This creates unity within the social group, which then generates a ‘collective conscience.’ Durkheim drew on secondary research of religious beliefs and practices in the Australian Arunta tribe of aborigines. He studied the practice of Totemism. Totemism is where something or somewhere has a particular symbolic significance for a social group. It is a sacred object venerated by the group and surrounded by ritual. For example Churingas are sacred drawings on wood or stone.
Durkheim believed that the essence of all religion could be found by studying it’s simplest form, in the simplest type of society. He studied totems, which he said was a society worshipping sacred symbols and rituals which were meant to symbolize all of society. In Durkheim’s view, sacred symbols represent society’s collective conscience or consciousness. The collective conscience is the shared norms and values of society. For Durkheim shared religious rituals reinforced the collective conscience and maintain social integration.
They have 5 key functions of religion in modern society. One of these functions is socialization. They say the main function of religion in modern society is to socialise society’s members into a value consensus by investing values with a sacred quality. These values become ‘moral codes’. For example, The Ten Commandments are ‘moral codes’ which influenced both formal and informal control.
Our diversity of religion results in people of different faiths or no faith living in one country peacefully. This is somewhat unsusual in the world and makes us a stronger country. The rest of the world looks to us with amazement that such diverse faiths can practice their religion in harmony. With this freedom we can have the luxury of great religious leaders inspiring their people and helping our country be stronger. During the American Revolution, our founding fathers were of different religions like Quakers, Methodists, Baptists and other religions.
Although many people would love to disagree, religion is a big part of most or all societies today. Whether in the western or eastern world, it is evident that religion has a large impact on the society around it, and as a result the culture of this area is also greatly impacted. As each culture is different and unique to the next, religion affects it in varying ways, and to different degrees. However it isn’t only religion that affects cultures, but cultures that affect religions also. We may not even realise it, but a lot of the laws that govern the way we live in Australia are taken from and/ or based on the Ten Commandments.
The world today is more interconnected than ever, this is known as globalisation. Religion may be related to its global context as when societies and religions come into closer contact with one another there is potential for religious conflict and for religious diversity and change. These points are argued by many. Nanda suggests that the process of globalisation is likely to cause a decline in religion and belief in the supernatural due to the western culture of other societies and other faiths and beliefs. She looked at globalisation in India, which had brought about a new middle class of scientists, I.T technicians and stock traders all beneficial to the global economy and found that there was actually an increased level of religiosity after the globalisation process.
The most likely factor this can be linked to is the tendency for celebrities to express their interest in this religion. According to the Official Scientology website the study of scientology is quite expensive and if you wish to progress to a higher level you must pay even more. The religion Scientology could be easily perceived as an act of consumerism. Technically this is more truth than opinion considering it is being sold to consumers. With the media’s attention to the fact that very powerful, prominent celebrities believe in such a controversial religion it can lead one to wonder if this is just a publicity stunt, or consumerism at it’s finest.
Christianity has flourished for the past thousand years and has taken hold in every continent in some form or fashion. In order to sell Christianity, it was important that many of the locals find some form of acceptance or way to identify with the new religion. Such a representation can be found the Celtic Cross. The Celts had many gods, but they had one deity above the rest, Morrigan. Morrigan was the sun god and had a symbol that resembled a circle.
Religion has always been a major factor in everything involving the world since the beginning of time. Though the similarities are present, no two religions are exactly alike so there are also various differences within the beliefs of the varying religious centers. Religion affects the society, the population, and the civilization of a country in countless ways. Religion is one of the most important factors of any empire, country, or civilization. Religion also provided a strong role in the governments of different societies around the world.
EFFECTS OF RELIGION DUE DAY 4 Organized religion has often times been one of the most important, actually you can say it has dramatically change as well as shaped our world history as we know it. If we took a look at our past recorded history of religion, you can see how it has served many different purposes in our society. Religion has always been a power over the lower class and as well to unify the diverse populations. Christianity is a perfect example of one of the very first effects of organized religion. In Europe, during the Middle Ages, Christianity was the number one controlling influence, this was all before the Enlightenment.