, strengthened kinship, planned economic initiatives, and sustained communal resilience. The article contributes to Islamic studies by proposing transformative disaster theology as a bridge between Islamic moral interpretation, community-based disaster risk reduction, and resilience-building among vulnerable communities.