evidence against secularisation

Question 1

Woodhead and Heelas - 2 types of secularisation

Answer 1

• disappearance thesis
• differentiation thesis

Question 2

disappearance thesis (Woodhead and Heelas)

Answer 2

the idea that modernity has brought about a reduced significance of religion for the individual and for society, and religion is in decline and eventually will disappear

Question 3

differentiation thesis (Woodhead and Heelas)

Answer 3

religion is no longer of significance to society as a whole but continues to have some significance in peoples’ lives

Question 4

never a ‘golden age’ of religion

Answer 4

there is evidence that the ruling classes were religious but little solid evidence on the religiosity of the poor

Question 5

ethnic minorities’ religious participation in Britain

Answer 5

increasing immigration means that the religious participation of ethnic minorities in Britain has actually increasing, for example the 2011 census showed the number of Muslims had grown by 1.5 million in just 10 years

Question 6

measuring religious belief and practice

Answer 6

although evidence may suggest religious belief and practices are in decline, this data may not be valid or reliable

Question 7

changing rather than declining

Answer 7

the growth of NRMs and fundamentalism suggests that, although traditional religion is declining, it is instead taking different forms with fundamentalism groups steadily increasing

Question 8

Kendal Project (Woodhead and Heelas)

Answer 8

• conducted a survey on the town of Kendal on a Sunday in 2000
• around 7.9% of the population attended church
• only 1.6% engaged in holistic milieu activities
• concluded that a spiritual revolution had not yet taken place
• if trends continue it will overtake traditional religion in 20 years

Question 9

Davie - ‘believing but not belonging’ survey

Answer 9

in a European survey around 60% of people described themselves as religious and 50% said God played a significant part in their life, so people are still religious but no longer engage in public religious practices

Question 10

Hunt - religion trends in the USA

Answer 10

in the USA 90% of Americans believe in God and 40% attend a religious institution, so although it is a highly secular society it has a high rate of church attendance

Question 11

Herberg - internal secularisation in the USA

Answer 11

churches in the US have undergone internal secularisation, where their beliefs are watered down to fit in with mainstream society, although public commitment to a religion is essential to American identity, so they therefore belong but do not believe

Question 12

Stark and Bainbridge - religious market theory

Answer 12

religions are like competing products in a market place and people weigh up the costs and benefits before they choose to participate, so if there is lots of choice of religion this leads to high levels of participation, such as in the USA

Question 13

criticisms of religious market theory

Answer 13

• only seems to take Christianity into account
• does not take into account internal secularisation of US churches
• little choice in some countries but participation is still high (Italy, Ireland, Spain, Islamic countries etc)

Question 14

Norris and Inglehart - existential security theory

Answer 14

suggests that religious participation is low in Western Europe because existential security is very high in the sense that well being and survival is high, compared to poorer countries or ones which face threats such as war where religious participation is far higher

Question 15

criticisms of existential security theory

Answer 15

• fails to take into account USA which has high existential security and high religious participation (suggests this is due to high levels of inequality)