Rodney Stark
Rodney Stark
Rodney William Starkis an American sociologist of religion who was a long time professor of sociology and of comparative religion at the University of Washington. He is presently the Distinguished Professor of the Social Sciences at Baylor University, co-director of the university's Institute for Studies of Religion, and founding editor of the Interdisciplinary Journal of Research on Religion...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionTheologian
CountryUnited States of America
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High testosterone levels have been proven to make men more likely to commit crimes. The tendency in men toward risky behaviour keeps turning up even where socialization is different, and so does crime and delinquency.
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Theology necessitates an image of God as a conscious, rational, supernatural being of unlimited power and scope who cares about humans and imposes moral codes and responsibilities upon them, thereby generating serious intellectual questions such as: 'Why does God allow us to sin?' 'Does the Sixth Commandment prohibit war?'
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Regular church-goers are substantially more likely than non-attenders to read, to take newspapers and magazines, to listen to classical music, to attend symphony concerts, operas, and stage plays.
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Most churches are run by preachers who went to seminaries, who decided to be preachers when they were 18, 19, 20 years old. These preachers never met a payroll. They don't know how the world works.
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Those who belong to megachurches display as high a level of personal commitment as do those who attend small congregations.
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Every minister knows it's harder to get the guys to church than the women. We ought to be asking why this is.
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Can anyone seriously imagine a society without stable families? Maybe we should raise all the kids in state orphanages.
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American churches work very hard at reaching out to people to bring them in.
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A whole lot of Americans have never met a Mormon.
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There was only one decline in church attendance, and that was in the late 1960s when the Vatican said it was not a sin to miss Mass. They said Catholics could act like Protestants, and so they did.
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Wherever you've got a state church, you have empty churches.
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The more members of the clergy that are out there working to expand their congregations, the more people will go to church.
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Had the followers of Jesus remained an obscure Jewish sect, most of you would not have learned to read, and the rest of you would be reading from hand-copied scrolls.
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There are many critics who think the megachurches thrive on people who enjoy dramatic Sunday services with fine music but don't wish to become very 'religious' on a day-to-day basis - that the megachurch appeal is a mile wide and an inch deep.