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A sociological account of liberal protestantism
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 October 2008
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Any list of important changes in Western religion in the last hundred years would mention the rise ofliberal Protestantism (and the associated ecumenical movement), and the decline in size and influence of the Protestant churches. What has been less obvious is the partial operation of secularization; in Britain and America liberal Protestant churches have declined more than their conservative rivals. In summary one could speak of the late nineteenth and the twentieth centuries as an era in which liberal Protestantism rose and then declined. This essay will attempt to synthesize, from a variety of sociological ideas, a suggested outline for a comprehensive explanation of that rise and fall. Such an ambitious and necessarily speculative project will require the argument to be conducted at a high level of abstraction but at various junctures details from the biographies of individuals and the careers of organizations will be introduced to illustrate and exemplify the points being made.
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page 401 note 1 I would like to thank the British Academy, the Social Science Research Council and the Queen's University of Belfast, who have at various times supported my research. I would also like to thank Professor Roy Wallis of the Queen's University, Belfast, and Professor David Martin of the L.S.E. for comments on the research that informs this essay.
page 401 note 2 For evidence of this trend see Kelley, Dean, Why the Conservative Churches Are Growing (New York: Harper and Row, 1972)Google Scholar and Bruce, S., ‘The persistence of religion: conservative Protestantism in the United Kingdom’, Sociological Review, XXXI, 3 (1983).Google Scholar
page 402 note 1 The thesis is expounded in a number of places: Berger, P. L., ‘A Sociological View of the Secularization of Theology’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, VI, 1 (1967), 3–16CrossRefGoogle Scholar; ‘A Market Model for the Analysis of Ecumenicity’, Social Research, XXX, I (1983), 77–93; and The Social Reality of Religion, (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973).
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