Robert Park was an accomplished student of African American life, and the social organization of African American community life centered and still does center in the Black Church. Most of his study in the sociology of African American religion dates from before his career at the University of Chicago and thus remains little known in the field. That he nevertheless influenced the sociology of religion is thus surprising, given his lack of focus on it during his years of prominence in general sociology. But influence it he did. It is the purpose of this chapter to describe and account for that influence. It begins with the religious stance of Park himself, which had an impact on his rather indirect relationship with the sociology of religion. That is followed by a quick review of his early work in the sociology of African American religion. Then the chapter proceeds with the context of the most influential part of Park's sociological career, sociology at the University of Chicago from 1915 until after his retirement from the department there in 1933. Then a study of his relevant writings and those of his students follows, in as chronological an order as reasonable. That section is not perfectly chronological because the relevant themes did not arise one by one over time. For example, one theme in Park's writings, the importance of missions, received attention from one of his students in the early 1920s and from Park himself in 1944. Finally, Park's interest in what we would now call globalism involved a research program that he conceived of as global but which was only carried out by his students in Hawai'i; a section is devoted to that lesser- known of Park traditions, which involved a great deal of inquiry into religious phenomena.

Park's Religious Stance

The late Edward Shils maintained that Park was far less religious than most people and therefore neglected religion in his sociology. “Of course, it must be said that Park was also very blind in matters of religion. He was somewhere between a Deweyan naturalist and a Unitarian” (Shils 1994, 21).