Fear, Faith and Indifference: Constructing Religious Identity in the Next Generation
October 10-11, 2004
University of Southern California
Conference Schedule
Conference Brochure (PDF)
Conference Speakers
Conference Committee
Over the past several decades, religious leaders, cultural critics and sociologists have written about the ever-increasing disengagement from institutions and practices that have been considered the norm over the past few centuries. This trend has been noted especially among younger people in the Northern Atlantic parts of the world and has often been understood as the result of the secularization of society and the pluralism of religions. At the very same time, a growing number of people are converting and moving to more orthodox religious practices. Not only is this widespread in the Northern Atlantic areas, it appears as a powerful movement also in the Middle East, Central and South Asia, and in Africa. Many of the religious people left in between these two movements feel diminished. All tend to worry about the next generation. Analyses of these diverse movements vary from the "death of traditional religion" to "the birth of a new authenticity." One conclusion appears to be clear: Western culture has affeced the world dramatically in the last fifty years, and its impact has been seismic. What does all this mean for the next generation?
This international conference will explore these multivalent developments. Scholars will explore historical, philosophical and theological dimensions of these trends and present sociological research that documents the current religious topography. Researchers will examine the diversity as well as institutional vitality of religion, and will pay special attention to generational differences and the transmission of religious tradition and practice. Various models that transmit the vitality of religion will be presented and critiqued. In particular, the conference will highlight models that retain religious traditions in non-reductive ways while at the same time bridging in an open and dialogical way the ever-increasing religious pluralism of the contemporary world.
This conference is made possible through a partnership between: