Religion and religiosity in the contemporary world Flashcards
Secularisation thesis - statistics to support
- 5% of people go to church in the UK
- 2021census, for the first time ever, less than half the population describe themselves as Christian.
- Priest shortages.
Wilson - secularisation
- Defines secularisation as the process whereby religious beliefs, practices and institutions lose social significance.
Beliefs
- How many people say they believe in God
- Social attitudes
Practices
- Do you practise religious festivals
- Do you go to church
Institutions
- How many people go to Catholic schools
- Religion no longer influences laws.
Evidence of secularisation:
- 1960s = 10-15% attended church
- 2015 = 5%
- 1971 = 3/5 weddings in a church
- 2015 = 1/3 weddings are religious
- Rise in bogus baptisms = baptising to get into schools.
Evidence of decline in the influence of religious institutions:
- Many schools do not practise an act of collective worship everyday.
- In 2004, 76% of schools did not do collective daily worship - OFSTED
Lepski
- Defines religiosity as religious behaviours, including religious thinking and practices.
How we operationalise religiosity effects the answers we get:
“What is your religion?” - 59% of Britons are Christian, 5% Muslim, 25% no religion.
“Are you religious?” - 53% of Britons have no religion.
Three problems with measuring secularisation are:
- Practical
- Ethical
- Theoretical
Was there ever a golden age of faith?
- A time when everyone believed in God + attended church regularly.
- In 1851 - 40% attended church.
- Could suggest religiosity is low, not declining.
Martin
- In Victorian Britain, church attendance was required for M/C respectability.
Three important themes of why secularisation is occuring:
- Modernisation
- Social change
- Social and religious diversity
Weber ‘the disenchantment of the world’
- Weber argues that Western society has undergone a process of rationalisation.
- Rationalisation refers to the process by which rational and scientific thinking replaces magico-religious thinking.
- Begins with the protestant reformation in the 16th century.
- Protestants like to use some science, accidentally led to secularisation through the disenchantment of the world.
Bruce ‘technological worldview’
- Says mostly the same thing as Weber.
- Use technology to look for other explanations of things, led to secularisation.
Parsons
- Privatisation of religion - it is more private to the individual - has led to disengagement, the church losing influence.
- E.g. in the past schools and hospitals had nuns and monks.
Wilson and Bruce - social and cultural diversity has led to a decline of religion
- Decline of community = pre-industrial society, people worshipped together. Now community is declining + so is religion.
- Industrialisation = Bruce is argues industrialisation broke up small close-knit communities.
- Diversity of lifestyles = in a simple community people share similar values, but in a complex society people have different values.
Aldridge
Some religious communities,like the Black pentecostal movement in London, flourish in anonymous, impersonal cities.
Berger (1969)
- In the past, Christianity was much easier to believe in as everyone was Christian (sacred canopy)
- Now, we have religious diversity - everyone believes their religion is true.
- They can’t all be true, Berger calls it a weakening of the plausability structure.
Criticism = Berger (1999) now having a choice of religion, people can choose one that best suits them.
Davie
Belonging without believing. Belong to a church community but not really religious - true in the USA.
Wilson
- Going to church is an expression of the American way of life.
USA church population
- 40% of the population go to church each week.
- Though, when sociologists do head counts it seems more like 20%.
