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The Emancipation of Europe's Muslims traces how governments across Western Europe have responded to the growing presence of Muslim immigrants in their countries over the past fifty years. Drawing on hundreds of in-depth interviews with government officials and religious leaders in France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Morocco, and Turkey, Jonathan Laurence challenges the widespread notion that Europe's Muslim minorities represent a threat to liberal democracy.

This study examines the transformation of communities within Christian churches in late-modern and postmodern social contexts. As a theoretical foundation, it presents changes in the concept of community, with a particular focus on the role of religious communities. Emphasis is placed on community as a social and spiritual resource and on the possibilities for reorganising churches. Three national case studies—an urban Reformed congregation, a small-town Catholic parish, and an ecumenical pilgrimage community—will be used to illustrate the functioning, challenges, and responses of church communities. This research uses both qualitative and quantitative methods, and the results highlight the power of community retention, the importance of personal relationships, and spiritual depth. This study also highlights the theory that the key to church renewal lies in rethinking and consciously building community forms. Digital space, personal networks, and spiritual needs are calling for new models for the church.

In Global Visions of Violence , the editors and contributors argue that violence creates a lens, bridge, and method for interdisciplinary collaboration that examines Christianity worldwide in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. By analyzing the myriad ways violence, persecution, and suffering impact Christians and the imagination of Christian identity globally, this interdisciplinary volume integrates the perspectives of ethicists, historians, anthropologists, and ethnographers to generate new conversations. Taken together, the chapters in this book challenge scholarship on Christian growth that has not accounted for violence while analyzing persecution narratives that can wield data toward partisan ends.  This allows  Global Visions of Violence to push urgent conversations forward, giving voice to projects that illuminate wide and often hidden landscapes that have been shaped by global visions of violence, and seeking solutions that end violence and turn toward the pursuit of justice, peace, and human rights among suffering Christians. 

Marital crises are common and can arise at any stage of marriage. When facing difficulties, many spouses seek support from religious communities, which provide spiritual and emotional guidance. These communities play a vital role in marriage preparation and helping couples navigate crises. In response to rising divorce rates, changing gender roles, and economic pressures, religious communities are adapting their pastoral methods. One innovative approach is storytelling, which allows couples to connect with others’ experiences, helping rebuild trust and understanding in their marriages. This article explores the role of storytelling as a tool for supporting couples in crisis, particularly in the context of religious pastoral care, focusing on its impact on communication, marital bonding, and spiritual growth.

This article explores the attributes and religious, social and political activities of local religious groups in three Italian cities across all religious traditions. This is the first application of Congregations Study methodology in Italy to analyze the social composition, structure and activities of religious communities. The research was conducted between 2020 and 2021 with a total number of 877 communities mapped in the cities of Bologna, Milan and Brescia, and their surroundings. All local religious groups in three cities and their surroundings were counted and one key informant per group was interviewed (N = 566) with a Congregations Study questionnaire. Based on the results of the interviews, we found that, during the last decade, the dynamics of growth of adults’ and children’s regular religious participation was distinct within the Muslim and Christian Orthodox communities. Social service for elderly, environmental programs and political activity were found to be promoted by the Catholic communities to a stronger degree, while activities linked to the support of migrants were endorsed stronger by Muslim and Orthodox groups. Moreover, this study assessed the theological, ethical and political orientation of religious communities, highlighting different trends across religious traditions. The article discusses various configurations of urban religious diversity by bringing similarities and contrasts between communities of dominant religious tradition and minority religions, thus questioning the applicability of City Congregations Study (CCS) methodology to the analysis of configurations of religious diversity in Italy.

The current paper focuses on the circumstances that have led to the high COVID-19 infection rates amongst the ultra-Orthodox population in Israel. The current study utilizes a qualitative design and is based on in-depth interviews, email correspondence and online records of 25 ultra-Orthodox individuals who either tested positive for COVID-19 or had contact with a verified COVID-19 patient. The data were analyzed through identification of main themes and an interpretation of their meanings. The findings showed that a wide range of causes led to the high infection rate, including aspects that derive from a structural element, a religious element and a social-ideological element—all of which are directly or indirectly connected to religion. These findings demonstrate the central role of religion in health outcomes among the ultra-Orthodox community in general and during pandemics in particular, and they shed light on the central role of religion in health outcomes among closed-religious communities. The findings further reveal the importance of cooperation between the state authorities and the religious ones, and of providing culturally adapted health service solutions in the fight against COVID-19 and promoting health more generally. Study limitations are discussed and recommendations for future research are provided.

Over recent decades, the European community has grappled with diverse forms of extremism and terrorism, exacerbated by economic crises, social divisions and the globalised nature of extremism. While most Preventing and Countering Violent Extremism (P/CVE) policies have targeted Islamic radicalisation, the approach has not fully addressed the nuances of different forms of extremism, including far-right ideologies. This paper argues for the inclusion of Social Labs as an innovative methodological approach from a sociological standpoint. The Social Lab methodology option, grounded in participatory action-research, places the community - here we refer to religious communities, religious leaders and inter-religious networks - as an integral part of the research and solution-creation process. Drawing on empirical research across Italy, Belgium and the Netherlands, this work combines qualitative tools like narrative interviews, focus groups, and working groups with inter-religious dialogue networks, aiming to foster localised, community-based solutions. The paper critically evaluates the analytical path of Social Labs in capturing the nuanced socio-economic and religious drivers of radicalisation and polarisation and explores its potential for preventing religious radicalisation at the grassroots level. The paper adds a critical layer by emphasising the need for methodological innovation in the form of Social Labs. It argues that Social Labs facilitate a more participative dynamics that can help in contextualising and ultimately countering extremism in its various forms. The paper concludes by presenting guidelines developed through Social Labs, aimed at fostering resilient communities and informing future policy and interventions.

The government’s measures against COVID-19 have raised, in virtually all contemporary democracies, important issues regarding the proportionality of limitations on fundamental rights, including freedom of religion or belief. This paper analyses some of those issues with particular reference to religious freedom, in the light of the experiences of various European and American countries. It also examines the cooperation (or lack of) between governments and religious communities in the fight against the pandemic, as well the response of religious communities to anti-COVID-19 rules, which has included recently some litigation alleging the unequal treatment of religion in comparison with other activities or institutions. The author argues that more dialogue and reciprocal cooperation between governments and religious communities (and civil society in general) is needed in this type of crisis, as well a strict scrutiny of restrictions imposed on freedom of religion from the perspective of proportionality and equality.

Cultural sociologists have devised numerous theoretical tools for analyzing meaning making among individuals and groups. Yet, the cognitive processes which underpin these theories of meaning making are often bracketed out. Drawing on three different qualitative research projects, respectively on activists, religious communities, and gamers, this article synthesizes work in sociology, psychology, and philosophy, to develop a sociology of imagination. Current work highlights that (1) imagination is a higher order mental function, (2) powerful in its effects, which (3) facilitates intersubjectivity, and (4) is socially constructive. However, sociology can additionally contribute to scholarly understandings of imagination, which have often focused on individualistic mental imaging, by highlighting the degree to which (a) imagination allows individuals and groups to coordinate identities, actions, and futures, (b) imagination relies on widely shared cultural elements, and (c) imagination is often undertaken collectively, in groups. The article concludes with suggestions for future sociological work on imagination.

In contrast to state-religion systems of separation, many European states have a confession-based policy on religion. This describes the relationship of the state to one or more preferred state-recognised religious confessions. State recognition, or preferential treatment of the chosen religious confessions, can occur in many variations. These preferred confessions are predominantly the (former) Christian state churches. Such policies date from a period when Christian state churches involved a major part of the population. In view of changing religious landscapes, traditional confession-based policies have developed an exclusive character. These policies include only chosen declining religious groups, while they exclude groups that have gained social relevance. Notwithstanding the new situation, many governments have hitherto failed to address the need for the adjustment of their policies on religion. Unadjusted policies are unsuitable to deal creatively with religious diversity in today’s society. Governments that treat religious communities differently come into conflict with state neutrality and religious peace. This article opens the door to a six-part study, arguing that confession-based state policies on religion should incline towards greater inclusiveness. It is in the state’s best interest to mobilise the positive potential of all religious-sociological groups. This article specifically focuses on the changes that are becoming apparent in today’s religious landscapes and how these changes challenge traditional confession-based policies. It lays the foundation for the subsequent articles as a case study and a new conceptual framework for a fair, progressive and peacebuilding policy on religion for the Swiss Canton Bern.