Twenty-eight scholars, many of them well known in the sociology of religion, examine a variety of faith traditions and sociological topics that illustrate the connection between religion and society in many different countries at the dawn of the 21st century. The faith traditions include Judaism, Roman Catholicism, evangelical and mainstream Protestantism, Islam, Hinduism, Yuruba religion, Chinese religion, and several new religious movements, including a UFO cult in Quebec.
The book will be of interest to scholars in the sociology of religion, but a special feature is its utility as a reader in undergraduate and graduate courses. The topics represent the range usually presented in a course in the sociology of religion: individual religiosity, religious identity, conversion, plausibility structure, community, church and sect, religious leadership, organizational analysis, new religious movements, race, gender, religion and politics, and the relationship of religion to social order and social change.
Table of Contents:
Introduction
Individual Religion, Choice, and Identity
Switching in American Religion: Denominations, Markets, and Paradigms? by N.J. Demerath III and Yonghe Yang
The "Return" to Traditional Judaism in the United States, Russia, and Israel by M. Herbert Danzger
From West Africa to Brooklyn: Yoruba Religion Among African Americans by Mary Cuthrell Curry
Identity Reconstruction and Empowerment of South Asian Immigrant Women in Canada, Australia, and New Zealand by Helen Ralston
Religious Views of Mainline Protestant Baby Boomers in the United States by Dean Hoge, Benton Johnson, and Donald A. Luidens
Gender and Jewish Identity Among Twenty-Somethings in the United States by Debra Renee Kaufman
Canadian Evangelical Church Women and Responses to Family Violence by Nancy Nason-Clark
Religious Organization
The Inverted Norm: The Formation and Functioning of Racially Mixed Christian Congregations in South Africa by David Venter
The Variety of Hindu Priests and Assistants: A Brief Introduction by Bradley R. Hertel
Catholic Deacons: A Lesson in Role Conflict and Ambiguity by Frank R. DeRego, Jr. and James D. Davidson
Attitudes to Women's Ordination in Protestant Congregations in the United States, Britain, and Australia by Edward C. Lehman, Jr.
Latinos and Latinas in the Catholic Church: Cohesion and Conflict by Gilbert R. Cadena
Mission Churches and Church-Sect Theory: Seventh-Day Adventists in Africa by Ronald Lawson
Russia's Religious Market: Struggling with the Heritage of Russian Orthodox Monopoly by Jerry G. Pankhurst
The Raelians Are Coming!: The Future of a UFO Religion by Susan Palmer
Religion, Political Order, and Social Change
Religions, and Regimes in China by Graeme Lang
Diversities and Discontinuities in the Islamic Response to Modernity by Mansoor Moaddel
The Sanctified Church and the Color Line: Reorganization, Social Change, and the African American Religious Experience by Cheryl Townsend Gilkes
Beating Back the Enemy: How Venezuelan Pentecostals Think About Social Change by David A. Smilde
Religion and Social Activism: The Grassroots Catholic Church in Brazil by Madeleine Cousineau
Pragmatism and Its Discontents: The Evolution of the Christian Right in the United States by Mark J. Rozell and Clyde Wilcox
New Religions in Australia: Cultural Diffusion in Action by Gary D. Bouma
The Earth Is Sacred: Ecological Concerns in American Wicca by Helen A. Berger
Suggestions for Further Reading
Index
