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The Sociology of God: The Case of Homeless Believers

This research began as personal curiosity about the religious beliefs of persons experiencing homelessness, and in particular their beliefs about God. What do they believe about God, and how are their beliefs socially constructed? Social research has generally limited its focus to assessing religion as an asset in ameliorating homelessness as a social problem with little attention to the religious behaviors and thought processes of persons experiencing homelessness themselves. I conducted a classic grounded theory (CGT) analysis based on 14 in-depth interviews with homeless believers (HB's) and three interviews with pastors-service-providers (PSP's) for comparative analysis. The findings include two major theoretical categories: The God Who Provides (TGWP); and, the core category, Believing in the God Who Provides. The results include two hypotheses: first, that there is no particular concept of God unique to HB's as a substantive unit; and second, that there is a similar five-stage process of believing by HB's and their domiciled counterparts.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:ucf.edu/oai:stars.library.ucf.edu:etd2020-2240
Date01 January 2022
CreatorsL'Hommedieu, John
PublisherSTARS
Source SetsUniversity of Central Florida
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
Typetext
Formatapplication/pdf
SourceElectronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-

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