Sociology of religion
1800s: Martineau · Tocqueville · Marx · Spencer · Le Bon · Ward · Pareto · Tönnies · Veblen · Simmel · Durkheim · Addams · Mead · Weber · Du Bois · Mannheim · Elias Sociology of religion is the study of the beliefs, practices and organizational forms of religion using the tools and methods of the discipline of sociology.
[2] Whereas the sociology of religion broadly differs from theology in assuming indifference to the supernatural, theorists tend to acknowledge socio-cultural reification of religious practice.
Classical, seminal sociological theorists of the late 19th and early 20th century such as Émile Durkheim, Max Weber, and Karl Marx were greatly interested in religion and its effects on society.
Like those of Plato and Aristotle from ancient Greece, and Enlightenment philosophers from the 17th through 19th centuries, the ideas posited by these sociologists continue to be examined today.
With the rise of European industrialism, Marx and his colleague Friedrich Engels witnessed and responded to the growth of what he called "surplus value".
Christianity teaches that those who gather up riches and power in this life will almost certainly not be rewarded in the next ("it is harder for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven than it is for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle …") while those who suffer oppression and poverty in this life while cultivating their spiritual wealth will be rewarded in the Kingdom of God.
In the field work that led to his famous Elementary Forms of Religious Life, Durkheim, a secular Frenchman, looked at anthropological data of Indigenous Australians.
American civil religion, for example, might be said to have its own set of sacred "things": the flag of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr., etc.
Although he believes some generalized statements about social life can be made, he is not interested in hard positivist claims, but instead in linkages and sequences, in historical narratives and particular cases.
In The Protestant Ethic, Weber argues that capitalism arose in Europe in part because of how the belief in predestination was interpreted by everyday English Puritans.
In his magnum opus Economy and Society Weber distinguished three ideal types of religious attitudes:[12] He also separated magic as pre-religious activity.
Symbolic anthropology and some versions of phenomenology argue that all humans require reassurance that the world is safe and ordered place – that is, they have a need for ontological security.
The inability of science to offer psychological and emotional comfort explains the presence and influence of non-scientific knowledge in human lives, even in rational world.
Unlike symbolic anthropology and phenomenology, functionalism points to the benefits for social organization which non-scientific belief systems provide and which scientific knowledge fails to deliver.
[15] Rationalists say that one cannot explain forms of knowledge in terms of the beneficial psychological or societal effects that an outside observer may see them as producing and emphasize the importance of looking at the point of view of those who believe in them.
His list consist of the following variables: belief, knowledge, experience, practice (sometimes subdivided into private and public ritual) and consequences.
[26][27][28] Secularism is the general movement away from religiosity and spiritual belief towards a rational, scientific, orientation, a trend observed in Muslim and Christian industrialized nations alike.
Peter Berger, an American sociologist, considers secularization is the result of a larger sociostructural crisis in religion is caused by pluralism.
On the other hand, Berger also notes that secularization may be indeed have taken hold in Europe, while the United States and other regions have continued to remain religious despite the increased modernity.
His work follows Max Weber's view that modern societies prioritize rationality, focusing on technical efficiency and practical solutions over existential questions, leading to a disenchanted world.
However, Gellner insists that these disadvantages are far outweighed by the huge technological advances modern societies have experienced as a result of the application of scientific knowledge.
He also acknowledges that other forms of belief and meaning, such as those provided by art, music, literature, popular culture (a specifically modern phenomenon), drug taking, political protest, and so on are important for many people.
[41] BBC News reported on a study by physicists and mathematicians that attempted to use mathematical modelling (nonlinear dynamics) to predict future religious orientations of populations.
The study suggests that religion is headed towards "extinction" in various nations where it has been on the decline: Australia, Austria, Canada, the Czech Republic, Finland, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand and Switzerland.
For example, according to Paul James and Peter Mandaville: Religion and globalization have been intertwined with each other since the early empires attempted to extend their reach across what they perceived to be world-space.
Roberto Blancarte, according to Odgers,[45] identifies three main periods in the development of a Latin American sociology of religion: Due to its complex nature, several studies demonstrated growing interest in understanding the religious context in relation to the multiple global processes playing out across the subcontinent, such as marginalization, ethnicity, migration, aging, and education.
[48] Children receive a religious legacy from their parents and from the society immediately surrounding them, through instruction and (intentionally or unintentionally) through the power of example that is shaped by values, personality, and interests.
Persuasive evidence across countries suggests that the gender gap can be explained in part by male and female identified role inside and outside of family and work.
Women who are at home focus on raising children and caring for sick and elderly family members which encourages stronger religious commitment.
[52] Evangelical women, rather, claimed the weakness in men proves that both wife and husband should hold mutual submission.Both spouses follow Christ's model of self-sacrifice and an orientation to the other person in family decision-making.
