1. Early sociologists believed that:
a)
b)
c)
d)
Faith and Religion would triumph over reason and science
Science and reason would become indistinguishable from faith and religion
Reason and science would triumph over faith and religion
Science would become less significant over time
2. Peter Berger defines religion as:
a)
b)
c)
d)
An institutionalised form of control
‘The opium of the masses’
The audacious attempt to conceive of the universe as being humanly significant
A response to ‘mythical fear’
3. Legal codes are a good example of:
a)
b)
c)
d)
Religious beliefs informing social structures
The success of secularisation
Scientific reason informing social structures
The weakened authority of the church
4. For Marx, religion was:
a)
b)
c)
d)
Important in creating social cohesion
A form of legitimate authority
Increasingly a private rather than public affair
The result of social alienation
5. Durkheim chose to study the Australian aborigines because:
a)
b)
c)
d)
No one had done it before
He believed they represented the most basic, elementary forms of religion within a culture
They had developed in isolation with little contact from the modern world
Religion played a central organising role in their culture
6. According to Durkheim, religion is centred in beliefs and practices that are related to:
a)
b)
c)
d)
Sacred as opposed to profane things
A personal connection with God
Material as opposed to immaterial things
The private and the public
7. In The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism Weber argues that Calvinism:
a)
b)
c)
d)
was far superior to Catholicism
was fundamentally opposed to capitalism
is a projection reflecting capitalistic alienation
offered an ideological base for capitalistic development
8. Weber saw the increasing dominance of rationality and scientific thinking as:
a)
b)
c)
d)
the end of the ‘theological stage’ of human development
a product of feudalism
creating greater individual freedom
creating a ‘disenchanted’ world
9. The ‘secularisation’ thesis makes the claim that:
a)
b)
c)
d)
humans will ‘outgrow’ belief in the supernatural
we must proceed bureaucratically
there will be a revival of religious fundamentalism
we are witnessing the end of ideology
10. Rodney Stark claims that religious decline is:
a)
b)
c)
d)
a myth
an aspect of modernity
inevitable
only evident in eastern Europe
11. Steve Bruce argues that New Age spiritualities are seen as:
a)
b)
c)
d)
exploiting their followers
evidence of the declining significance of religion
a matter of choice rather than authority
developing from new media
12. The claim that ‘god is dead’, is meant by Friedrich Nietzsche to be:
a)
b)
c)
d)
an ontological argument
a social fact
a subjective position
an absurdity
13. Jonathan Sacks argues that in the modern world:
a)
b)
c)
d)
religion has lost all authority
the limitations of science are obvious
religion is responsible for many conflicts
religion is increasingly a private rather than public affair
14. Stephen Seidman sees the transformation of European society in the rise of modernity as:
a)
b)
c)
d)
bringing forth problems of meaning
creating vast material wealth
helping to end the despotism of the church
reducing human interactions to a logic of market exchange
15. Which of the following are examples of science projecting itself ‘as a secular ideological
replacement for religion?’
a) Post-modernism, Marxism and social evolutionism
b) Marxism, Comtean positivism and social evolutionism
c) Fundamentalism, post-modernism and post-structuralism
d) Marxism, post-postmodernism and post-structuralism
16. Fundamentalist religious groups speak with the ‘rarest of modern accents- ___?’
a)
b)
c)
d)
Scepticism
Naivety
Compassion
Authority
17. The Fundamentalist Project’s categories of fundamentalist groups are:
a)
b)
c)
d)
Christian, Jewish and Muslim
World Conqueror, World Transformer and World Ruler
Christian, Islamic and Environmentalist
World Conqueror, World Transformer and World Renouncer
18. Which of the following is NOT an example of a ‘World Conqueror’ movement?
a)
b)
c)
d)
Hamas
Revolutionary Shi’ism
Fundamentalist Protestantism
Haredi Jews
19. Sacks argues that many religious believers experience the modern condition as:
a)
b)
c)
d)
An assault to be resisted
Core to their beliefs
Bringing us better social values
Reinforcing religion
20. Who claims that understanding religion is necessary to form a coherent picture of reality?
a)
b)
c)
d)
Jurgen Habermas
Ninian Smart
Ross McCormack
Tracey McIntosh