FAMILIES AND RELIGIOUS BELIEFS

Families and Religious Beliefs



Families and Religious Beliefs

Introduction

Families are sacred and central to major world religions, and all world religions include beliefs and practices that influence families. The United States may be the most religious and religiously diverse nation in terms of voluntary participation in religious institutions. Ninety-five percent of all married couples and parents in America report a religious affiliation, about 90% desire religious training for their children, over half say they attend religious services at least monthly, and 60% say religion is “important” or “very important” to them; only 2% say they do not believe in God. Even given the tendency of U.S. survey respondents to exaggerate their religious participation, religious beliefs and activities continue to be reported as an important part of American family life (Chadwick, 2003).

Discussion and Analysis

As Pankhurst and Houseknecht (2000) stated, “[R]eligion and family may be primordial institutions, but they are also dynamic and 'modern' institutions” (p. 28). The latter half of the 20th century in the United States was characterized by remarkable growth in both religious and family diversity owing to changes in religious expression, increasing numbers of immigrants with non-Jewish and non-Christian religious affiliations, and changes in family structure.

There now is tremendous diversity in North America in how individuals and families experience and express spiritual beliefs and practices, with as much diversity within major faith groups as between them . Linder (2003) has listed 216 major Christian denominations, and Melton (2003) has documented over 2,600 distinct faith communities in the United States and Canada (70% are Christian). Increases in religious diversity continue at a rapid pace; indeed, religious diversity may be greater than other types of diversity.

Moreover, Americans have always been dynamic in their religious identities and degrees of adherence, as manifested in high levels of intergenerational and personal changes in orthodoxy and activity within faith communities and high levels of conversions from one faith community to another. Scholars have only begun to capture this religious diversity in relation to marriage and family life (Chinitz, 2001).

According to the 2000 U.S. census, there is widespread variation in how family households are structured. Recent important changes in families include higher proportions of individuals not marrying or marrying later, increased numbers of couples cohabiting, higher rates of divorce and remarriage, increased age at birth of first child, more adult children living with parents, and married couples having more years together after children are raised. As several chapters in this book illustrate, scholars disagree as to whether the changes in marriage and family life generally have been a boon or bane to individuals, families, and societies.

The religiosity-family linkage has received relatively little attention from social scientists when compared to other aspects of personal and social life. Many social scientists have been skeptical of the viability and even the desirability of research on religiosity and have treated personal and familial religious beliefs and practices as nonissues .

In recent years, however, there has been an increase in both the quantity and the quality of empirical research linking religiosity and families, due in part to a growing acknowledgment that “even from an atheistic or agnostic position, it is important to understand what motivates and energizes a large portion of the world's population”...