RELIGION

Paper 4 Ms. Hiba Khan

Religion and Society
Ways of defining religion

Religion can be defined in terms of three broad ideas:

1. A set of beliefs that includes an idea (notion) of ‘god’, or some kind of supernatural force or being
that exists beyond our direct experience. There are many versions of these beliefs. Some forms
are:

 Monotheistic – a belief in a single god, such as Christianity, Judaism and Islam

 Polytheistic – a belief in many gods, such as Hinduism and Paganism
 Non-theistic/Athiests – no worship of gods

A set of practices involving such things as collective worship and prayer, which van be expanded to
include ceremonies such as weddings or funerals and religious festivals. As with beliefs, religious
practices vary.
Some religions involve:

• Personal communication with God through prayer (Christianity)

• Communal worship, such as Christianity and Islam

• Exorcism, in which ‘evil spiritual entities’ are evicted from a person or place they ‘possess’ such as
Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodox Churches

• Baptism for the dead, as practiced by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (‘Mormons’) –
those who have died can be baptized by proxy; they are considered Mormons after their death, even
though they may not have been Mormons in life

Defining religion: why it matters

The definition of religion that a sociologist describes to will have a profound impact on their conclusions
about the role and impact religion has in society. This is most obviously the case where the
secularization debate is concerned: if one adopts a more exclusive definition of religion, then it would
appear that religion is in decline. However, if one adopts a more inclusive definition of religion, this
decline will not be so apparent.
1. Some form of organization that allows practices and beliefs to be expressed as a group (collectively).
This includes sacred places reserved for the expression of beliefs, such as a church, mosque or meeting
hall, and people, such as vicars, priests and imams, employed by a religious organization to take
services or generally look after believers’ well-being

A notable characteristic of religion than is its diversity. Rather than being a single (homogeneous) entity,
religion is expressed in many ways across three dimensions:

 Historical – in the same society over time

 Contemporaneous – in the same society at the same time
 Cross-cultural – between different societies

McGuire (200) suggests that problems of definition arise because religion has a ‘dual character’ – it is both
individual and social. On an individual level, different religions encompass different beliefs and practices and
teach a variety of ways to ‘be religious’.

Some of these involve communal practices, such as attending religious ceremonies, others do not. It is
possible, for example, to be a ‘Christian’ without ever setting foot inside a church.
On a social level, religions perform certain functions for society:

 Socialization into a range of moral beliefs and values

 Social solidarity – giving people a sense that they have things in common
 Social control, both direct, such as Islamic codes defining what people may wear or eat, and indirect: moral
values that provide a template for how the individual is expected to lead their life ‘in accordance with God’

Any definition of religion must avoid focusing too closely on one particular aspect of religious behavior, such as
beliefs, practices or organizational forms, set apart from other aspects.

As a large and complex phenomenon, religion needs to be defined and understood in terms of how its various
parts relate to and influence one another. This has given rise to two different approaches: inclusive and
exclusive.

The inclusive approach sees religion in the broadcast possible terms. Rather than trying to define religion by
what it is – a precise set of beliefs and practices – this functional approach focuses on what religion does for
the individual, for example providing answers to questions such as what happens after death, and for society.
Durkheim (1912) claimed that religion carried out (fulfilled) two necessary functions:

 Social solidarity: This related to how religion creates a feeling of belonging to a particular group by
providing individuals with shared beliefs and values. It also acts as a source of personal and social
identity, by giving the moral code to follow, such as the Ten Commandments.

 Social integration: This relates to the specific ways in which social solidarity is created, through
processes (mechanisms) such as shared practices and experiences. This might include things such
as religious services and ceremonies.
The focus on function means that the content of religious beliefs is not important – it does not matter
who, what or how people worship.
There is, for example, no difference between worshipping in a Christian church, a Muslim mosque in front
of a totem, or at a personal shrine. Nor does it matter if people pray to one god, many gods or no gods at
all.
What is important is the fact that people act in specific, often collective ways, and that they hold certain
types of belief that influence their behavior.
For inclusive approaches, therefore, the key to understanding religion is to see it as a belief system, or
ideology, based on faith: the uncritical and complete acceptance of a particular set of ideas.
This inclusive approach has been criticized for seeing religion ‘everywhere and nowhere’. For example,
we can see ‘religious-type’ behavior in everything from football to shopping to church attendance, yet we
cannot identify precisely which aspects of that behavior are uniquely religious. As a result, there is no way
of knowing whether societies are becoming less religious (secularization) or more religious
(resacralization).
The exclusive approach considers religion in a narrower way, in terms of things conventionally seen as
religious:
 Belief in a god or the supernatural
 Behavior such as prayer, collective worship and ceremonies

This excludes ‘quasi-religious’ behavior that might serve a similar function to religion but which is not
actually religious in the strict sense of the term.

Although it is necessarily based on faith, religion is not defined by the idea alone, religious beliefs are
quantitatively different from other forms of beliefs.

Exclusive approaches involve a definition of religion focused on its content or substance (substantive): the
beliefs, practices and organizations that are religious and that mark religious behavior as substantively
different from other, similar, behaviors.
Religions as seen from this approach have essential characteristics:

 Maguire (2001) defines as ‘that which is utterly and mysteriously precious in our experience’ The
sacred, something and which is frequently represented through objects

 Moral codes with a sacred origin, such as the Ten Commandments, believed to have been given to
Moses by God in Judaism and Christianity, or Shari’ah in Islam.

 Communication with the supernatural, through mechanisms such as prayers.

Exclusive approaches, therefore, define religion as behavior that is both special and different. In addition,
substantive definitions make it possible to measure levels of religious behavior in a society- to test, for
example, whether society is becoming secularized or resacrillised.

Critics of this approach question whether religion really does have unique and exclusive features. These
critics claim that exclusive approaches simply adopt a definition that fits neatly with conventional,
mainstream world religions such as Christianity or Islam. From this view (perspective), religion is defined
as whatever these institutions say it is.

This creates two problems:

 Such organizations have a vested interest in ensuring that the product they are promoting (religious
experience) is both unique and has limited competition.

 To identify the unique characteristics of religion, the definition is drawn so narrowly that it excludes
behaviors not conventionally seen as religious, as well as behavior that has some characteristics of
mainstream religion but not others.
Scientology, for example, makes no distinction between ‘the sacred’ and the ‘profane’ and has no concept
of ‘god’ as understood by conventional religions. It does, however, focus on ideas about spirituality that
are religious in nature.
Difficulties in measuring belief

Someone’s faith is largely subjective, which makes it very difficult to measure quantitatively.
Changes in religious belief and practice make religiosity difficult to measure…. now we have moved into a
postmodern society, which is more individualistic, people are more likely to practice religion privately and
individually, and less likely to engage with traditional religious institutions such as the Christian church – but does
this shift mean society is necessarily less religious?

Sociologists disagree over how we should define religion, which will influence how religious they perceive a
society to be. For example, someone who uses a substantive/exclusive definition of religion, and says that a religion
must involve a belief in God, would probably believe that religiosity is in decline. However, someone who uses a
functional/inclusive definition could argue that religiosity is just as strong as ever, it has just changed – with civil
religion having taken over from ‘traditional’ religions, for example.
More specific questions about religiosity relate to the indicators used the concept. McGuire (2002), for
example, suggests that religion has a ‘dual character’ that involves measurement across two dimensions:
1) Individual indicators, such as whether someone holds religious beliefs and whether these are
orthodox (such as believing in a single all-powerful deity) or unorthodox (such as believing in witchcraft
or more vaguely ‘spirituality’)

2) Social indicators that measure things like religious participation, such as attendance at religious
services and membership
In this respect, Cornwall et al. (1986) identified three broad dimensions of religiosity. Taken as a whole,
these represent an overall level of religious commitment:

• Knowing or the ‘belief dimension’

• Doing: an indicator of religious participation/membership
• Feeling: a specific measure of commitment to both an individual’s beliefs and any religious
organization with which they identify

These issues have given rise to pro-and anti-secularization arguments: We can consider these issues in
terms of problems that influence the debate.
When measuring religiosity, we have to take into account the fact that it is possible to:

Believe without belonging: people can hold religious beliefs while showing little or no commitment to
religious organizations or practices. They can believe in ‘God’ without collectively practicing their belief
or linking that belief to any particular religious organization. It is also when people do not belong to
religious organizations or practice religion in public, yet claim to be religious or believe in a god.
British sociologist Grace Davie in the 1990s, describes the growing number of people who say they are
“spiritual but not religious”

Belong without believing: this involves those who attend religious services without having any
strongly developed sense of religious belief. Religious practice may have secular functions, with people
attending services for reasons such as friendship, social status, custom or tradition.

Uncovering religious beliefs also presents reliability problems. For example, do ‘religious beliefs’ mean
the same thing to everyone? One way around this problem is, as Hughes and Church (2010) note, to
use a proxy indicator or belief, such as whether people believe in a higher ‘higher being’. If they do, this
indicates that they hold some form of religious belief. If they do not, this suggests that they are unlikely
to hold further beliefs that could be classes as religious.
While this type of indicator is useful for those who hold conventional religious beliefs, it is less helpful as
a broad measure of unconventional beliefs. Many new religious movements (NRMs) and new age
movements (NAMs), for example, define religiosity in terms of ‘spirituality’ another concept that is difficult
to define and measure reliably- and do not necessarily believe in a conventional good or higher being.

The extent to which people participate in religious activities can be viewed in two basic ways:

1) Attendance at religious services/meetings, with participation data frequently supplied by religious

organizations. Although such data is useful, it cannot simply be taken at face value because it hides
methodological problems relating to its creation and meaning. More specifically, religious
organizations frequently use different ways of defining and counting attendance.

The lack of a standard way to count attendance means that it is difficult to track changes over time,
even for the same organization, and this makes estimates of changing religious attendance
unreliable.

An alternate way to estimate attendance is through social surveys. Asking people about their
attendance is more reliable because questions can be standardized. It also has construct validity,
because attendance figures measure what they claim to measure.
However, the validity of the survey can be questioned:
 Hadaway and Marler (1998) note that US opinion-poll data about religious attendance showed
significant differences between the numbers claiming to attend services and those who actually
attended.

 The National Secular Society (2010) noted that in the UK ‘people tend to “over-claim” when asked
about good moral (virtuous) behavior’; Hewitt (2010), for example, reports that around 1.3 million
Catholics claimed to attend church services at least once a month, compared with a figure of around
850,000 calculated by Christian research.
2) Membership figures should be a more reliable and valid measure of participation because they count
those who actually join a religious organization. However, these figures are complicated by different
interpretations of ‘membership’. For some, membership of a religion is assumed or linked to ethnic identity.
We need, therefore, to understand the Preference (distinguish) between active members and those
counted as ‘members’ on the basis of being born in a country where a particular church is the official
religion. Understanding membership figures is further complicated for the following reasons:

 Smaller religious organizations are more reluctant to reveal their membership numbers to ‘outsider
researchers’.

 Where organizations supply their own data, membership maybe increased to create the impression
that the organization is larger than it actually is.

 Some religious organizations do not hold services or enlist members. They may have clients – people
who buy a particular course of teaching – and customers who purchase a particular product or service
from time to time.
Ams et al. (1985) suggested that a more valid way to understand religiosity is to measure commitment
– the argument to which people feel they belong to a particular religion using a scale that measures and
combines four commitments:

Disposition: the philosophical dimension to religiosity through questions about spiritual ideas and
experiences, such as whether people ‘draw comfort from prayer’.
Orthodox belief: the extent to which people believe in ideas like god or the soul.
Moral values: how these are influenced by religious values and teachings.
Institutional attachment: the frequency with which people attend religious services, meetings and
ceremonies.
Social groups and religiosity, including class, gender ethnicity and age
*KEY TERM

Religiosity: the extent to which religion is important in people’s lives.

Sacred: anything considered special or holy, the opposite of profane

Profane: the everyday and ordinary, the opposite of sacred

Religious beliefs: belief in a deity or supernatural power that may have some control over people’s
destiny
Any understanding of the relationship between class and beliefs is complicated by two ideas:

 Definitions and measurements of class vary both historically and cross-culturally, which makes both
long-term (longitudinal) and comparative studies difficult.

 Measuring people’s belief is similarly complicated, not least because, as Navone (2002) argues ‘just
because people say they are religious, does not make it so, no more than if they say they are
intelligent or moral’.

Keeping these limitations in mind, much of the data about the relationship between class and belief
suggests that there are few differences in belief about the existence or ‘god’ or some form of supreme
being, and in general religious concepts, such as heaven or life after death.

This is not surprising when we consider that traditional religions address major philosophical questions,
such as what happens after death, that go beyond (transcend) narrow class interests.

Similarly, religious practice shows a closer correlation between class and areas such as attendance at
services. Regular attendees (weekly or monthly) are more likely to be middle or upper class while those
who never visit church, except for weddings and funerals, are more likely to be working class.
Country % of adults for whom religion is important

Senegal 97

Nigeria 92

India 92

Pakistan 91

South Africa 87

Kenya 85

Brazil 77

USA 59

Great Britain 33

Canada 30

Italy 27

Germany 21

Russia 14

Japan 12

France 11
The relationship between class and religiosity varies across different societies with different level of
economic development and claimed beliefs.

In developed nations, religion was historically a source of status for both the upper and middle classes.
Members of the upper class used their positions within powerful religious institutions such as the church
to exert power over their society.

Members of the middle class used church attendance as a measure of social respectability and
acceptance. These religious functions may no longer apply in industrial societies, but they still do so in
some developing nations.

In postmodern societies, religious affiliation relates more to individual, personal identities rather than the
collective, social identities of the past.

The weakening of traditional class associations, along with increased consumer choice, explains why
social class no longer correlates very closely with affiliation.
There is a closer relationship between class and religious groups with fewer followers.

Stark and Bainbridge argue that cults draw their members from the higher social classes, whereas Kelly
(1992) has suggested that new religious movements are founded and populated by the educated middle
classes.

Adler’s (1979) research has drawn attention to the fact that, in the USA, members of witch covens mainly
come from the professional middle classes.

Bader (2003) also notes that two thirds of those who claim to have been abducted by aliens previously
held middle-class occupations.
New age movements (NAMs) add a further dimension to the relationship between class and religion in
terms of the argument that they involve ‘meaning without motivation’.

Middle-class, and middle-aged people turn to NAMS (New Age Movements) that promise to help them
live more harmoniously or successfully in a world that seems to largely pass them by.

Bruce (1995) argued that the general attraction of NAMs to the middle classes is based on the idea that
‘spiritual growth appeals mainly to those who’s more pressing material needs have been satisfied.

Unmarried mothers raising children on welfare tend to be too concerned with finding food, heat and light
to be overly troubled by their inner lights and when they do look for release from their troubles they prefer
the bright outer lights of bars and discotheques’.

For sections of the working class, who are the victims of inequality and are treated as not important
(marginalized), religion can offer an explanation of their situation and can promise that suffering now will
be rewarded with a better future after death.
• Weber suggested that sects offer members a theodicy of disprivilege, a world view that helps
them cope with their lives.

• This explains why members of the working classes may join sects or other religious organizations.

• In effect, the promise of salvation in the afterlife makes up (compensates) for poverty in this life.

• Theodicy of Disprivilege refers to the belief of the promise that salvation may be granted as a
reward for earthly poverty.

• It can be one of many reason that explain the large numbers of lower class people who join
religious sects or partake in mainstream religious practice, e.g attend church, temple or mosque.
Ethnicity

On a global level, there are marked differences in religiosity across different nations. Emergent nations in
Africa, Asia and South America have higher levels of religious belief and practice than developed nations
such as the UK and Germany.

The UK is an example of a developed nation with a low general level of religiosity. Cook (2003) warned that
‘collecting data on ethnicity is difficult because there is no consensus on what constitutes an ethnic group’.

However, British society reflects a range of ethnicities and religious affiliations, considered not just in terms
of different ethnic groups associating themselves with different religions, but also in terms of the diversity of
affiliation within some ethnic groups.

Indian ethnicities, for example, involve a mix of Hindu, Sikh, Muslim and Christian religious affiliations.

It is important to note that there are significant variations in affiliation and strength of belief based on
gender and age across all ethnicities. Age, in particular, is significant when comparing the experiences of
different generations within recent immigrant ethnicities.
There are generational differences among minority groups in how young and old classify themselves:

 Older, first-generation, immigrants are more likely to identify with their country of origin.

 Younger, third-generation, individuals are more likely to classify themselves in terms of their country of
birth.

We can explore a range of explanations for the relationship between ethnicity and religiosity, starting with
deprivation. In the UK, the highest levels of religious affiliation are found among Pakistani (92%) and
Bangladeshi (92%) minorities.
Berthoud (1998) has shown that these ethnic groups are among the very poorest in British society. This
suggests a correlation between among some ethnic groups. While this correlation is interesting, deprivation
itself is not enough poverty/class and religiosity explanation for higher levels of religiosity, measured in
terms of both affiliation and practice.

Although Christians generally profess high levels of affiliation, this does not translate significantly into
religious practice. As Crockett and Voas put it: ‘All major ethnic minority populations are more religious than
British-born whites’. Since high levels of deprivation exist among the white working class, the question
here’s why do some ethnic groups display higher levels of religiosity under similar economic
circumstances?
However, this raises the question of why nominal belief should be considered ‘less authentic’ than overtly
practiced beliefs:

o Private beliefs may be sincerely held without the need to have them continually and publically
reaffirmed.

o Public practice may be a sign of social processes, such as status considerations or cultural/peer
pressures, rather than strict religious belief.

These behaviors require affirmation and re-affirmation through communal gatherings that promote both
social solidarity and a sense of ethnic identity.

For ethnic minority groups in particular, religiosity performs significant services and functions in terms of
social identities. One function of religious organizations for many ethnic minority groups is that of providing
a sense of homogeneity, shared purpose, and cultural continuity and performance.
The answer is linked to ideas and issues related not just to ethnicity but also to the experience of being
an ethnic minority. The key to understanding levels of ethnic group religiosity, both majority and
minority, is found in two areas:

 Inter-group relationships – how, for example, different minority groups relate to both other minorities
and to the ethnic majority.
 Intra-group relationships – differences, for example, within ethnic minority groups, such as class,
gender and age, that relate to how these groups interact with the ethnic majority.
These different experiences, therefore, relate to questions of identity, considered in terms of both the
self-perception of different ethnic groups and the various social factors that go into the ‘constructive mix’
of such identities. We can illustrate this idea by contrasting the experiences of the White British majority
ethnic group in the UK, following a mainly Christian faith, with those of the Pakistani minority following a
mainly Muslim faith.
The measured differences in religiosity between these two groups are conventionally explained in terms
of a distinction between two types of ‘believer’:
 Nominal: where people are ‘born into a religion’, such as the Church of England and generally
associate themselves with this religion without having much firm faith or commitment to it. They
may, in this respect, be considered largely agnostic – neither believing nor disbelieving.
 Authentic: people who demonstrate their firmly held beliefs through various forms of practice and
commitment. Pakistani Muslims in the UK generally fall into this category.
Gender
Men tend to have lower levels of religiosity than women, but they occupy the highest positions in religious
hierarchies; it is mainly men who are priests and imams.

In virtually all countries in the world, women tend to be more religious than men. In the U.S., recent surveys
show a sizeable 12-point difference between the genders in terms of religiosity. What explains the gap?

John P. Hoffmann:We recalled that, long ago, the philosopher and mathematician Blaise Pascal had proposed that
believing in God was a risk-avoidant strategy and not believing was. We then married the ideas that women are more
religious than men, men are usually greater risk takers than women, and religious involvement may be a risk avoidant
life strategy to hypothesize that risk preferences might account for at least some of the gender difference in religious
beliefs and behaviors,” Hoffmann explained.
‘Risk and religion: An explanation of gender differences in religiosity‘ paper says “One takeaway of these studies is
that one of the reasons, but certainly not the only reason, that young men are less involved in religion than young
women is because they are more likely to say they like to take risks. Thus, those interested in understanding why some
people are more religious than others may wish to consider not only their core beliefs and life experiences, but also
their tendency to behave in a risky manner,”
Age

Older people tend to be more religious than young people. Older people are more likely to say that they
are religious or that they believe in a god, and more likely to belong to a religious organization. This is
particularly true in Europe. Developed nations in general.
In the UK, the average church goers is high and increasing. The next age top in terms of religiosity,
however, is the young – those under 35. Part of the debate around age and religion is whether age
differences reflect age or cohort, for example may be that people who were born in a particular decade or
period were socialized differently, affecting their commitment to religion later in their life.
Thus the period of the 1960s and 1970s, with a widespread rejection by people of established beliefs and
practices, may have led to those who were young at the time being less religious not only than their
parents’ generation but also their children’s generation.
The relationship between ageing and religiosity is usually explained by the greater concern that people
have with thoughts about death as they approach the end of their lives and often, suffer declining health.
Religion can offer comfort and support. In addition, belonging to a church or other religious organization
can offer older people a network of support and opportunities to socialize and feel a sense of purpose. This
may be particularly important for those who have lost partners and whose adult children have moved
away, or those who relied on their colleagues at work for socializing. Older people today may also have
been socialized into a religion as children, and may return to religion as they are after not being actively
religious during the busy periods of their adult lives, working and raising children.
The fact that religion tends to be associated with older people may be a main reason why fewer young
people are religious. Established, mainstream religious organizations may seem very old-fashioned and
not attractive to young people.

Churches have also struggled to amend their situations over issues such as birth control
(contraception), abortion, gay rights and marriage and female priests, where they seem outdated and
out of step with the values and beliefs of most young people today.

They have also been linked to child abuse, with claims that senior figures have covered up the extent of
abuse. More generally, churches have been affected by the widespread rejection authority and tradition,
which has also affected, for example, political parties.

At the same time, both work and leisure take up a lot of young people’s time and may reduce time
available for religion.

For young adults, starting career may require a lot of energy and time, including long working hours, to
become established, while leisure expanded through the range of activities available and longer hours
for shopping and socializing.
Postmodernists link the declining religiosity of young people to a wider decline in religious thinking and
growing disenchantment. Older religious explanations of the world no longer hold. This is part of the
wider decline of the power of metanarratives (explanations) to influence how people think about the
world.

Associated with this is the much wider range of religions from which young people can now choose.
There is a religious and spiritual marketplace, which young people are increasingly aware of through the
internet and other media.

In Britain, for example, as well as older religions from other parts of the world such as Buddhism and
Islam, there are new religious movements, New Age spiritual ideas and subcultural groups offering a
sense of belonging.

Even when young people have been socialized into a religion, there are many opportunities to move
away, or to reject religion entirely. Also, religious socialization is weaker – Sunday schools, through
which Christian churches in the United Kingdom have traditionally passed on their messages, have
declined dramatically, and many schools have very limited religious content in assemblies.
Lynch (2008) has suggested that the feelings that might once have led young people to religion are
being diverted into areas that have always been seen as non-religious.

For some people, the non-religious becomes ‘sacred’, in Durkheim’s terms their energies are diverted
to football, music, social activities such as clubbing or to commitment to a cause such as feminism or
environmentalism.
From this view, religiosity has not disappeared but has been channeled into new, almost
unrecognizable, forms.
Some young people are very religious. In the UK, this applies to some young Muslims, who are often
more religious than their parent’s generation. This may be a reaction against the perceived decline of
their religion and a rejection of aspects of Western culture which is called cultural defence..

Some young people in the UK are strongly Christian but not in enough numbers to challenge the
overall impression of declining religiosity. It may be though, that young people may be ‘believing
without belonging’, so that their religiosity may not being picked up in statistics such as those on
church attendance, or that they will turn to religion later in life.
Religion and other belief systems
Is Jediism a religion? Or, is it rather a belief system?
Church of Jediism (star Wars) www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOdoFPsG-Ag

Provide an argument supporting your claim

Religion is the adherence to codified beliefs and rituals that generally involve a faith in a spiritual nature and
a study of inherited ancestral to faith as well as to the larger shared traditions, knowledge and wisdom related
to understanding human life. The term "religion" refers to both the personal practices related systems of
belief.
A belief system can refer to a religion or a world view

The development of modern industrial societies has led to religion being challenged by different belief
systems, particularly those centered around science such as the emergence of scientific explanations about
the origin and nature of the world, that weaken the power of religious explanations.

There have also been political developments that question the traditional basis of secular power and authority,
such as the ‘divine right of monarchs’ to rule in feudal societies because their authority comes directly from
God.

Sets of ideas and values shared by a social group are ideologies. Ideologies provide a way of interpreting the
world, and they explain and justify the interests of a social group. For example, patriarchal ideologies justify
(legitimize) the interests of men.
Religions can be seen as ideologies, although not all meet the principle of being based on the interests of a
social group. Political ideologies focus on how society should work and how power should be exercised.
Some political ideologies can be combined with religious beliefs.
Both ideology and religions are closed belief systems. That is, they cannot be disproved because
they rely on faith and beliefs, and their followers will find ways to reject or explain away evidence that
challenges their beliefs.

Over the last few hundred years, scientific and rational ways of understanding the world have grown in
influence and have challenged religious understandings. Unlike religion, science is an open belief
system; this makes it different from all ideologies.

Scientific knowledge is based on continuous research and testing. Theories are tested and will be
rejected if they are found to be wrong. So, unlike religious beliefs, scientific knowledge is constantly
being revised and moving closer to an accurate account of reality.

This does not mean that science is always right, or that it can explain everything. There are many
questions that religions claim to offer definite answers to where science cannot provide answers,
because evidence is not available.

Science can, however, show some religious beliefs to be false, for example the bible’s account of
creation taking place in seven days has been replaced by the theory of evolution.
Early sociologists expected that science would replace religion. They saw religion as belonging to the pre-
modern world. Auguste Comte, often described as the founder of sociology, suggested that there were
three stages in human understanding of the world.

In the first stage, the theological stage, phenomena are explained as being caused by gods, spirits or
other supernatural beings.

In the metaphysical stage, the supernatural aspect of this produced and people start to investigate and
explain the phenomena by referring to natural or abstract forces such as the power of Nature.

Finally, in the scientific stage, rational scientific explanations based on observation, evidence and logic
take over.

Comte saw the development of sociology as part of this, with human society investigated in a scientific
way that would uncover the laws of human nature.
Later, Max Weber argued that the world was becoming disenchanted. That is, as society becomes more
modern, political (bureaucratic) and secular there is no longer room for the magical or mystical, for
superstition, intuition and faith. The world ceases to be what Weber called and ‘enchanted garden’.

While most of Europe has become secular with only a minority believing in a god or saying that they are
religious, globally religion remains strong, so the replacement of religion by science expected by early
sociologists has not happened.

Scientific ideas are widely accepted and guide much human activity, but even in secular societies many
people still believe in spirits, ghosts, astrology (horoscopes) and so on.

Millions of people continue to follow the large world religions, and there has been a growth of religious
fundamentalism (discussed later), interpreted by some as evidence of religion growth.
Science has itself been challenged by postmodernism. Postmodernists argue that science, at least
the application of science, has created problems as much as solved them.

Science has lost some of its authority because of a reaction against its role in some of the problems
of modern societies, such as pollution, climate change, weapons of mass destruction and new forms
of disease.

Scientists are supposed to be objective, yet some have clearly put their knowledge in the service of
corporations or governments who have used them for suspicious purposes.

Postmodernists see science as another metanarrative, in a period when all metanarratives have been
discredited.