Ämnet religionskunskap har genomgått en omfattande förändring från den tiden då det kallades kristendomskunskap. Skolan skall idag verka på ett icke-konfessionellt vis. Syftet med denna uppsats är att undersöka hur lärarens religiositet påverkar denne i undervisningen av de fem världsreligionerna. För att besvara denna fråga har jag begagnat mig av en enkätundersökning som kommer att ligga till grund för fördjupande intervjuseminarier kring frågan. Sammanfattningsvis påvisar både enkätundersökningen samt intervjuseminarierna att eleverna som deltagit i undersökningen anser att lärarens religiositet inverkar på undervisningen av de fem världsreligionerna. De anser att om läraren lyckas använde sin religiositet för att skapa engagemang för ämnet leder detta till att religiositeten har en positiv inverkan på undervisningen. Om läraren däremot söker influera elever för att övertyga dem om sanningen i dennes egen religiösa åskådning anser de att detta påverkar undervisningen på ett negativt vis.

Religion plays a role in acculturating Nigerian immigrants into American society through networking and through belief systems that inculcate in Nigerian social and cultural norms practiced in the United States.

Few countries can boast of having the culture of formal volunteering seen in the United States. In explaining this phenomenon, many empirical studies have found religiosity significant in predicting behaviors among young adults, adults, and the elderly. However, teens (13 – 17 years) have not attracted much attention from researchers, though they possess the time and resources most needed to volunteer. Using data from the National Study on Youth and Religion (NSYR) Wave 1, this study examines the relationship between formal volunteering and teens’ individual (religious salience and religious experience) and collective religiosity (religious tradition, church attendance, and religious youth group participation). Parental variables and teen demographics are also tested using a three-stage ordinal logistic regression. Regarding individual religiosity, the results suggested a significant relationship between teens’ religious experiences and formal volunteering. In addition, parents can induce formal volunteering by encouraging their teens to volunteer and participate in religious youth groups.

Since the 1960s there has been a rapid increase in the number of individuals throughout much of the Western world who identify as having no religion. This is particularly so in Canada where individuals who identify as having no religion now account for a rather sizeable portion of the total population. Despite the rapid and exponential growth in the number of people who no longer affiliate with religion, however, the sociological study of who the nonreligious are and what a social world not necessarily rooted in religion—what I call nonreligion—might entail have only recently captured the interests of sociologists. As a result, relatively little is known about this growing group of people and nonreligion. One such area that remains significantly understudied is the intersection of nonreligion and law. Canadian law has been called on by the nonreligious to decide upon the constitutionality of various legislation including that which has prohibited access to same-sex marriage, abortion, and physician-assisted dying. The intersection of nonreligion and law thus provides valuable insight into how nonreligious individuals attempt to promote social change in Canadian society. But, the law also acts as a window through which to explore the often-ignored meaningful beliefs, values, and practices of the nonreligious, or the positive content of nonreligion. Much research about nonreligion and the nonreligious has focused on what nonreligion is not and what the nonreligious do not do vis-à-vis religion, very little research engages with the meaningful aspects of nonreligion and nonreligious identities. This thesis seeks to explore the meaningful aspects of nonreligion and contribute original research to this lacking body of scholarship. This thesis asks: How is nonreligion conceptualized in Canadian law and is this framing of nonreligion characterized by more than the simple rejection or negation of religion? In other words, does nonreligion have positive content in the context of law, and if so, what is this positive content? Drawing on the discourse analysis of the Supreme Court of Canada’s Latimer (2001), Bedford (2013), and Trinity Western (2018) cases, I explore the concepts of human rights, morality, and dignity to draw attention to the ways in which nonreligion is socially constructed in law. My analysis shows that nonreligion is conceptualized in legal discourse as encompassing positive content. I argue that social constructions of nonreligion in law are inclusive of meaningful beliefs, values, and practices and that it is no longer sufficient to think of nonreligion and the nonreligious as simply deficit in nature.

This is a study of certain high school and college students to the thirteen Fireside Programs given under the direction of the General Authorities of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the first three months of 1960. The purposes of this study are twofold: (1) to study the reactions to the fireside program and (2) to study the change in conduct of the audience through the addresses and discussions.

This study will present a comprehensive study of the YMMIA from 1939 to 1974. This study includes the emergence of different programs and the changes in age groupings, as well as goals of the program. A short historical background chapter will be included to acquaint the readers with the previous growth and development of YMMIA since it was instituted.

The aim of this study is to investigate discourses related to Christianity in Swedish crime fiction. In doing this the top-selling books each year between 2004 and 2021 are examined. Furthermore, the purpose is to explore whether the identified discourses can be related to attitudes towards Christianity in Swedish society. The investigation is done using Norman Fairclough’s three-dimensional model for Critical Discourse Analysis. The result shows that the top-selling Swedish crime novels, written so far in the 21st century, mostly have a prejudiced attitude towards Christianity and are characterized by a general discourse of suspicion concerning this worldview. This is to some extent connected to conventions of the genre and the fact that there is a lack of nuance in what types of Christian practices that are described. It is however also notable that there is a similar discourse of suspicion towards Christianity in Swedish society.

Roman literature and history clearly show that the Romans in the days of the Emperors constantly deified many of the abstract terms which to us designate qualities of character, or ideals worthy of emulation in life. Among the more significant of these are such ideas as faith, honor, intellect, concord, fidelity, hope, chastity, and understanding. It is the purpose of this thesis to discuss the development of some of these virtues as they were represented through the mythological deification with which the Romans invested them. The goddesses, Concordia, Fides, Pietas, and Spes are herein presented as illustrating this popular and national trait of the Romans. A separate chapter is devoted to the discussion of each of these goddesses; frequent references are made to Roman customs or literature which show this tendency.

Alle in dieser Dissertation gemachten Analysen fokussieren auf einen zentralen Element für die Entstehung und die Entwicklung der Pfingstbewegung. Es handelt sich dabei um das Konzept, dass sich religiöse Erlösung auf die Erfahrung des sozialen Aufstiegs gegründet ist, insbesondere im Sinne der Integration unterintegrierter sozialen Gruppen in die Gesellschaft. Diese in den USA enstandende neue Religion befriegt vor allem die religiösen und sozialen Bedürfnisse derjenigen Bevolkerungsgruppen, die neu in der urbanen Welt der großen nordamerikanischen Städten angekommen waren. Es geht dabei also um diejenigen sozialen Schichten, die in der Peripherie dieser grossen Städte lebeten und die sozial, wirtschaftlichund ethnisch aus der Gesellschaft ausgeschlossen wurden. Im Anschluss daran analysieren wir auch, wie die gleichen sozialen und religiösen Bedürfnisse die Grundlagen für die Entwicklung der Pfingstbewegung in Lateinamerika darstellen – insbesondere in Brasilien. In diesem Land findet eine grosse Menge exkludierter Individuen, die meistens auch Bewohner städtischer Peripherie sind (was ihren modernen Charakter beweist), im Pentekostalismus das Versprechen einer Lösung für ihre Probleme, vor allem für die Sehensucht nach Integration in eine soziale Welt, an der sie vorher nicht teilnahmen. Dieses Integrationsversprechen hängt direkt mit der normativen Erwartung des sozialen Aufstiegs zusammen. Aus disem Bild kann man den Schluss ziehen, dass sich der Pentekostalismus als religiöses Phänomen dadurch auszeichnet, dass er die Versprechen der Moderne für die von der modernen Gesellschaften vergessenen Individuen aktualisiert. Mittes seiner religiösen Narrative verleiht der Petenkostalismus der Idee des sozialen Aufstiegs und damit auch der Hoffnung sozialer Inklusion exkludierter Individuen eine neue Kraft. Der Pentekostalismus nimmt auf diese Weise die Form einer christlichen Religion der Schwarzen, Mulatos, Armen und aller anderen Individuen an, deren Integration in die moderne Gesellschaft als problematisch erscheint. / All the analyses we have developed throughout this dissertation point to a central element in the emergence and development of Pentecostalism, i.e., its raw material – the promise of religious salvation – is based on the idea of social ascension, particularly the ascension related to the integration of sub-integrated social groups to the dynamics of society. The new religion that arose in the USA focused on the needs and social dramas that were specific of the newly arrived to the urban world of the large North-American cities, those who inhabited the periphery of these cities, those that were socially, economically, and ethnically excluded from the core of society. We also analyzed how the same social drama was the basis for the development of Pentecostalism in Latin America and, especially, in Brazil. In this country, a great mass of excluded individuals, also residents of urban peripheries (which proves the non-traditional and modern characteristic of these sectors), found in Pentecostalism the promises of answers to their dramas, mainly the anxiety to become integrated to a world in which they did not belong before. Such integration was embedded in the promise present in the modernity of social ascension. This scenario leads us to the conclusion that Pentecostalism was a religious discourse capable of taking the main promise of modernity to social groups or classes “forgotten” by modern society. Through a religious discourse, Pentecostalism fulfilled the notions of social mobility, and its consequent idea of individual ascension to the mass of people not yet fully integrated to the modern world, but living in it. Following, it became the Christian religion of blacks and mestizos, of the poor and all the others who felt out of place in that world. So the Pentecostalism became a religion of periphery par excellence.

Does mediation via the Internet contribute to the use of the Bible as a cultural resource, and if so does this contribute to other ways of relating to the Bible as an authority? This is investigated in three steps. Firstly, quantitative survey data concerning Bible reading and other forms of contact with the Bible as well as attitudes to the Bible are scrutinized for variation over time and generational differences. Secondly, patterns of use on a Swedish Christian ecumenical web site on the Bible targeted at teenagers are explored. Thirdly interviews with young users of this web site are assessed in terms of detraditionalization. Earlier results emphasizing the privatizing effect of the mediation of religion are complemented by considering a cultural component against which the individual relates to religion in a manner which is both private and social. This study supports the findings of earlier studies on the Internet and religion, as to the significance of factors such as offline experiences of religion, attitude to pluralism, and technical features online. This study adds to those results by exposing how these features come into play in the use of a Christian website, and that such a site may also work as an arena for young people from diverse religious backgrounds. Thirdly, the role of the mediation of religion via the Internet for religious and social change is understood in a reciprocal manner: the Internet is a product of a time of insecurity, an agent contributing to this insecurity, as well as a cultural response to this insecurity. It is argued that the use of the studied website can be seen as detraditionalization, in terms of weakening of traditions and individualization of religion. The concept virtual plausibility structure is suggested for understanding the role of the Internet in between the individual and the social in late modernity.