Discuss the view that the influence of religion on UK society is declining

The UK is lucky to take on such a vibrant, diverse and cultured population from migrants that befuddle entered our small islands from the past few thousand years. so far each time they reach out Britain there home, they bring there religious belief. This gives insurrection to the umteen religions and there denominations that have a presence. But what is a religion? According to the Penguin Dictionary of Sociology it is A set of cultural ideas, symbols, and practices that centering on the meaning of spiritedness and the nature of the unknown. Secularisation had been happening for long time before Nietzsche pro filled, divinity is Dead and is a far more complex process than just a drop in church building attention. Marxists apprehend that religion is form of loving control on the proletariat by the bourgeoisie. He saw religion as the opium of the masses, teaching them acceptance which was reinforced by hymns like All things glazed and beautiful which had verses akin to The rich man in his castle, the poor man at his gate, God made them, game or lowly, and ordered their estate. aided there exploitation by teaching them to accept there point in society because it was God wished.When Marx wrote this, churches had a high monopoly on truth so people would be more inclined to believe it. Looking at statistics of ex and current communist countries it is clear that secularization is very high with the majority of Britain from Chinese decent claiming they have no religion, it is also known that countries that sustain a Marxist, however stringently, doctrine that government officials must have no religion, this is very widely compel in positioning the Peoples Republic of Chinas administration but non as obligatory within the soviets of the USSR.With still bingle class there should be no reason for a religion to control society, however when countries became communist the did non all suddenly drop there gather ins and become atheists, even if thes e values were taught at school, they were gloss over taught in the home as primary socialisation al focal points comes before secondary such as the school. The media openly ridicules religion by broadcasting comedies such as Father Ted and The Vicar of Dibley which portray very un Orthodox Ministers and there they very un orthodox parishivirtuosors.But the media does not stop there it regularly comments on the flaws in religion through various mediums such as articles printed about the bonuses of secularisation and TV programs calling for religions to be abolished in the bid for world peace. However many of the Abrahamic religions forgot the second commandment Though shall not hero-worship false idols but would God really smite the celebrities that use there fame to help highlight human work and those less fortunate than ourselves?However jealous a god he is, does he okay of celebrities such as The Pope or Grand Ayatollah? Even with there religious leadership they free fit the job description of a celebrity. Religions are often accused of being behind the measure on items seen as very taboo notwithstanding have always been there, especially hardy rights and abortion. around religions see all human life as sacred and that abortion is an act of killing one of gods children so a sin, they also conform to functionalist view of homogonous, heterosexual, monogamous marriage been the only appropriate view on raising children. indoors the past hundred years many laws have been passed that work towards an classless society in which no person is superior or inferior to another such as gay rights, abortion rights and gender equality, which have been advocated for as long as Plato in his The Republic in which he sees men and woman indifferent albeit for childbirth and strength, to which he concludes that somewhat woman are stronger than some men.Moreover, some religious organisations have moved slightly with times, notably the Anglican assurance which no all ows gay and female Vicars, abortion in certain circumstances as well as divorce and remarriage. So as many equality principles have been oppressed by religion and are only tardily winning it over, only one has been supported which is race equality, which was lead and fronted by one the most storied men in the world, a Methodist minister, Dr Martin Luther King.But to counter that the Dutch Reform Church openly supported Agrammatical constituentheid in South Africa, as well as many Far Right semipolitical Groups mainly National Socialism Groups such as Hitlers Administration but also the BNP and NF groups which solely believe in Aryan Protestants to be the superior race, a dumbfounded patriarchal view that contradicts many statements within the bible including when Jesus Christ died on the Cross for our sins he removed all barriers including that of gender, race, and nationality.This is as tell by the apostle Paul There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, fo r you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ then you are heirs according to the promise (Galatians 328-29). Weber beginning introduced his theory of rationalization in his book The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, He predicts a crepuscule in religion ascribable to industrial advancement, plurality of religions and a rise in science and engine room to answer suspenses that gave rational answers juxtaposed to religions ambiguous statement of it was Gods will.He looks at the Protestant denomination of Calvinism who believed in predestination and worked hard to beat their anxiety on whether they would be accepted into heaven. Eventually this evolved from a monopoly on truth to a monopoly of industry with many Calvinites becoming successful capitalistic businesspeople, for which Weber argued was inevitable. A rise in religious pluralism also adds to secularisation as individual religions are loosing their monopoly on truth as they are co-habiting and reco gnising other religions.Many large religious buildings now have faith rooms in which all religions are welcome. Also some Christian denominations meet and work together as Christians this is called Ecumenicalism. Within the past 250 years scientific advancement has gone from virtually nothing to a vital part our lifes today, religion has caught on on this bandwagon as well, but to only a certain extent. Darwins theory of developing is still questioned by some many religious individuals however these are mainly creationists.Weber indicateed that at long last the mystical ideas would be succumbed by scientific ones. Durkheim (1965) suggests that religion was about celebrating the rules of your society and making the citizens keep to those rules. Yet, he argues, that as a society becomes more complex religion struggles to bind individuals due to industrialization and social fragmentation that regulate religion into a corner of where it becomes one of many beliefs and fails to unify members of society.Secularists and Antidisestablishmentarians have fought along side the broad left and broad right respectively, but hardly any battles have been as severe as the Spanish civil war (1936 1939) The Republicans were secularists and some of the more radical groups within in them such as the Stalinists NKVD committed terrible atrocities against the catholic church in Spain such as massacring clergy and destroying churches and monasteries. objet dart the Nationalists were led by the infamous General Francisco Franco and had largely fascist yet catholic views and ties.They suppressed the terrorist secularist activities by executing teachers that promoted the removal of the church from education. Clear Statistics prove a decline in church attendance (All Protestant and Roman Catholic) from 30% of the population in 1900 to 12% in 1990, Hamilton (? ) Table 1. However a Social Attitudes Survey (1992) cited in Haralambous et al (2000) table 7. 19 pg 479 states that 75% of p eople believe in at some point God with or without scepticism, while the remaining 25% either utter they were Atheists, no answer or that they did not if there was a God and believed there was no way to find out.As 75% of people still believe in God at some point, this adds to the point that people may not be attending churches but still are retaining faith and does indicate a rise in Atheism. Davie calls this believe without belonging. Returning back to the Penguins Dictionary of Sociologys exposition of religion in no point of the description does it state that one has to attend a particular proposition place of worship to practice there religion.This adds to the point that people have not stopped believing in god but merely openly practicing in public, this could be that a conventional church does not fit in with there views of a religion or their lifestyles. In America evangelistic Christians have used the TV to their advantage and started to broadcast live sermons, this is ta king the idea of songs of praise to a new level and with channels emerging such as GOD channel, religious sermons can make it into our homes if we choose.Furthermore, Christian Church attendance was only mentioned above so what would be held for other religions and the attendance at there place of worship. Other data suggests that Christianity is just for Christmas According to UK Census Data (2001) 71. 6% claim to be Christian, 2. 7% to be Muslim, 1. 0% to be Hindu, 0. 6% to be Sikh, 0. 5% to be Jewish, 0. 3% to Buddhist and 23. 2% either have no religion or did not state one. However, comparison this with data from Social Trends 30 (2000) cited in Moore (2001) pg 417 suggest that while Christianity may be on the fall down other religions are not.Islam in the UK had increased 380% from 130,000 individuals in 1970 to 495,000 individuals. As well the amount of people stating their religion as Sikhism increased 250% from 1970 to 1990. Interestingly, participants of other non-Christ ian religious institutions had increased 231% over the twenty-year period, these could be institutions that conform to the description of a religion but are either world rejecting or world affirming. valet de chambre rejecting religions promise savoir on judgement day and normally have very tight, strict rules and regulations placed upon their members, and most of all see the world as a bad place in which will not make it into heaven. World affirming religions on the other hand are too promised savour but do not have as many tight restrictions on its members but maybe one or two, such as no sex before marriage or no drinking alcohol and most all important(predicate)ly do not see the world as a bad place. There are many methodical issues raised when researching any religion topic, let alone secularisation.There are many points to allow in when research is undertaken for instance the reliability of the data, would a different research get the same results or if a different sample o f participants and method of data collection was used. Is their a true representative sample, this would be important as Britain is a highly religiously diverse country and a poor sample could conglomerate the results. How valid is the data actually gained is it what the researcher aimed to find in their question or is it irrelevant due to an ambiguous question.Religion is a very private matter and a researcher must question there self on how far they may be intruding on a participants life or institution. Finally a researcher must be sensitive to the data and interaction with participants, as beliefs are very sacred to a person they must be fully aware of their usage so that they do not offend. Secondary sources must be looked at with great care and what they place applied today for example a woman practicing herbal medicine would not be seen as anything bizarre in todays world but 400 years ago burnt at the endanger for witchcraft.In conclusion the debate of secularisation has rage on with the sociological world for many year, yet a unified decision has yet too be and probably wont be made. Bellah (1967) and Luckman (1996) both argue that religion is not in decline but is merely ever-changing form. They say that the public side of religion may be in decline but the private side of religion and ain belief is not. Berger (1967) on the other hand says that religion is loosing its traditional place within society grammatical construction how the growth of science and technology has questioned it, and suggests that religion, as a way of life is no longer in capacity to do so.Wilson (1966) described secularisation as the process whereby religious thinking, practices and institutions lose their social signification But even though there is a drop in church attendance, society is not loosing its belief in a religion. Many religions have religious buildings to worship their god, yet with some religions it is not compulsory to attend them regularly, such as Isl am and Judaism perhaps Christianity has to learn from its religious relatives.On the contrary Voas (2005) gives turn out for a significant rise in church attendance around Christmas time, which can rise by 330% in some diocese in Anglican Britain. Perhaps this suggests that Anglicans choose to go to church only at special religious occasions. Many sociologists looking at secularisation focus on Britain and do to take into account other countries that have taken a huge rise of fundamentalism such as the USA and Iran, which are closely linked too politics.Fundamentalists, such as the Christian Coalition, helped shape the policies of the Reagan and supply administrations, Bruce (1995). Finally Stark and Bainbridge (1990) suggest that secularisation and strong religious belief alternate in a cyclical pattern. From this I agree with Bellah and Luckman that religion is not in decline but merely changing the form in which it presents its self within society, as there is more corroborati on between researchers that suggest people have not lost faith.