Jewish Identity and the High Holidays
My dual roles as a Jewish sociologist and a sociologist of American Jewry come to the forefront during the Jewish High Holidays. Each year, as I take part in the holidays, I …
Populations and Generational Change
Movies, Money and Morality
This post originally appeared on Trans-Missions, the USC Knight Chair in Media and Religion site. When I was a kid the Movieguide newsletter would arrive and, if I was quick enough, I …
Religion in the News: What Does it All Mean?
This post originally appeared on Patheos’ Black, White and Gray blog. Several news stories about religion in the U.S. have caught my attention over the last couple of weeks, and they each …
Richard Flory talks about churchgoing on podcast
Why go to church when a recent Barna Group survey found that most churchgoers barely remember any insight from the previous week’s service? CRCC Director of Research Richard Flory talked about that …
Demographic Change: Casualties or Opportunities?
This post originally appeared on Patheos’ Black, White and Gray blog. At the USC Center for Religion and Civic Culture, we’ve been talking a lot lately about how different communities in the …
Prof. Flory Goes to Chapel
I attended chapel today at Biola University (where I once worked), which increased the number of times I have attended a Biola chapel from zero to one. But, if chapels had been …
“Beach Children” Find Salvation through Pentecostal Preachers
In cities and towns around the world, countless numbers of people flock to beaches in search of sun, sea and sand. Yet a different picture emerges in Lagos, Nigeria, the second-largest city …
Black History Month: Looking Foward, Looking Back
This post originally appeared on Trans-Missions, the USC Knight Chair in Media and Religion site. At the beginning of Black History month we were greeted with tragic news: Don Cornelius, the founder …
Who’s Leading the Evangelical (Super) Pack?
This post originally appeared on Trans-Missions, the USC Knight Chair in Media and Religion site. In an effort to rally evangelical support for one Republican candidate in the upcoming South Carolina primary — …
Reading an Image in the Other Context: A Visual Essay
If a photo is worth a thousand words, what would those words say? Paul Jenkins explores questions about representation, cultural context, and historical meaning in a photograph by Basel Mission photographer Rudolf …