Browsing by Subject "Religion"
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Item An Exploratory Analysis Of Attitudes Toward Religious Help-Seeking Among African-American Christians(2010) Hardy, Kimberly Michelle; Wells-Wilbon, Rhonda D.; Social Work; Doctor of PhilosophyThis dissertation used an exploratory, cross-sectional research design to: (1) understand African-American Christians' attitudes toward religious and professional help-seeking; (2) understand whether or not African-American Christians are seeking help from their church leaders to assist in the amelioration of serious personal and/or mental health issues in lieu of mental health professionals; and (3) understand the dynamics of the religious help-seeking relationship. Using an electronic survey, a sample of 146 self-identified African-American Christians participated in the study. The findings revealed that the sample had favorable attitudes toward professional help-seeking, which contradicts previous literature indicating resistance to seek professional care. Also, the sample held favorable attitudes toward religious help-seeking albeit slightly. Correlation analysis revealed a weak, positive correlation between the religious and professional help-seeking. The Attitude Toward Religious Help-Seeking Scale (ATRHSS) was designed for use in the study as no other instrument was available to measure the attitudes of African-Americans regarding religious help-seeking. The ATRHSS had good internal consistency with a Cronbach alpha of .720. Specifically designed to reveal the attitudes of African-American Christian members of the Black Church, a principle components factor analysis revealed the latent components of Significance of Faith and Pastoral Disapproval as factors associated with an unexpected reservation toward religious help-seeking. This is content not discussed previously in the social work literature. Additionally, the concepts of mistrust (related to the confidential nature of pastoral counseling) and skepticism (related to the pastoral counselor's professional ability to render such services) were prevalent among those surveyed. Lastly, when presented with 22 issues which could be the focus of clinical intervention and the choice of professional resource to address them (social worker, counselor, psychologist/psychiatrist, pastoral counselor), social workers were never chosen as the preferred provider. Ultimately the findings suggest two things: (1) that social work's wholesale abdication of clinical responsibility for African-Americans in favor of a perceived preference for informal, indigenous sources of support may be inaccurate and (2) that the lack of preference for social work practitioners among respondents necessitates an examination of the professional shortcomings that keep potential clients from seeking out social work services.Item Ernest Hemingway's Use Of Luck As Religious Discourse In His Major Works(2015) Gallagher, Mary Beth; Cary Nerad, Julie; English and Languages; Doctor of PhilosophyThis dissertation examines Ernest Hemingway's employment of the word and idea of luck as religious discourse in his works, Death in the Afternoon (1932), To Have and Have Not (1937), For Whom the Bell Tolls (1940), and The Old Man and the Sea (1952). Hemingway uses the language and tenets of Christianity as scaffolding to edify his religious vision of luck. In Death in the Afternoon, belief in luck is cloaked within the Catholic framework of rituals and saintly devotions. Hemingway watched the toreros pray to the Blessed Virgin for both protection and luck. Influenced by the concept of luck as a religious element in the bullfighting world, Hemingway explored the concept further in his fiction. In To Have and Have Not, For Whom the Bell Tolls, and The Old Man and the Sea, Hemingway presents and develops luck in a variety of spiritual forms such as blessings, salvation, grace, and the focus of a pilgrimage in an attempt to create a religion that better explains and defines the Modernist experience.Item Fandom as religion: a social-scientific assessment(Intellect (Firm), 2021-06) Elliott, Michael A.; Towson University. Department of Anthropology, Sociology & Criminal JusticeMy objective in this article is to outline both a conceptual and a methodological reframing of the ‘fandom as religion’ comparison from a social-scientific perspective. This comparison is familiar territory by now. It has survived the decades because there are, in fact, some striking similarities between fan devotion and religious devotion. However, there are some lingering issues that continue to hamper this field. As a result, I begin by discussing these issues in more detail and highlight how they can be problematic. Next, I discuss how fan devotion is better conceptualized as a sacred rather than a religious experience. Finally, I suggest suitable methods for gathering first-hand data from fans to test this association. On the whole, I believe this reframing will lead to a more accurate understanding of fandoms and chart a clearer path forward for scholars in this field.Item From Radicals and Raps to Clairvoyants in Cabinets: The Failed Promise of the Spiritualist Movement(2017-05-09) Rines, Emily; Center for Humanities - History; Bachelor's DegreeAlthough frequently seen as outlandish radicals, the Spiritualist movement in its first half a century bore a striking resemblance to mainstream social mores, and especially to the mass-produced death culture of mid to late nineteenth-century America. Spiritualists shaped themselves in reaction to socially accepted attitudes towards death, and in so doing expressed many of the same beliefs and feelings, rearticulated to set themselves apart. Were it completely separated from the pervading forms of Nineteenth-century death culture, Spiritualism would have had nothing to shape itself in relation to and would likely have lacked much of its power to endure. Spiritualism owes its rise and endurance, in large part, to the death culture it so loudly decried. Without an elaborate culture of death and dying, there could be no place for Spiritualists in nineteenth-century America.Item Impact of faith based institutions in the urban environment through social and economic development.(2004-09-23) Harrison, Robert L. (Skip), Jr.; Worthy, George; Master of City and Regional PlanningItem Islamic extremism and the West: Expounding the negative implications of the clash between Islamic extremists and some Western nations.(2011-05-18) Madu, Ifeanyi V.; Metaferia, Getachew; Master of ArtsItem The Latino Racial Justice Circle Guide for Faith Community Dialogues on Immigration(University of Maryland Baltimore County, 2019-07) Filomeno, Felipe; Political Science; Global StudiesThe LRJC Guide for Faith Community Dialogues on Immigration describes, step by step, the LRJC dialogue model. The LRJC hopes it will enable faith communities everywhere to use dialogue for mutual understanding and collaboration between immigrants and native citizens. The guide includes organization procedures, recommendations for dialogue facilitators, ground rules and prayer, and questions for dialogueItem "Real Gods Require Blood": The Religious Significance Of Death In James Baldwin's Go Tell It On The Mountain And If Beale Street Could Talk(2015) Lindsay, Michael Martir; Carter, Linda M.; English and Languages; Doctor of PhilosophyThis dissertation proposes that in Go Tell It on the Mountain and If Beale Street Could Talk, James Baldwin uses death as a religious experience that represents a spiritual reckoning for characters in each novel. Baldwin's interpretation of death and the ramifications concerned with the realities of death, thematically tie together in both novels to formulate a theological proclamation. Chapter two focuses on the father/son theme in the novels and reinterprets this theme using the premise of adoption, articulated by Apostle Paul in Ephesians, to describe the dynamic relationships between fathers and sons. Leonard Shengold's definition of soul murder is employed to establish the fathers as powerful and murderous. Chapter three, by exploring the symbolism of religious sacrifice, examines the figurative meaning and religious value of death for the novels' characters and proposes that the characters, whether powerful or powerless, seek death as an entryway to their true fates. Orlando Patterson's definition of social death is utilized to establish death as an everyday reality of the characters of the novels. Chapter four examines death through the idea of mortification to suggest that for blacks, death is an inherent consequence of a socio-political order that defines them as inferior before birth. Kenneth Burke's theory of conscious-laden repression is used to reexamine the Fall of Man in order to illustrate the profound implication of death on the powerless subject. This study concludes that Baldwin's use of religion, in particular death, moves beyond biblical metaphor and therefore both novels should be examined as more than fictional. Through his search for spiritual meaning encoded in biblical passages, James Baldwin's work should be considered religious text; therefore, Baldwin, though he might have objected to the distinction, should be considered a theologian.Item Religion in Bioshock(2023-05-03) Martinez, Donavyn; Geography; INST 150This paper discusses the state in which religion is described and used within the 2013 video Bioshock InfiniteItem Religion, parties, and voting behavior: A political xxplanation of religious influence(Oxford University Press, 2009) McTague, John; Layman, Geoffrey C.; Towson University. Department of Political ScienceThis article tries to provide a political explanation of religious influence. The article begins by determining how the relationship of religion to politics and voting behavior has changed during the past 4 decades. It looks at why that change has occurred, even if the new religious divisions between the electoral coalitions of the parties are most likely to take shape. This is done by focusing on the dynamic relationship between the three parts of the American party system. The last portion of the article centers on challenges, caveats, and alternatives to the authors' framework.Item Rhetoric, Religion, Wilderness, And War: Creating The Racial Other In Rowlandson's Captivity Narrative(2012) Hillson, Franklin J.; Nerad, Julie C.; English and Languages; Doctor of PhilosophyUsing a postcolonial lens as well as several other critical approaches, this study explores four areas--rhetoric, religion, wilderness, and war--in Rowlandson's influential and popular captivity text The Sovereignty and Goodness of God (1682). I examine these areas to show how the narrative fuses these categories to form a powerful Eurocentric-based whiteness at a critical historical moment when English colonization was still relatively young. Together, these elements justify domination both of the land and of the non-European Other (even to the point of extinction). I argue that these areas worked in a mutually beneficial manner--for European whites--to help codify America's view that "the only good Indian was a dead Indian." Examining this powerful quartet reveals the importance of Rowlandson's narrative in helping to define the early cultural identity of colonial Americans and, by extension, our own contemporary identity and attitudes toward the Other. As such, this study examines selected seventeenth century "come-hither" literature as well as several captivity narratives emerging from the end of that century and from the beginning of the eighteenth. This conversation then expands to include selected later works such as Cooper's The Last of the Mohicans, a "modern" captivity narrative, as well as contemporary "captivities" from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The study begins with an investigation of the rhetoric used to portray the Native American and the settler. Rowlandson's text reflects a dramatic shift in how Euro-colonists envisioned natives, which contributed to the process of othering. Chapter two examines the contest between native and Puritan religions and how Rowlandson's negative portrayal of praying Indians casts into doubt the concept of Anglo-Indian compatibility. Chapter three studies the narrative's sinister portrayal of the wilderness and how it is mapped onto the indigenous population. Chapter four moves the discussion to King Philip's War, which precipitates and backgrounds Rowlandson's captivity. War is the ultimate process of cultural and racial othering. Concomitantly, beneath this ecclesiastically-approved (white male) narrative lies a subtle multivocality. Rowlandson's narrative intriguingly provides a voice to the frustrated indigene, which is paradoxically expressed by the captive herself in her wilderness and wartime condition. Also voiced is a proto-feminist subtext in the words and deeds of the female protagonist who ironically is afforded more freedom as a captive in the wilds than as a member of colonial society. This study concludes with a look at selected captivities from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which highlight the foundational aspects of the captivity narrative tradition in our literature with its portrayal of the Other.Item What if we prayed more? Discrimination, religious and spiritual coping, and cardiovascular disease risk among African American women and men(2023-01-01) Ashe, Jason; Waldstein, Shari R; Psychology; PsychologyInterpersonal discrimination is a chronic stressor for many African American (AA) adults and is implicated in racial disparities in cardiovascular diseases (CVDs). AAs, and particularly AA women, often turn to religion and spirituality (R/S) to cope with undue mistreatment and racism, but no prior studies have examined whether religious/spiritual coping might differentially buffer the associations of discrimination with CVD risk factors among AA women and men. This study examined the interactive relations of self-reported multidimensional discrimination, religious/spiritual coping, and sex with several traditional cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk factors ? including systolic and diastolic blood pressure (SBP, DBP), glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c), body mass index (BMI), and total cholesterol (TC) ? in a sample of midlife AA women and men. Data were drawn from 753 AA adults (52.9% = women; mean age = 48.73 years; 44.4% below the federal poverty level; 61.9% religiously affiliated with most identifying as Christian/Catholic) in the Healthy Aging in Neighborhoods of Diversity across the Life Span (HANDLS) epidemiological cohort study in Baltimore, Maryland. Participants underwent comprehensive medical examinations, including clinical assessment of SBP, DBP, HbA1c, BMI, and TC; self-reported multiple dimensions of interpersonal discrimination (social status-based, lifetime burden, gender, racial, and everyday) and endorsed frequency of religious/spiritual coping use. Multivariable linear regression examined interactive relations of multidimensional interpersonal discrimination, religious/spiritual coping, and sex to CVD risk factors in models that adjusted for age, poverty status, educational attainment, health insurance status, history of clinical CVDs, and use of antihypertensive, blood glucose-lowering, and lipid-lowering medications. Further sensitivity analyses adjusted for affective (depressive symptoms), biobehavioral (substance use history), social support (marital status, instrumental and emotional social support coping use), and biomedical (BMI when not assessed as an outcome) factors. Results revealed significant three-way interactions among discrimination, religious/spiritual coping use, and sex for SBP, DBP, BMI, and TC (after removal of one outlier). Although visual plots demonstrated similarly patterned findings across these CVD risk factors, all simple regression slopes were nonsignificant. Significant main effects of religious/spiritual coping (b = 0.45, p = .031) and sex (b = 2.50, p = .003) were noted for DBP levels. More frequent religious/spiritual coping use was associated with higher DBP; and men had higher DBP than women. These relations became nonsignificant when social support variables were added to the base models in sensitivity analyses; however, these variables did not mediate the associations. These largely null findings suggest that, in this sample of AA women and men, religious/spiritual coping use may not differentially buffer the associations between multidimensional interpersonal discrimination and CVD risk factors. However, complex methodological considerations lead us to call for further investigation of this topic using improved measurements of other forms of discrimination, multidimensional assessments of religious/spiritual coping use and other forms of religiosity, and increased attention to Intersectionality-driven statistical models.