Church and Religion in Contemporary Europe Results from Empirical and Comparative Research

During the last decades, the academic special field of sociology of religion, as well as the general public, has witnessed lively debates on the “new” role and significance of religion in modern societies. Not only perceptions such as a “clash of civilizations” or a “return of religion”, but also a renewed discussion on the relationship between religion and politics seem to stimulate the above mentioned questions. Meanwhile, a considerable quantity of empirical studies focused on the revitalization of religion or the prospects of a continuing secularization have been conducted. The topic of this publication deals with the results derived from a wide range of these studies, a large number of them focused on comparative analyses about the situation of churches and religion in Europe.