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This paper addresses the issue of whether religiosity is really multidimensional as suggested by Glock and Stark and numerous other researchers. The "religiosity in 5-D" scales devised by Faulkner and DeJong (1966) to operationalize the Glock-Stark typology were completed by 873 students in 1967 and 656 students in 1970 at a small, private liberal-arts university in Florida. Each of the 5-D scales more than adequately met the minimum criteria of Guttman scaling in both data sets. The results of a factor analysis (varimax and oblique rotation) of the 23 items in both data sets indicated the predominance of the Ideological commitment factor which accounted for 78 and 83 percent of the common variance respectively. A second-order factor analysis confirmed the existence of one general factor. Our conclusion is that religiosity is not multidimensional. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

If religion is faith concerning man's fate, how can this faith find expression today? This is a historical question: for all that will follow about shedding received notions and holding tradition in abeyance, this tradition, this received notion of the relevance of history, of man's historicity, cannot be done without in assessing surrender and hence its relevance for religion. There are some expectations, in particular two, that the title of this paper may raise but that are false; they should be dissipated at once. One, there will be no discussion of the social aspects of religion. Nor will there be any comparison between the analysis of surrender and innumerable extant comments on related phenomena, such as religious or mystical experiences. In this late historical phase, when there even is a sense in which we might be past history, or might soon be past history, religion may well appear as the mood embraced in an effort to come to terms with two unanswerable questions-it is the phase in our history in which one knows that these questions are unanswerable.

In this article, the author describes how Leo Pfeffer, the author of the paper entitled, "Issues That Divide," has contributed among other things a unique, highly useful, and systematic cataloguing of the principal issues around which Catholic-non-Catholic tensions and conflicts have developed and exist in America today. This brief postscript to his paper is intended to highlight some of the sociological and social psychological implications of what he has to say on this subject. As it is implied, the essential nature of Catholic-non-Catholic conflict makes it unlikely that such conflict will disappear in the natural course of events in the foreseeable future. Its control requires a more adequate understanding of its process than the social sciences can supply at present.

Research on intrinsic and extrinsic religion has been troubled by conceptual diffuseness and questionable scale validity. Hunt and King have proposed greater specificity in conceptualization and measurement in future work. This paper attempts to specify and measure a single crucial dimension identified by Hunt and King, namely ultimate versus instrumental religious motivation. Two validation studies were done utilizing persons nominated by ministers as having either ultimate (extrinsic) or instrumental (extrinsic) religious motivation. A new 10-item intrinsic Religious Motivation Scale is proposed, and measurement problems are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper attempts to develop a testable theory of secularization. The first requirement of this theory is to specify the limitations of structural-functional analysis. One of these limitations is its adherence to questionable norms for the measurement of religion. In moving beyond structural-functional analysis of secularization as a process, the choice is made to define the secular in terms of Parsons's theory of action. This theory suggests the possibility of a secular, as well as a religious normative orientation. These two normative orientations contain such dimensions as scope, intensity, and a posture toward social change. The theoretical development of this paper is related to major analyses of American society and calls into question some of the assumptions underling the theory of action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper offers a typology of organized religion that grows out of the conceptions of the Ultimate espoused by Christian religious bodies and relates to these conceptions the patterns of social organization of these bodies. The attempt is to discover a typology that adequately accommodates the theological and confessional character of religious bodies, on one hand, and their social structures and behavioral patterns, on the other. The paper offers three major types: Familial, Democratic, and Dominical. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The full time religious professional in a religious collectivity occupies a strategic position in the social system in which he is professionally involved. The multifarious tasks in which he engages are to be seen as due, in part, to the diffuseness of his responsibilities, a diffuseness which is characteristic of leadership roles in any social system. The coordinating and harmonizing facets of any leadership role demand this kind of generalized or diffuse role definition. While this diffuseness is characteristic of any leadership role in any social system, goals or objectives of the social system which sustains the full time professional religious leader are themselves more diffuse and less amenable to rational evaluation than are the goals of most organizations in this society. In its own understanding, the church exists to cure souls, to save souls, and/or to witness to God's saving act in Jesus as the Christ; hence, as conceived internally, its ultimate goal transcends moral, cognitive and emotive goals or objectives, although dimensions of each goal are involved in the objectives of the social system that constitutes the church and in the theological understanding that informs these goals.

The paper explains why so many people exercising freedom of choice and living in a world of privatized religion, elect to make use of religious rites of passage, in the form of religious rituals associated with birth, marriage and death, while at the same time rejecting other social forms of religious action. The phenomenon is a complex one and therefore any simple causal explanation will probably be inadequate. Moreover, the undergirding of rites has changed with the course of time, no longer are they upheld by legal or quasi-legal sanctions. Recognition has to be given to the social setting of rites of passage. A crucial mark of differentiation between rites of passage and other rituals is that such rites directly involve, or are intended to involve, family and kin groups, extending even to the local community, that is, participants stand in a socially structured situation. Rites have some religious significance for participants. To actors, occasions related to rites of passage, the birth of a child, marriage and death, are in themselves times of personal importance, although not necessarily of crisis proportions.

Farm family fertility in five areas selected on the basis of nationality and religion has shown a differential decline in the period from 1875 to 1940. In this paper no effort was made to explain the over-all decline in farm family fertility. German Lutherans showed the greatest decline, namely 65 per cent, followed by the Norwegian's 58 per cent and the German Catholic's 40 per cent. Nationality coupled with religion are obviously factors explaining some of this differential decline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the hypothesis that members of the urban working class are significantly less involved (associationally) in the church than are members of other occupational strata. Using data from a national sample of adult, male. Catholic heads of households in Italy, a statistically significant but very weak positive relationship was discovered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies ways in which different Protestant churches serving Mexican Americans may articulate with the dominant society and facilitate the assimilation of their members. The data reflect the perceptions of a purposive sample of Protestant ministers of Mexican-American congregations in El Paso. Three types of ministers are constructed, and the assimilative role of each is discussed. The general conclusions are that church-sect and Protestant ethic theoretical formulations may be profitably applied to the analysis of the Mexican Americans; the most sect-like groups may socialize members into a latently assimilative ethic of personal reform, while the more church-like groups are manifestly assimilating members into an ethic of social adjustment to a complex society. In addition, there is evidence of the assimilation of the churches themselves as they move into middle class society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper questions the assumption that religion, or its functional alternatives, inevitably provides the basis for the cultural integration of all societies. In modern societies the process of differentiation has reached the point at which a normative order based on religious beliefs and values is no longer possible. This development, however, coincides with increases in productive capacity which tend to make less difficult the tasks of motivating enough individuals to work and of providing legitimacy for the social order. As a religious basis to the normative order becomes less necessary, religion will continue to have functions for certain strata and for private individuals, but these functions will be more likely to be expressive than utilitarian. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores some of the origins of the southern Black's conversion to Catholicism and discusses the significance that this change of church affiliation may have for the traditional Negro Church. The change is viewed as emerging from the breakdown of the Negro Church's importance as an over-arching, multifunctional institution serving the social, political and economic needs, as well as the religious needs, of the Black communities. Because of the centrality of the Negro Church to Negro life in the South, the change of Blacks from their traditional forms of religious expression is seen as a special case of the general phenomenon of church-change. Change from communal forms of religious expression to church affiliations premised on individual initiative and responsibility emerges as a dominant pattern in this instance of church-change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The need for a refined concept of cult emerged as the result of an attempt to analyze the Spiritualist movement in terms of the church-sect typology. Previous definitions of cult also appear inadequate when applied to the analysis of Spiritualism. This paper argues the need for a refined concept of cult, and proposes a definition of cult in terms of one basic criterion -- that cults are religious movements which make a fundamental break with the religious tradition of the culture -- and two subordinate criteria -- that cults are composed of individuals who have had or seek mystical, psychic, or ecstatic experiences, and that they are concerned with the problems of individuals. It also proposes a typology of cults, and an explanation of the origin and development of cults in terms of a continuum from cult to new religion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Russian Marxism has been called a religion, or compatible with religion, by many laymen as well as theologians. This paper attempts to find acceptable definitions of religion and of Russian Marxism, and goes on to show that, in terms of these, Russian Marxism, on the one hand can be called a religion and, on the other, is totally opposed to religion in all acceptable forms. It finds further that Russian Marxism is, in fact, an inversion of Christianity and, more specifically, of Roman Catholicism. It concludes that because of the diametrically opposed views of Christianity and Russian Marxism, a Christian-Russian Marxist dialogue is Impossible, if each side is to retain its essential nature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper, working from a twofold typology of religious and ecclesiastical reform, proposes a thesis which holds that religious reform proceeds at its own pace and constitutes the change to which the Church ultimately must adapt if it is to survive as a structure. Changes in norms, values, life goals, and core ritual constitute religious reform. Some of the norms undergoing change concern contraception, obligatory Mass attendance and unquestioning priestly obedience. The once high value placed on the priesthood shows evidence of diminution, while the Mass, the core ritual of Catholicism and traditionally its own raison d'ˆtre, shows evidence of becoming a function of community or fellowship. These changes generate conflict with ecclesiastical authority which seeks orderly growth, internal discipline, and the avoidance of conflict. Assuming the beneficial or integrative function of social conflict, a new, humane, and religious synthesis of values and goals may be expected to emerge (provided the religious reformers do not tire of conflict). On the new synthesis, the thesis holds, will rest the new forms of religious life, encompassing both Protestant and Catholic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a response of the author on comments made by sociologists N.J. Demerath and A.W. Eister on the church-sect dimension. I am provoked much more to agreement than to debate. There are, nonetheless, points which call for clarification and further conceptualization. We will begin with Eister's sweeping statements since his critique and my own are more complementary than contradictory. It is wrong, however, to infer that I am attempting to salvage the church-sect typology, to criticize only a part of it and to replace that part with an improved part, so that the basic edifice of church-sect will be retained. I must assert that the basic intention of my paper was to show how and why the church-sect dimension was faulty and to show this empirically. In order to offer an adequate critique of any theoretical tool, it has to be taken apart piece by piece, if nearly all the pieces are faulty as I would assert is true of church-sect then we are left with an unusable tool, one which must be either entirely remade, or discarded altogether. Eister suggests that this is too trivial and partial, that the tool ought to be smashed without reference to its component parts.

In both empirical research and interpretation today there is a total lack of agreement as to what secularization is and how to measure it. The present paper tries to bring the concept of secularization into focus by considering 1) the history of the term, 2) six types of usage today and their application in selected examples of research, 3) a critique of these forms of secularization concept as analytical tools, and 4) a critique of the secular-religious polarity. It is concluded that the term secularization, because of its polemical past, its extremely varied definitions, and its frequent use as a Blanket term to cover several disparate processes, should either be abandoned or be explicitly recognized as a comprehensive term covering three complementary but distinct processes, desacralization, differentiation and transposition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study of religious experience provides an example of those strange discontinuities which seem to beset the social sciences. The present paper Is intended as a beginning of this conceptual task. There is an attempt to develop some basic sub-types and ordering dimensions for organizing the variety of experiences to which men attach religious definitions. The conceptual scheme has been informed by data from a sample of Protestant and Roman Catholic church members residing in the San Francisco Bay Area, California. These data include both quantifiable and qualitative information on the religious experiences of respondents. Where appropriate, these data will be introduced both to indicate the relative frequency of different forms of religious experience and to illustrate how people perceive such experiences. Following many previous writers, it has been suggested that the essential element characterizing religious experience, and distinguishing it from all other human experience, is some sense of contact with a supernatural agency.

Empirical research in the sociology of religion has varied widely in terms of units of analysis. Three general foci have tended to underlie most of the empirical work done in this field: the individual (e.g. the social psychology of religion) religion as a social movement (e.g. the sect-church typology) and individual churches of a deviant or unusual nature. With certain exceptions there has been relatively little attention paid to the more "normal" type of urban congregation. This is unfortunate because it is in these local congregations that the majority of church-goers can be found, and empirical research which ignores this aspect of religious organization is incomplete and somewhat truncated. This paper seeks to remedy the deficiency in this area of research by presenting an analysis of urban congregations in one city based upon research carried out on a sample of 37 local congregations representing two denominations. One of the more difficult research questions in this area concerns the origin of the transition phase. Available evidence suggests that while general value consensus seems to evolve spontaneously, it remains latent unless concrete suggestions are initiated by, or receive support from individuals who are on a high level of the power structure of the local church.

This paper attempts to clarify the concept of rationality in Max Weber's sociology of religion. Three new terms: rationalism, rationalization, and rationality, are used to distinguish the different meanings Weber gives to rationality. Efficient orientation of means to ends (rationalism) is distinguished from the systematizations (rationalization). Rationality, finally, is the control of action by ideas. Rational social action is produced only by powerful irrational motives, and it holds a distinct place in Weber's sociology of ideas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article tests the distinction drawn between highly organized and less highly organized philosophicoreligious sentiments. The genesis of philosophicoreligious sentiments for all of the subjects was a matter of gradual awakening. This awakening had its onset during early childhood years. The first crucial contacts with religion occurred when need-satisfactions or need-frustrations were effected. The data suggest further that it was not the satisfaction or frustration of any need whatsoever that was important, but rather the satisfaction or frustration of strong needs which at the time the individual accepted as belonging to his self. As a consequence of repeated experience with religion during childhood, adolescence, and adulthood, experiences at home, at Sunday school, at church, at college and so on, experiences involving new need-satisfactions or frustrations as well as the need-satisfactions or frustrations originally effected by religion, the philosophicoreligious sentiments of all of the subjects have undergone a gradual development. That this development has been a matter of increased organization, resulting from dual processes of differentiation and integration, is suggested by the fact that, for a majority of the subjects, the childhood philosophicoreligious sentiment was simple a matter of belief in a personal God.

This article focuses on public opinion and information concerning mental health. In order to study certain opinions related to mental illness, an interview questionnaire was constructed which contained nine basic questions pertaining to the problem. These questions were designed to explore the causative factors which the public associates with mental disease, and to sample opinions and attitudes concerning mental illness. In addition, several questions were asked in order to determine the sex, race, age, educational level, religious affiliation, country of birth and occupational level of the respondent. The final draft of the questionnaire was established after pre-testing on preliminary forms. None of the data collected before the final draft is included in this report. This paper reports the findings obtained from six of the nine questions.

The article reports on nationalism in United States. There are scores of new States in Asia and Africa that are trying to set up free societies. It is a "new birth of freedom" on a grand scale. It is in fact freedom's greatest test, for it involves the older free regimes of Europe and the United States. If truth counts over charity, then one must point out that the new States will fail, if not all, then all but a few. Some are already succumbing to the initial perils of liberty that the last paper of the Federalist warned Americans against: "anarchy, civil war, a perpetual alienation of the States from each other, and perhaps the military despotism of a victorious demagogue." The real wonder is in believing that national unity could ever arise in freedom among the many units that nowadays arrogate to themselves the name of nation. They are nations only to the map maker. Many are areas marked off only for colonial administrative convenience; some have dozens, even hundreds, of languages, several antagonistic religions; a still uncounted welter of tribes living in mutual ignorance or traditional war; and above all there stands the great gulf between the village primitive and the urban modern.

The article presents information on the teaching of dogmatic religion in a democratic society. People become dogmatic to exercise power over others; or to quell dissent and promote unity; to vent their feelings; and to establish confidence in themselves and others especially with regard to aims, values, and courses to be taken. The term is used in several senses: in the primary sense of affirming undemonstrated and even indemonstrable propositions; or again, in a second sense of claiming a certainty of revelation that makes human criticism irrelevant and impertinent; and again, in a third sense of claiming to represent preeminently a supreme value, which justifies a person or group in bidding for a controlling or even exclusive authority. The argument presented in this paper is that dogmatism in the second and third sense is sufficiently dangerous and inimical to democratic society so that such societies should endeavor to reduce it just as far as they can. It is also argued that dogmatism in these two senses is a mistaken service to religion and to God. On the other hand, to try to remove dogmatism from religion in the first sense of eliminating the affirmation of undemonstrated and indemonstrable propositions seems to imply an extreme scientific Puritanism.

The article presents introduction to the book "The Religious Situation: 1968," edited by Donald R. Cutler. The book provides important perspectives in the contemporary understanding of religion. Sociologist Huston Smith usefully explores some of the points at which the sacred is apprehended in the world and provides some theoretical insight as to why a sense of the sacred persists and may even is growing. Sociologist Joseph Campbell expounds the idea that the Western world for the last thousand years or so has been developing a world view that nurtures genuine individuation, overcoming the sheer identity between god and man posited in the Orient or the subjection of man to the tyranny of an objectified God in Middle Eastern religion. Together these two papers raise some of the more controversial issues that arise in connection with the poorly defined issue of secularization. They point the way for much needed future work. A second group of papers address themselves to the role of ritual in human life.

The article presents a comment on a previous article Pluralism, Religion, and Secularism, by J. Milton Yinger that appeared in the April 1967 issue of the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. Problems of concept formation, specification, and operationalization are among the most complex that social scientists must face. Probably because of the complexity, however, such problems tend not to be given the systematic attention they deserve. Consequently, it is refreshing indeed to find someone making the attempt, particularly with regard to such inchoate though significant concepts as pluralism, religion, and secularism. In his definitions of pluralism, religion and secularism, Yinger is concerned, the author believes, to avoid being culture bound. His definitions are meant to be universally applicable. This would call, it would seem, for methods of measurement, which are also universally applicable. Yinger makes what the author considers to be a very important distinction between conceptualization as observation and conceptualization as evaluation. Operating from Yinger's assumptions, his effort to derive a more abstract definition of conceptualization is probably valid.

The article presents news related to religion. The Book "Mobility and Religious Commitment," is written by G.K. Nelson and R.A. Clew. The Book "Religion and Modern Life: Beliefs and Practices of Church Members," is written by Dean Knudsen and Pamela Rich. Rabbi Arthur Gilbert, a pioneer in the ecumenical movement, has resigned as assistant to the president of the Jewish Reconstructionist Foundation to accept a full-time appointment as an associate professor of religious studies at Marymount Manhattan College in New York. In his teaching, he will bridge the areas of religion, sociology, psychology and urban studies. Papers are invited for the International Congress of Religious Studies meeting in Los Angeles, California, to be held from August 30 to September 4, 1972.

This article presents information related to religious institutions, meetings and communications. The Religious Education Association has published a research supplement to its journal "Religious Education," titled "Review of Recent Research Bearing on Religious and Character Formation." This supplement, dated July-August, 1962, can be secured from The Religious Education Association, 545 West 111th Street, New York 25, at a cost of $3. It is edited by Stuart W. Cook and contains ten essays, each a significant survey and analysis of recent research, with extensive references to other work being done. The annual meeting of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion is to be held October 26-27, at the Inter-church Center, Riverside Drive, New York. Attention has been called to a study by Charles H. Foster, "A Question on Religion," published as paper numbered sixty-six in The Inter-University case Program, University of Alabama Press. This study is addressed to the issue of whether a question concerning religious affiliation should be included in the U.S. Census.

The article focuses on news related to member of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion. Katherine T. Hargrove recently became an official member of the International Consultative Committee of Organisations for Christian-Jewish Co-operation. Phillip Larson is continuing his column, Amicus in Clergy Journal, formerly Church Management. John O. Meany presented a paper on Death Psychology and the Experience of Hesychast Prayer at Oxford University, England. Recent publication by members include Salvation and Its Vicissitudes: Clinical Psychology and Political Values by Benjamin Beit-Hallahmi, Readings in Psychology and Religion by L.B. Brown and others. The session on Religion and Politics: Comparative Studies scheduled for the World Congress of Sociology in Toronto in August, 1974, will be chaired by Professor Thomas C. Bruneau of the Department of Political Science. Intensive Summer Training Program in Psychosynthesis to be held from June 24, 1974 in New Hampshire. A training program for persons working in the helping professions.

Presents a correction to the title of author John Meany's paper that was incorrectly listed in the "News Notes" section of the June issue of the "Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion."

The article focuses on sociologist Peter L. Berger's definition of religion. In his stimulating article in the June 1974 issue of Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Berger presents an argument for reconsidering the kind of definition employed in the scientific study of religion. The major thread of his argument runs as follows. Concepts and definitions are tools fitted to the purposes of the investigator, like substantive or functional definitions of religion. Some use functional definitions for ideological purposes, that is to avoid specifically religious experience or to deny the transcendent. The scientific study of religion needs a reinvigorated substantive definition of religion from the phenomenological approaches of analysis of the numinous as religious experience and of model of multiple realities. The author agrees with Berger's approach while disagreeing with the impact of the total argument. The author holds that there are issues in the formation of concepts and definitions which are logically prior to the purposes of investigators.

This study investigated the relationship between religious persuasion and fear of death in physically healthy persons and terminally ill patients. No differences in the intensity of fear of death were Fear of Death found between believers and unbelievers. Personal nearness to death also did not reveal any meaningful differences between believers and unbelievers. What did emerge was a pattern generally characteristic of all the populations studied, highpointing an ambivalent acceptance-avoidance approach toward fear of death. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the author's reply to critics' comments regarding a previous issue of The Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. One of the critic observes that the author's religious vision is "reassuring." There is nothing that makes the author happier than to reassure a Swiss Lutheran, but the author do not find his visions reassuring at all. The author merely suggested that it is very likely that human kind is going to go on asking fundamental religious questions. It does not follow that any substantial proportion of the population will necessarily continue to give Christian answers, much less frequent Christian churches. Of course, the validity of the Christian symbol system cannot be demonstrated by public opinion polls; and Christian hopefulness, if it is worth the name, does not rely on sociological analysis. As for another critic's comments that the thesis of Unsecular Man lacked empirical validation and the author knows that he completed a project under the direction of his colleague William McCready was designed precisely to test the "theories" of Unsecular Man.

The article presents a research on farm and nonfarm families differences in religious beliefs and practices. Generally, it is believed that farm families hold more traditional religious beliefs and are more active in church and home religious activities than nonfarm families. Social changes have been occurring in rural American society, which may invalidate these propositions. Yet, since religious beliefs and practices are rooted in value systems, which are not subject to major changes in a short time span, it is probable that the traditionally assumed farm-nonfarm differences in religious beliefs and practices still exist. No current research is available, however, to test these hypotheses. Some limited data are offered to test the hypothesis that Protestant farm parents and farm-reared college students adhere to more conservative religious beliefs and engage more actively in religious practices than nonfarm parents and their college students. Data were obtained from 38 farm girls and 30 farm boys and from 73 nonfarm girls and 24 nonfarm boys who were students at Iowa State University.

The author comments on the speech by Father John Meyendorff, chairman of the World Council of Churches' Faith and Order Commission (FOC), which was presented at the FOC's meeting in August 1971 in Louvain, Belgium. The author admired the theological depth and richness of Meyendorff's presentation. He also supported Meyendorff's emphasis on the eucharistic center of unity.

The article presents news related to the study of religion that appeared in the 1972 issue of the "Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion." The 12th International Conference for the Sociology of Religion will be held at Scheveningen, Holland, from August 26 to 30, 1973. Title of the Congress Conference will be "Metamorphose contemporaine des phenomenes religieux." The Philosophy Department at Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton, Florida, is considering adding a staff member who would teach comparative religion. He or she should be trained in the history of religion and comparative religion but not in theology. A nondenominational approach would be preferred. The Institute for Eeumenical and Cultural Research at Collegeville, Minnesota, is a residential research center. It offers to scholars the opportunity to pursue a research project for an academic year, a semester, or for a summer. The Fellows of the Institute comprise a community of scholars engaged in research, in dialogue and prayer.

It is proposed that previous studies of the relationship between orthodoxy and social activism have yielded inconsistent findings because a critical mediating variable, salience or perceived importance of religion, usually has been neglected. Findings from a survey of 1,300 students at Washington State University support the hypothesised role of salience as a mediating variable. Relationship between orthodoxy and church activism emerges only for the high salience subsamples. The apparent utility of the orthodoxy-salience-activism model for bringing coherence to previously inconsistent findings seems to argue for more widespread use of salience as a control variable in studies of the concomitants and consequences of religiosity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The way in which a concept is defined strongly influences its use in research. There ate times when drastic redefinition can open up new questions and powerfully affect our approaches to old questions. Definition of interfaith marriage on the basis of the single criterion of church membership or identification, it is argued, has prevented us from studying the causes and consequences of intermarriage effectively. A multi-variable definition is proposed and its possible effects on research are illustrated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents abstracts related to marriage and family research. They include "Main Features of the Ancient Roman Family," by Panos D. Bardis, "Family Structure and Child-Rearing Patterns: The Effect of Family Size and Sex Composition," by Glen H. Elder and "Religious Observance and Family Formation in Israel: Some Intergenerational Changes," by Judah Matras.

In his much discussed and influential book "Protestant, Catholic, Jew," author Will Herberg attempted to relate certain, mostly quantitative, changes in religious practices in the U.S. to the different problems of identity faced by three generations of Americans, the immigrant first generation from about 1880 to the First World War, the second generation in the inter-war years and the third generation in the post war period. In particular, Herberg was concerned to account for the post-war return to religion which, he argued, was significantly correlated with the emergence of the third generation. Herberg's three-generations thesis was applied to all three religious communities but was given special application to religious changes in the Jewish community. Since Herberg's book was published in 1955, a number of surveys of local Jewish communities have been made and a reappraisal of the three-generations thesis is now possible. The paper examines Herberg's thesis to the following questions. Firstly, what is the evidence for significant quantitative shifts in Jewish religious affiliation, identity and observances? Secondly, is it accurate to refer to a return to religion in the post-war period? And, finally, given that one does find certain changes in religious dimensions, can they be explained by Herberg's generations thesis?

The article presents a study of creditor's practices in the financing of religious institutions. The paper evaluates religious organizations' debt from the point of views of lenders who have found or may find such investments suitable for their needs. The article seeks to answer whether legal organizations and the management of religious institutions influence their credit standings. Do these institutions trade on equity and what standards do lenders use in developing loans for religious organizations?

The article presents the authors reply to sociologist Andrew M. Greeley's ad hominem and his comments about the author in the June 1974 issue of Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. The author feels that he hardly deserves anathematization for not examining Greeley's unpublished works. Greeley seems to have confused the two books American Priests and Priests in the United States. Greeley is advertised as the author of 40 books. In contrast to these figures the bibliography with which Greeley supplied the symposiasts as a working tool contains only 15 book titles. Greeley's most interesting attempted defense on this basis is with respect to the author's criticism of Religion and Career on the basis that generalizability of the findings to the total population may be risky. But these things are insignificant when one considers the true import of Greeley's defense on the ground that he has covered the author's objections in his unpublished work.

This article presents information on the publication details of the periodical "The International Migration Digest." From its inception as a little paper concerned with the problems of one group of people, it has ever broadened its scope to embrace the needs of all migrant peoples everywhere, of all nations, all races, religions or of no religion. In this still expanding program, the Digest is to become the "International Migration Review," and is to be issued quarterly. It is increasing its committee of valuable consultants and includes some of the most widely experienced men in the field of sociological studies of migrant problems. The variety of material used, the sources of that material all make the Digest the most central and all-inclusive locus from which to explore all avenues of study and findings in the field. Its character is universal. Today, when the surge of the uprooted, of the dispossessed, the refugees, is greater than ever and more simultaneously worldwide, there is pressing need for the fruits of the most disciplined study of the needs and conditions of migrant people. The periodical is the organ of the Center for Migration Studies, itself an integral part of the Center in Rome. The Digest is severely disciplined in its published material. It demands a high standard of scholarship, of technical exactness in its papers.

This article presents a list of books on religion that appeared in the October 1963 issue of the periodical "Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion." The list mentions "Religious Belief and Philosophical Thought: Readings in the Philosophy of Religion," edited by William P. Aston, "The Hymns of Zarathustra," by Jacques Duchesne-Guillemin and translated by M. Heming, "Beyond the Chains of Illusion: My Encounter With Marx and Freud," by Erich Fromm, "Aztec Thought and Culture," by Miguel Leon-Portilla. The list also include "The True Face of the Kirk: An Examination of the Ethos and Tradition of the Church of Scotland," by Stuart Louden, "Salvation History: A Biblical Interpretation by Eric C. Rust, "The Church As the Body of the Christ," by Krister E. Skydesgaard et al, "World Religions and World Community," by Robert L. Slater, "Religion and Contemporary Society," edited by Harold Stamer, "The New Religions of Japan," by Harry Thomsen and "The Secular Meaning of the Gospel," by Paul M. Van Buren.

Studies of homogamous preferences in mate selection have tended to assume that a person in a particular social position i.e., race, religion, social class, education, age, is under pressure to choose a mate, or to express preference for one, occupying the same position. This paper will consider the relative importance of religious homogamy versus educational homogamy as a function of both social positions and personal values. Two hypotheses will be examined; the first placing emphasis on traditional position variables, while the second concerns the importance of individual values. The relative importance which individuals place on religious versus educational homogamy varies between positions, as indicated by categories of relevant sociological variables. A correlation ratio for the joint effect of sex, religious preference, and school attended equals .18, or no higher than that for strength or religious feeling alone. When the dichotomized strength of religious feeling is added to the other three variables, the correlation ratio reaches .32, or nearly double the previous figure.

The sources cited within this issue are presented including "Unity on the Ground," edited by Colin Buchanan, "Case Studies in Unity," by R. M. C. Jeffery, and "The Asian Meaning of Modernization," edited by Sarah K. Chatterji.

The article looks at social and anthropological perspectives of conversion. It mentions the renewed interest of sociologists Charles Y. Glock and Rodney Stark on religion who suggested five general American theological denominations including liberals such as Methodists, moderates such as Presbyterians and conservatives such as American Lutherans. It also notes sociologists and anthropologists who say that conversion can be at the cultural or social level as well as the individual level.

This article presents information on various programs related to religion, to be held in the U.S. The annual fall meetings of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion will be held on October 25-26, 1963 at Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts. The general two-fold theme of the program is New Knowledge on the Mystical and the Moral Dimensions of Religion. There will be a special session on knowledge gained and sought by the use of psychedelic drugs and other experimental stimuli. At the 16th meeting of the Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis at the New York Academy of Medicine, Harold Kelman, dean of the American Institute for Psychoanalysis, will present a paper on Techniques in Dream Interpretation. Examples of dreams as indicators of character structure, of conflict, of the emerging self, of aspects of the analytic relationship will be presented. The manner in which patients can be helped toward specific objectives in the understanding of dreams will come under consideration.

Reviews the article 'Is God Supernatural?,' by Michael Fordham, published in the journal 'Theology.'