Definition of Religion - A Sociological Critique.

This paper deals with the major types of definitions of religions used in the sociology of religion and their influence on sociological research. Not all definitions are either substantive or functional: some are a combination of the two. Luckmann makes a difference between an elementary and non-specific social form or religion and a specific historical form of religion. The sociological theory of religion is only interested in specific forms of religion in society. Secularization is occurring through the development of a cultural religion--an American way of life with religious overtones. Berger's use of the term secularization as desacralization is a consequence of his definition of religion. There is no secularization in the U.S., in Yinger's opinion: if one defines religion statically--in terms of a system of beliefs and practices that emerged at a given time and were subject thereafter to no essential revision--religious change is nearly identical with secularization. Thus, the distinguishing traits of religion lie not in the entities themselves but in an attitude extended toward certain ideas, objects and acts, and this attitude is extended to them because, society attributed sacred qualities to them. A substantive definition of religion searches for the essence of religion and defines it as sacred.