Kategoria BISAC: Social Science >> Sociology of Religion

In a society overrun by commercial clutter, religion has become yet another product sold in the consumer marketplace, and faiths of all kinds must compete with a myriad of more entertaining and more convenient leisure activities. Brands of Faith argues that in order to compete effectively faiths have had to become brands - easily recognizable symbols and spokespeople with whom religious prospects can make immediate connections

Mara Einstein shows how religious branding has expanded over the past twenty years to create a blended world of commerce and faith where the...

What role did religion play in sparking the call for civil rights? Was the African American church a motivating force or a calming eddy?

The conventional view among scholars of the period is that religion as a source for social activism was marginal, conservative, or pacifying.

Not so, argues Johnny E. Williams. Focusing on the state of Arkansas as typical in the role of ecclesiastical activism, his book argues that black religion from the period of slavery through the era of segregation provided theological resources that motivated and sustained preachers and parishioners battling...

Now a major motion picture Starring Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Amy Adams. Written and directed by John Patrick Shanley from his Pulitzer Prize winning play.

The best new play of the season. That rarity of rarities, an issue-driven play that is unpreachy, thought-provoking, and so full of high drama that the audience with which I saw it gasped out loud a half-dozen times at its startling twists and turns. Mr. Shanley deserves the highest possible praise: he doesn t try to talk you into doing anything but thinking-hard-about the gnarly complexity of human...

From India to Iraq, from London to Lahore, the relationship between religion and violence is one of the most bitterly contested and casually misrepresented issues of our times. This groundbreaking volume brings together expert perspectives from a variety of fields to probe it. It seeks to shift analytical focus on to the contexts in which violence is expressed, enacted and reported. Ranging from Islam to Buddhism to new religious movements in the West, Dying for Faith offers a comprehensive and highly original account of a complex phenomenon that has so far attracted sensational...

Pentecostalism is a movement within Christianity placing special emphasis on a believer's personal encounter with God through the Holy Spirit. It is arguably the world's fastest-growing form of religion. While exact figures are uncertain, there may now be as many as 500 million Pentecostals. Closely related to other forms of ""born-again"" Christianity (Evangelical and Charismatic), Pentecostalism has been described as a religion ""made to travel."" From the outset it has been a strong missionary movement, and has been oriented towards recruitment and expansion. Research into this...