(How) Do Religious Rites of Passage Matter for Individuals? Revisiting the Transformative Role of Religious Experience

• In Event: 2329 - Section on the Sociology of Religion Referred Roundtables (1 hour)
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: 2. Religion and Identity in Context

Abstract

Early scholars of religion stressed the importance of institutionalized “rites of passage” to integrate and reinvigorate groups themselves. Surprisingly little work, however, has explored the efficacy of such rites for the religious lives of individuals. Though research has examined the transformative role of semi-institutionalized rites like short-term missions trips and pilgrimages, we shift the focus to consider the potential influence of more fundamental initiation rites like baptism, first communion, and bar/bat mitzvahs. Utilizing waves 1 and 4 of the National Study of Youth and Religion and focusing on overall religiosity and disaffiliation as the outcomes, we examine whether experiencing a religious rite of passage during or before one’s teenage years predicts the religious outcomes of young adults. We find no difference in religiosity over time between persons who experienced a religious rite passage and those who did not. However, those who underwent a religious rite of passage remained significantly less likely to disaffiliate by wave 4. Testing for interactions show the influence of such initiation rites does not vary across religious traditions. Findings suggest the experience of baptism, bar/bat mitzvah, confirmation, or other rites of passage matter primarily as durable markers of social identity, binding adherents to their faith community, if only nominally.

Authors

• Samuel L. Perry, University of Oklahoma

• Kyle Clayton Longest, Furman University