Download or read book Financing American Religion written by Mark Chaves and published by Rowman Altamira. This book was released on 1999 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Brings together short essays that emerged from an evaluation of the Lilly Endowment Inc.'s Financing American Religion initiative. Nineteen chapters (some previously published in well known works and others only in difficult-to-find pamphlets) explore who gives, how much, and why. They investigate how money moves and how it affects religious organizational behavior as well as how attitudes toward money have altered over time. Topics include individual giving as well as congregations and religious organizations and their resources. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
Download or read book Religious School Financing and Educational Pluralism in the American Tradition written by Thomas C. Berg and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The pattern of church-state relations in the United States presents what many Europeans may see as a paradox. America is by far the most religiously observant of Western nations, yet it provides far less than many Western European nations in government support for religiously affiliated education at the primary and secondary levels, the most important years in forming children's minds. This article, written for a European audience, reviews two explanations for the American tradition of no financing. One is "pluralist," asserting that religious primary and secondary schools can better maintain their independence and identity without state aid because aid brings state regulation; and the second "cohesionist," asserting that while nonsectarian religion is socially valuable, schools of particular denominations undercut social unity by separating children in their formative years and therefore should not be encouraged with government support. I offer a few reasons why the pluralist approach to education is more attractive than the cohesionist approach. Finally, I assess whether the tradition against financing of religious primary and secondary schools does in fact promote educational pluralism, and I conclude that, on balance, it is better for pluralism that religious schools have the option to receive state financing.
Download or read book The Business Turn in American Religious History written by Amanda Porterfield and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2017 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Business has received little attention in American religious history, although it has profound implications for understanding the sustained popularity and ongoing transformation of religion in the United States. This volume offers a wide ranging exploration of the business aspects of American religious organizations. The authors analyze the financing, production, marketing, and distribution of religious goods and services and the role of wealth and economic organization in sustaining and even shaping worship, charity, philanthropy, institutional growth, and missionary work. Treating religion and business holistically, their essays show that American religious life has always been informed by business practices. Laying the groundwork for further investigation, the authors show how American business has functioned as a domain for achieving religious goals. Indeed they find that religion has historically been more powerful when interwoven with business. Chapters on Mormon enterprise, Jewish philanthropy, Hindu gurus, Native American casinos, and the wedding of business wealth to conservative Catholic social teaching demonstrate the range of new studies stimulated by the business turn in American religious history. Other chapters show how evangelicals joined neo-liberal economic practice and right-wing politics to religious fundamentalism to consolidate wealth and power, and how they developed marketing campaigns and organizational strategies that transformed the American religious landscape. Included are essays exposing the moral compromises religious organizations have made to succeed as centers of wealth and influence, and the religious beliefs that rationalize and justify these compromises. Still others examine the application of business practices as a means of sustaining religious institutions and expanding their reach, and look at controversies over business practices within religious organizations, and the adjustments such organizations have made in response. Together, the essays collected here offer new ways of conceptualizing the interdependence of religion and business in the United States, establishing multiple paths for further study of their intertwined historical development.
Download or read book Religion and Finance written by Mervyn K. Lewis and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 2019 with total page 348 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Judaism, Christianity and Islam all impose obligations and constraints upon the rightful use of wealth and earthly resources. All three of these religions have well-researched views on the acceptability of practices such as usury but the principles and practices of other, non-interest, financial instruments are less well known. This book examines each of these three major world faiths, considering their teachings, social precepts and economic frameworks, which are set out as a guide for the financial dealings and economic behaviour of their adherents.
Download or read book The Financing of American Evangelical Religion written by and published by . This book was released on with total page 104 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Business and Religion written by Matthew Godfrey and published by . This book was released on 2019-09-02 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume elucidates both the diverse texts of the New Testament as well as the larger Jewish, Greek, and Roman worlds in which they were produced. It contains sections with various papers on the "Jewish Background of the New Testament," "Greco-Roman Background of the New Testament," "Jesus and the Gospels," "The Apostle Paul," "Hebrews, the Catholic Epistles, and Revelation," "New Testament Issues and Contexts," "The Text of the New Testament," and "After the New Testament." The volume therefore ranges from the law of Moses and intertestamental period to the First Jewish Revolt of AD 66-73 and the canonization of the New Testament.
Download or read book Evangelicals Incorporated written by Daniel Vaca and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2019-12-03 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A new history explores the commercial heart of evangelical Christianity. American evangelicalism is big business. For decades, the world’s largest media conglomerates have sought out evangelical consumers, and evangelical books have regularly become international best sellers. In the early 2000s, Rick Warren’s The Purpose Driven Life spent ninety weeks on the New York Times Best Sellers list and sold more than thirty million copies. But why have evangelicals achieved such remarkable commercial success? According to Daniel Vaca, evangelicalism depends upon commercialism. Tracing the once-humble evangelical book industry’s emergence as a lucrative center of the US book trade, Vaca argues that evangelical Christianity became religiously and politically prominent through business activity. Through areas of commerce such as branding, retailing, marketing, and finance, for-profit media companies have capitalized on the expansive potential of evangelicalism for more than a century. Rather than treat evangelicalism as a type of conservative Protestantism that market forces have commodified and corrupted, Vaca argues that evangelicalism is an expressly commercial religion. Although religious traditions seem to incorporate people who embrace distinct theological ideas and beliefs, Vaca shows, members of contemporary consumer society often participate in religious cultures by engaging commercial products and corporations. By examining the history of companies and corporate conglomerates that have produced and distributed best-selling religious books, bibles, and more, Vaca not only illustrates how evangelical ideas, identities, and alliances have developed through commercial activity but also reveals how the production of evangelical identity became a component of modern capitalism.
Download or read book American Religion written by Mark A. A. Chaves and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2017-08-29 with total page 172 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The most authoritative resource on religious trends in America—now fully updated Most Americans say they believe in God, and more than a third say they attend religious services every week. Yet studies show that people do not really go to church as often as they claim, and it is not always clear what they mean when they tell pollsters they believe in God or pray. American Religion presents the best and most up-to-date information about religious trends in the United States, in a succinct and accessible manner. This sourcebook provides essential information about key developments in American religion since 1972, and is the first major resource of its kind to appear in more than two decades. Mark Chaves looks at trends in diversity, belief, involvement, congregational life, leadership, liberal Protestant decline, and polarization. He draws on two important surveys: the General Social Survey, an ongoing survey of Americans' changing attitudes and behaviors, begun in 1972; and the National Congregations Study, a survey of American religious congregations across the religious spectrum. Chaves finds that American religious life has seen much continuity in recent decades, but also much change. He challenges the popular notion that religion is witnessing a resurgence in the United States—in fact, traditional belief and practice is either stable or declining. Chaves examines why the decline in liberal Protestant denominations has been accompanied by the spread of liberal Protestant attitudes about religious and social tolerance, how confidence in religious institutions has declined more than confidence in secular institutions, and a host of other crucial trends. Now with updated data and a new preface by the author, this revised edition provides essential information about key developments in American religion since 1972, plainly showing that religiosity is declining in America.
Download or read book Pious Property written by Bill Maurer and published by Russell Sage Foundation. This book was released on 2006-01-09 with total page 138 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Owning a home has always been central to the American dream. For the more than one million Muslims in the United States, this is no exception. However, the Qur'an forbids the payment of interest, which places conventional home financing out of reach for observant Muslims. To meet the growing Muslim demand for home purchases, a market for home financing that would be halal, or permissible under Islamic law, has emerged. In Pious Property, anthropologist William Maurer profiles the emergence of this new religiously based financial service and explores the ways it reflects the influence of Muslim practices on American economic life and vice versa. Pious Property charts the development of Islamic mortgages in America, starting with Islamic interpretations of the prohibition against riba—literally translated as "increase" but interpreted as "usury" or "interest." Maurer then explores the different practices that have emerged as permissible options for Islamic homebuyers—such as lease-to-own arrangements, profit-loss sharing, and cost-plus contracts—and explains how they have gained acceptance in the Islamic community by relying on payment schemes that avoid standard interest rate payments. Using interviews with Muslim homebuyers and financiers, and in-depth analysis of two companies that provide mortgage alternatives to Muslims, Maurer discovers an interesting paradox: progressive Muslims tend to use financial contracts that seemingly comply better with the prohibition against interest, while traditional Muslims seem more inclined to take on financing very similar to interest-based mortgages. Maurer finds that Muslims make their decisions about using Islamic mortgage alternatives based not only on the views of religious scholars, but also on their conceptions of how business is supposed to be conducted in America. While one form of Islamic financing is seemingly more congruent with the prohibition against riba, the other exhibits more of the qualities of American mortgages—anonymity and standardized forms. The appearance that an Islamic financing instrument is legal and professional leaves many Muslim homebuyers with the impression that it is halal, revealing the influence of American capitalism on Muslim Americans' understanding of their religious rules. The market for halal financial products exists at the intersection of American and Islamic culture and is emblematic of the way that, for centuries, America's newcomers have adapted to and changed the fabric of American life. In Pious Property, William Maurer explores this rapidly growing economic phenomenon with historical perspective and scholarly insight.
Download or read book Reorganized Religion written by Bob Smietana and published by Worthy Books. This book was released on 2023-08-29 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A superb examination of the future of Christian institutions.... A must-read for anyone invested in the fate of the American church." -Publishers Weekly (starred review) Uncover the ways the Christian church has changed in recent years--from the decline of the mainline denominations to the mega-churchification of American culture to the rise of the Nones and Exvaneglicals--and a hopeful reimagining of what the church might look like going forward. The United States is in the middle of an unprecedented spiritual, technological, demographic, political and social transformation-- moving from an older, mostly white, mostly Protestant, religion-friendly society to a younger diverse, multiethnic, pluralistic culture, where no one faith group will have the advantage. At the same time, millions of Americans are abandoning organized religion altogether in favor of disorganized disbelief. Reorganized Religion is an in-depth and critical look at why people are leaving American churches and what we lose as a society as it continues. But it also accepts the dismantling of what has come before and try to help readers reinvent the path forward. This book looks at the future of organized religion in America and outline the options facing churches and other faith groups. Will they retreat? Will they become irrelevant? Or will they find a new path forward? Written by veteran religion reporter Bob Smietana, Reorganized Religion is a journalistic look at the state of the American church and its future. It draws on polling data, interviews with experts, and reporting on how faith communities old and new are coping with the changing religious landscape, along with personal stories about how faith is lived in everyday life. It also profiles faith communities and leaders who are finding interesting ways to reimagine what church might look like in the future and discuss various ways we can reinvent this organization so it survives and thrives. The book also reflects the hope that perhaps people of faith can learn to become, if not friends with the larger culture, then at least better neighbors.
Download or read book Passing the Plate written by Christian Smith and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2008-09-29 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Passing the Plate shows that few American Christians donate generously to religious and charitable causes. This eye-opening book explores the reasons behind such ungenerous giving, the potential world-changing benefits of greater financial giving, and what can be done to improve matters. By illuminating the social and psychological forces that shape charitable giving, Passing the Plate is sure to spark a much-needed debate on a critical issue.
Download or read book Faith and Money written by Lisa A. Keister and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2011-09-05 with total page 261 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For those who own it, wealth can have extraordinary advantages. High levels of wealth can enhance educational attainment, create occupational opportunities, generate social influence and provide a buffer against financial emergencies. Even a small amount of savings can improve security, mitigate the effects of job loss and other financial setbacks and improve well-being dramatically. Although the benefits of wealth are significant, they are not enjoyed uniformly throughout the United States. In the United States, because religion is an important part of cultural orientation, religious beliefs should affect material well-being. This book explores the way religious orientations and beliefs affect Americans' incomes, savings and net worth.
Download or read book American Theocracy written by Kevin Phillips and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2006-03-21 with total page 570 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An explosive examination of the coalition of forces that threatens the nation, from the bestselling author of American Dynasty In his two most recent bestselling books, American Dynasty and Wealth and Democracy, Kevin Phillips established himself as a powerful critic of the political and economic forces that rule—and imperil—the United States, tracing the ever more alarming path of the emerging Republican majority’s rise to power. Now Phillips takes an uncompromising view of the current age of global overreach, fundamentalist religion, diminishing resources, and ballooning debt under the GOP majority. With an eye to the past and a searing vision of the future, Phillips confirms what too many Americans are still unwilling to admit about the depth of our misgovernment.
Download or read book Card Carrying Christians written by Rebecca C. Bartel and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2021-05-24 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the waning years of Latin America's longest and bloodiest civil war, the rise of an unlikely duo is transforming Colombia: Christianity and access to credit. In her exciting new book, Rebecca C. Bartel details how surging evangelical conversions and widespread access to credit cards, microfinance programs, and mortgages are changing how millions of Colombians envision a more prosperous future. Yet programs of financialization propel new modes of violence. As prosperity becomes conflated with peace, and debt with devotion, survival only becomes possible through credit and its accompanying forms of indebtedness. A new future is on the horizon, but it will come at a price.
Download or read book Funding the Faiths written by Laurence R. Iannaccone and published by . This book was released on 2014 with total page 16 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Of all the things that sustain formal religious institutions, none is more essential than material support. Without adequate income, congregations fold, denominations fail, and the faithful flock to greener pastures. Nor is any facet of religious commitment more concrete and quantifiable. People may say all sorts of things about their faith, but there is no substitute for putting your money where your mouth is (and even Jesus observed that “where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” ). Faced with skepticism about the accuracy and consistency of attendance and membership rates reported by individuals or institutions, the obvious alternative is to follow the money. Strange as it may seem, the economics of religion has yet to pay much attention to financial matters. In fact, one learns much more about the financial activities of religious institutions from historians, sociologists, and religious leaders, than from economists. There is no good reason for this imbalance to persist. Hence, this essay suggests some first steps toward a general theory of religious finance. We cannot hope to summarize all the ways in which religious goods and services are marketed in modern America, much less around the world and over time. Nor can we enumerate the countless factors that shape the marketing of any particular religion in any particular time and place. Rather, we seek merely to identify some key aspects of religions and their environments that help us to understand why methods of finance vary so dramatically over time, place, and type of religion. We begin with general claims and follow with specific examples.
Download or read book The Founding Fathers and the Place of Religion in America written by Frank Lambert and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2010-07-28 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How did the United States, founded as colonies with explicitly religious aspirations, come to be the first modern state whose commitment to the separation of church and state was reflected in its constitution? Frank Lambert explains why this happened, offering in the process a synthesis of American history from the first British arrivals through Thomas Jefferson's controversial presidency. Lambert recognizes that two sets of spiritual fathers defined the place of religion in early America: what Lambert calls the Planting Fathers, who brought Old World ideas and dreams of building a "City upon a Hill," and the Founding Fathers, who determined the constitutional arrangement of religion in the new republic. While the former proselytized the "one true faith," the latter emphasized religious freedom over religious purity. Lambert locates this shift in the mid-eighteenth century. In the wake of evangelical revival, immigration by new dissenters, and population expansion, there emerged a marketplace of religion characterized by sectarian competition, pluralism, and widened choice. During the American Revolution, dissenters found sympathetic lawmakers who favored separating church and state, and the free marketplace of religion gained legal status as the Founders began the daunting task of uniting thirteen disparate colonies. To avoid discord in an increasingly pluralistic and contentious society, the Founders left the religious arena free of government intervention save for the guarantee of free exercise for all. Religious people and groups were also free to seek political influence, ensuring that religion's place in America would always be a contested one, but never a state-regulated one. An engaging and highly readable account of early American history, this book shows how religious freedom came to be recognized not merely as toleration of dissent but as a natural right to be enjoyed by all Americans.
Download or read book Righteous Riches written by Milmon F. Harrison and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2005-03-03 with total page 188 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Does God want us to be wealthy? Many people believe that God offers not only eternal joy in the hereafter but also material blessings in the here and now. Other Christians see this "prosperity theology," as nothing more than vulgar materialism, incompatible with orthodox Christianity. In Righteous Riches, Milmon F. Harrison examines the Word of Faith movement, an independent, non-denominational Christian movement that preaches the so-called "health and wealth gospel." The Word of Faith movement is an international network loosely bound by a basic doctrine called the "Faith Message," which teaches that it is God's will for Christians to be prosperous, successful, and healthy in the present life. Drawing on his personal experiences as a former insider and in-depth interviews with members, Harrison takes us inside the movement, revealing what it is like to belong, and how people accept, reject, and reshape Word of Faith doctrines to fit their own lives. Although the movement is not exclusively African American, many of its most prominent and recognized leaders are African American ministers with large congregations and national television audiences. Analyzing the movement's appeal to African Americans, Harrison argues that, because of their history of oppression and discrimination, African American religious institutions have always had to address the material--as well as spiritual--concerns of their members. The Word of Faith Movement, he says, is one of several prosperity movements that resonate strongly with African Americans. Situating the movement in the contexts of both contemporary American religion and the history of the Black Church, Righteous Riches offers a fascinating look at a quintessentially American phenomenon.
