Using the tools of sociological theory, Robert Brenneman seeks to discover why a pot-smoking, gun-wielding "homie" gang member would want to trade in la vida loca for a Bible and the buttoned-down lifestyle of an evangelical hermano (brother in Christ) - and to what extent this strategy works for the many youth who have tried it.

The social sciences have mostly ignored the role of physical buildings in shaping the social fabric of communities and groups. Although the emerging field of the sociology of architecture has started to pay attention to physical structures, Brenneman and Miller are the first to combine the light of sociological theory and the empirical method in order to understand the impact of physical structures on religious groups that build, transform, and maintain them. Religious buildings not only r...

Using the tools of sociological theory, Robert Brenneman seeks to discover why a pot-smoking, gun-wielding "homie" gang member would want to trade in la vida loca for a Bible and the buttoned-down lifestyle of an evangelical hermano (brother in Christ) - and to what extent this strategy works for the many youth who have tried it.

Beyond Belief addresses what happens when women of extreme religions decide to walk away.Editors Susan Tive (a former Orthodox Jew) and Cami Ostman (a de-converted fundamentalist born-again Christian) have compiled a collection of powerful personal stories written by women of varying ages, races, and religious backgrounds who share one commonality: they’ve all experienced and rejected extreme religions. Covering a wide range of religious communities—including Evangelical, ...

When Germany occupied Hungary in 1944, fifteen-year-old Miklos Friedman drew on his wits to survive. Recruited into forced labour, sent to a ghetto and, ultimately, to the Nazi camps of Auschwitz and Mühldorf, Miklos never stopped fighting to change his fate. After the war, he risked everything in order to leave his past behind. Decades later, a chance meeting in Toronto led Miklos, now Michael Mason, to discover the power of his new name.

Writer and scholar George Steiner's Massey Lectures are just as cogent today as when he delivered them in 1974 -- perhaps even more so. He argues that Western culture's moral and emotional emptiness stems from the decay of formal religion. He examines the alternate mythologies (Marxism, etc.) and fads of irrationality (astrology, the occult). Steiner argues that this decay and the failure of the mythologies have created a nostalgia for the absolute that is growing and leading us to a massi...

For decades, Operation World has been the world's leading resource for people who want to impact the nations for Christ through prayer. Its twofold purpose has been to inform for prayer and to mobilize for mission. Now the research team of Operation World offers this abridged version of the 7th edition called Pray for the World as an accessible resource to facilitate prayer for the nations.The Operation World researchers asked Christian leaders in every ...

This book addresses an issue currently making political headlines in the United States—immigration. Immigrants have long engendered debates about the boundaries of belonging, with some singing their praises and others warning of their dangers. In particular, the 11 million unauthorized immigrants in the country provoke heated disagreements with issues of legality and morality at the forefront. Increasingly, such debates take place online, by organizations in the immigrant rights and the im...

The Price of Freedom Denied shows that, contrary to popular opinion, ensuring religious freedom for all reduces violent religious persecution and conflict. Others have suggested that restrictions on religion are necessary to maintain order or preserve a peaceful religious homogeneity. Brian J. Grim and Roger Finke show that restricting religious freedoms is associated with higher levels of violent persecution. Relying on a new source of coded data for nearly 200 countries and case studies ...

Winner of the 2015 Pierre-Antoine Bernheim Prize for the History of Religion by the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres After a century during which Confucianism was viewed by academics as a relic of the imperial past or, at best, a philosophical resource, its striking comeback in Chinese society today raises a number of questions about the role that this ancient tradition might play in a contemporary context. The Sage and the People is the first comprehen...

The history of the twentieth century is one of modernization, a story of old ways being left behind. Many traditionalist Mennonites rejected these changes, especially the automobile, which they regarded as a symbol of pride and individualism. They became known as a “horse-and-buggy” people.Between 2009 and 2012, Royden Loewen and a team of researchers interviewed 250 Mennonites in thirty-five communities across the Americas about the impact of the modern world on their lives. This ...

This book focuses on the recurring struggle over the meaning of the Anglican Church’s role in the Indian residential schools--a long-running school system designed to assimilate Indigenous children into Euro-Canadian culture, in which sexual, psychological, and physical abuse were common. From the end of the nineteenth century until the outset of twenty-first century, the meaning of the Indian residential schools underwent a protracted transformation. Once a symbol of the Church’s sacred m...