#  Religion Research is on the Rise 

 





October 18, 2000

 

 

Source: The Los Angeles Times

On October 18, 2000,  *The Los Angeles Times*  reported that "in Pennsylvania,researchers are documenting how religion keeps young people from drugs anddelinquency. In Cambridge, professors are pondering how faith propels environmentalismand inner-city economic development. And in one of the world's most religiouslydiverse laboratories--Southern California--scholars are visiting such sacred sites asSikh gurdwaras, Chinese Buddhist temples and Armenian apostolic churches to scrutinizethe powerful role that religion plays in the lives of new immigrants. Across thenation, scholars have begun to promote a new paradigm in academia: Religion matters.Once a largely forgotten factor in social research, dismissed by those who believedthat society would inevitably secularize and cast spirituality aside, religion is nowa hot field of inquiry. Until recently, a long-standing academic bias against religionhas blinded many scholars to its powerful role in shaping both private lives and thepublic culture. 'While millions, even billions, of people view so many different humanconcerns through the lens of religious faith, this crucial subject remains one of themost understudied social phenomena of the 20th century,' Princeton UniversityPresident Harold Shapiro said last year. That's changing. Driven by new fundingopportunities, a national spiritual resurgence and growing political interest infaith-based initiatives, more people than ever are studying religion. No longerconfined to schools of divinity, religion is being increasingly probed in departmentsof sociology, political science, international relations, even business schools. Thenew research is expected to 'significantly reshape the social sciences,' said JonMiller, a USC sociology professor. 'We've started to legitimize the study of religionand help people acknowledge it's a phenomenon people need to pay attention to,' saidDonald E. Miller, executive director of the USC Center for Religion and CivicCulture."



 

 

 



 

 See also:- [ Campus ](/news-stories/campus)
- [ Interfaith ](/religions/interfaith)
 
 

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