beleif questions

• Open belief system


  Open to scrutiny, criticism and testing by others
• Closed belief system


  Holds a monopoly on the truth and doesn't tolerate challenge
• Who regarding religion as "The opium of the masses"


  Karl Marx
• New Age Religion


  • Emphasis on Self
  • Everything is connected
  • Self is the final authority
  • Global Cafeteria
  • Therapy
• Characteristics of religious fundamentalism


  • Traditional Beliefs
  • Them V Us Attitude
  • Use of modern technology to spread message
  • Literalism
  • Aggressive Action
  • Patriarchy
• Sect


  A religious group that has broken away from a larger, established religious denomination, or movement, because of a set of beliefs that differ in some key way
• CUDOS norms


  • Communism
  • Universalism
  • Disinterestedness
  • Organised Scepticism
• Who refers to the "female prism" which all feminist perspectives on religion agree

  Abbott and Wallace
• Who found that there are two main characteristics of those that join NRM's: Social Grievance and a strong bond with those that recruited them

  Stark and Bainbridge
• Who said secularisation is a long term decline in the power, popularity and prestige of religious beliefs and rituals

  Steve Bruce
• Types of NRM according to Wallis


  • World Affirming
  • World Rejecting
  • World Accommodating
• Sect


  • Not Bureaucratic & Hierarchical but are more Egalitarian
  • Radical in Nature
  • Withdraw from society
  • Closed/ Controlled Membership
  • Intolerant of others
• Categories of cult according to Stark and Bainbridge

  • Audience
  • Client
  • Cultic Movements
• Church


  • Bureaucratic & Closely linked to the State
  • Conservative
  • Integrate with the Social & Economic Structure of Society
  • Universalist with Open Membership
  • Intolerant & Hegemonic
  • Make up the Ecclesia of a Country
• Female is the biggest consumer of religion
• Millenarian Movement


  Those that believe that a significant event will change the world and lead to 1000 years of blessedness for the saved
• Where religion could be said to have brought about social change

  • Civil Rights Movement
  • Latin America in the 1960's
  • Iranian Revolution 1979
  • Poland in 1989
• Areas of decline that could be said to be evidence of secularisation

  • Practice
  • Belief
  • Power
• Ideology


  A worldview or set of ideas and values
• Who argue that NRMs emerge as a form of religious or social protest

  Stark and Glock
• Stained Glass Ceiling


  Women are barred from the higher positions of power within mainstream religion
• Factors that determine if religion is a conservative force or a force for social change according to McGuire & Robinson


  • Nature and extent to religious belief
  • Significance of religion in society
  • Social involvement of religion
  • Degree of central authority in religious organisation
• Function of religion according to Malinowski

  Psychological functions to help people overcome life-crisis
• Wallis defined which group as 'life positive' aiming to release human potential and to accept the world


  World Affirming Movements
• Who was the leader of the peoples temple

  Jim Jones
• Differential socialisation


  The term used to explain how women are taught to be submissive, passive and obedient. Traits that are more compatible with religiosity
• Religiosity


  The extent to which someone sees themselves as religious
• Period Effect


  The term used by Voasand Crockett to mean that older generations are more religious due to the time in which they were brought up
• Stages that Comte believed religion would inevitably pass through

  • Theoretical
  • Metaphysical
  • Positivity
• What did Huntington explore

  Clash of Civilisations
• Animism


  The belief the spirits and ghosts can impact the human and natural world either positively or negatively
• What did Berger mean by the Sacred Canopy

  Religion protects its believers from all dangers in the world. Religion comforts its followers by answering the big questions
• Theistic religion


  A belief in a supernatural power, that could be a single entity or man entities
• What did Polanyi mean by subsidiary explanations


  A series of 'get out' clauses which a religious leader can use when challenged on their belief system
• Paradigm


  A set of guidelines which define a theory or idea
• Core principles of science

  • Pursuit of facts
  • Objectivity
  • Establishing cause and effect
  • Reliable methods
• Internal Secularisation


  The changing of beliefs within a religion to remain relevant in the modern world
• What did Popper mean by Falsification


  That theories and ideas are open to being proven wrong, and only become fact when they cannot be
• Civilisations according to Huntington

  • Western
  • Islamic
  • Japanese
  • Slavic-Orthodox
  • Hindu
  • Confucian
  • Latin American
• Two types of world view according to Mannheim

  • Ideological Thought
  • Utopian Thought