relative to their efficiency in mobilizing available resources, as might be achieved through the motivation of existing members to make personal sacrifices (e.g. time, money, material things) for the greater good of the institution to which they belong.
At the same time, the institutional processes of religious groups and movements set priorities, allocate resources and confer different kinds of status relative to particular religious construals of the world. These construals constitute the ideational dimension of religion, which comprises an assortment of beliefs, theories and values. In combination, such beliefs, theories and values furnish a religious worldview, which, for example, treats issues such as the nature and activity of the sacred, the origins and purpose of the cosmos and the destiny and responsibilities of humankind. In effect, the ideational dimension constitutes what Kuhn describes as a ‘paradigm’; that is, an interconnecting set of presuppositions and values which entail a particular way of viewing and engaging the world (1962, pp. 43–51).
As a paradigm, the ideational dimension impresses itself upon institutional dynamics by influencing matters such as goal-setting, resource mobilization, structural administration and organizational behaviour. The ideational dimension, then, does not simply provide a symbolic description of the world, it actively orchestrates institutional practice within and towards the world. In Clifford Geertz’s terminology, the ideational dimension is both a ‘model of’ the world and a ‘model for’ the world’s engagement (1973, p. 93). Strained relations between the Roman Catholic Church and various national governments and international charities, for example, stem from Catholic institutional policies in respect of artificial contraception, same-sex adoption and sexual discrimination; policies directly informed by theological judgements in respect of sexual activity, expression and status. In effect, the ideational dimension of religious institutions may at times lead them to act in ways which are not, at least for those looking on, in the material best interests of the organization in question.
In tandem with established organizational dynamics, the ideational dimension influences the associational sphere through its practical and symbolic orchestration of interpersonal activities. As indicated above, this orchestration may be reflected through particular uses of sacred space, liturgical contents and ritual divisions of labour. In its turn, the associational dimension informs individual religiosity through, for example, its reinforcement of subjective representations of the sacred, personal moral judgements and private spiritual practices. Allowing for its idiosyncratic nature and irreducibly personal character, individual belief nevertheless involves the subjective appropriation of otherwise collective symbols, shared values and associational practices.
Macro-structural dimension
At its best, sociology explicates individual behaviour and institutional activity by conceptualizing their relationship with prevailing societal dynamics. Consequently, the raison d’être of the sociology of religion resides in its understanding the aforementioned dimensions of religion by examining their refraction of and influence upon prevailing social processes. As Maduro notes:
No religion exists in a vacuum. Every religion, any religion, no matter what we may understand by ‘religion’, is a situated reality – situated in a specific human context, a concrete and determined geographical space, historical moment, and social milieu. (1982, p. 41)
Sociology thereby engages the ‘situated reality’ of religion by identifying, exploring and seeking to explain its relationship with overarching societal structures and processes which both impact upon and are influenced by it.
In the first instance, sociology may concern itself with understanding the refraction of social and biological categories, such as class, race, age and sex, through the membership profiles of particular religious groups and movements. In Brazil, for example, census figures for male–female religious participation in Christianity are more or less equal for Roman Catholicism (49.5 per cent to 50.4 per cent respectively) and average out at approximately 44 per cent male to 56 per cent female for traditional Protestantism and most of neo-Pentecostalism. However, participation within the largest and fastest growing neo-Pentecostal group – the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God – exhibits a distinctly asymmetrical profile with 38 per cent male to 62 per cent female involvement. At the same time, there is also a clear asymmetry among those recorded by the census as ‘without religion’ (60 per cent male to 40 per cent female) (Campos, 2004, p. 134). In the same vein, new and alternative spiritualities across the industrialized world draw the bulk of their members from the white, urban middle classes and exhibit a greater ratio of female to male participation (Clarke, 2005). What do these figures tell us about society in general and the religious arena in particular – not least its reproduction of or challenge to prevailing class, ethnic-racial and gendering dynamics?
Secondly, for example, the sociology of religion may concern itself with the interaction between religious institutions and prevailing political, economic and legal structures. On the one hand, sociology can engage the ways in which different religious groups are more or less efficient in accessing the mechanisms of political power and thereby gaining financial or juridical privileges through, for example, tax breaks (as charities) or legal protections (via blasphemy laws) and exemptions (equality laws). On the other hand, sociologists might also analyse the manner in which different political, economic and legal structures work to the benefit of some forms of religion (usually mainstream traditional) and to the detriment of others (usually novel religious phenomena). Understanding both the religious interface with existing opportunity structures and the ways in which these structures shape the religious landscape is a central concern of much contemporary sociology of religion.
A third example can be drawn from sociology’s attempts to understand the implications of modernity for religious belief and practice. For example, each of the characteristics of modern society mentioned in the previous chapter (e.g. integration, complexity, individualization) generates both challenges to and opportunities for the religious field. For some sociologists, such are the challenges which modernity sets religion that religious decline, if not eventual disappearance, is their rather pessimistic prognosis (Bruce, 2002). For others, however, while the challenges which modernity sets religion may well result in decline in certain (usually traditional) sectors, in other areas modernity is seen to furnish ample opportunity for religious transformation and growth (Martin, 2005). Wherever one stands in respect of growth, decline and/or transformation, the attempt to relate macro-structural processes with micro-social and mid-range institutional activity sits at the heart of sociology’s engagement with religion. After all, it is through the interplay of these dynamics that the different dimensions of religion assume in real time and space their multifarious shapes, rhythms, smells and colours.
Methodological considerations
When engaging religion in respect of its various social contexts, sociologists bring to bear a raft of applied methods (Brink, 1995, pp. 461–75). Choosing an applied research method is very much like deciding upon what to have for breakfast. One must first choose what is going to be eaten and then one must decide how it is to be prepared for the plate. If it is to be eggs, for example, are they to come fried, scrambled, poached or hard-boiled? Whatever the choice, in each case a different mode of preparation requires a different set of implements. I use this image to underline how different research methods do not simply acquire data but, like the frying pan, whisk or pot of boiling water, they prepare what is to be consumed in one way rather than another. As with the egg that arrives on the plate, data is cooked relative to the methods used in its acquisition and preparation. There is, in effect, no such thing as raw data. Choice of research method, then, is never simply a question of ‘What data needs acquiring?’ but also of ‘How best to acquire the necessary data in the most appropriate form?’
Different applied methods are more or less suited to different kinds of social terrain. Examination of patterns in movement between different religions, for example, needs to gather data in respect of the amount of switching actually taking place and the profiles (e.g. sex, age, relational status, profession, religious affiliation) of those doing the switching. Once acquired, this data can then be examined for particular trends (such as increased transit by North American Protestants) or compared with data from other social contexts (for example