Religious Inheritances: The Good, the Bad and the Apocryphal

[This book review was originally published here on ‘The Cardus Daily’ Blog on June 8, 2011.]

imageIn his latest book, Beyond the Gods & Back: Religion’s Demise and Rise and Why it Matters, Reginald Bibby sets out to answer these questions: “What is the situation with religion today?” and “What does it mean for Canadian life and lives?”

Building upon his earlier work, Bibby notes the steady decline in religious identification, attendance, and belief between the 1960s and mid-1990s, followed by leveling off—and in some cases, an upswing in religiosity—that suggested signs of new religious life and led some to conclude that we were seeing a renaissance of religion. It prompted a re-evaluation and even abandonment of the secularization thesis postulated by prominent social scientists. Upon closer examination of the data and trends since the mid-1990s, Bibby suggests we are seeing neither the death nor the rebirth of religion in Canada, but rather an increasing polarization between the religious and non-religious, between theists and atheists.

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