Traditional church beliefs and alternative beliefs in Croatia

Marinović Jerolimov, Dinka (2006) Traditional church beliefs and alternative beliefs in Croatia. In: Religions, churches and religiosity in post-communist Europe. Zakład Wydawniczy Nomos, Krakow, pp. 253-265. ISBN 83-60490-14-7

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Abstract

Author analysed acceptance of church beliefs and different alternative beliefs among adult population in Croatia, than differences among two groups of religious respondents (« firm believer» and « religious» ) and irreligious respondents in this respect, and finaly « sociodemographic picture» of respondents concerning acceptance of these beliefs. Analysed dana are from the research Social and Religious changes in Croatian Society conducted by The Institute for Social Research in Zagreb in 2004 on the representative sample (N=2220 respondents) in Croatia. The analyses of the research results has shown that in the dimension of beliefs church beliefs are hierarchically structured and fragmented ; most widespread belief is in the existence of God (82%), which is higher then those that are religious, while other church beliefs are bellow this level of acceptance (between 39% and 77%) ; alternative beliefs have been accepted at the level of 5% and 26% which confirms the hypothesis on the existence of parallelism in acceptance of traditional church beliefs and alternative beliefs among some of the religious population. This indicates that there is a dissolving of dogmatic system and syncretic religious consciousness or rather privatization of beliefs among those respondents. The hypothesis that there is a difference within the group of religious respondents has been confirmed as well: convinced believers accept certain church beliefs more then those who identified themselves as religious but do not accept everything their church teaches. That the New Age I beliefs are more accepted by the uncertain, indifferent and non-religious and New Age II beliefs are more accepted by the religious indicates that they must have taken those items in the context of church religiosity (God and sin are mentioned in the three of those items). Acceptance of church beliefs among some of the non-religiously identified respondents indicates that there is a possibility of diffuse religiosity among them. The hypothesis on the influence of attending religious practice on the greater acceptance of church beliefs has also been confirmed. However, those attending church more frequently also accept some New Age beliefs, which indicates that they understood those statements in the context of their own religion or the greater sensibility of the regular churchgoers for spiritual content. The hypothesis on the difference of acceptance of traditional church and alternative beliefs among specific segments of population in regard to their socio-demographic, socio-structural and socio-cultural characteristics has also been confirmed. Analysis shows the greatest influence of gender, education, profession and macro-regional affiliation.

Item Type: Book Section
Additional Information: Language: English.
Uncontrolled Keywords: Traditional church beliefs, alternative beliefs, Croatia
Subjects: H Social Sciences > HM Sociology
Depositing User: Karolina
Date Deposited: 20 Dec 2016 13:00
Last Modified: 20 Dec 2016 13:00
URI: http://idiprints.knjiznica.idi.hr/id/eprint/572

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