Empirical Theology: inter‐ or intra‐disciplinary?

Young people’s attitudes to religious diversity: quantitative approaches from social psychology and empirical theology

“…Empirical theology was conceived in England and Wales by Leslie J Francis as an interdisciplinary activity whereby the practitioners of empirical theology sought to have their work tested both by the theological academy and by social scientists. The debate between these two perspectives was well captured by Cartledge (1999) As a relatively new and emerging discipline, it remains too early for major reviews to have drawn together key findings, although clear patterns are emerging with Journal of Empirical Theology, through the conferences of the International Society for Empirical Research in Theology, and through the series of essays published by Brill including: Religion inside and outside traditional institutions (Streib, 2007), Empirical Theology in texts and tables: Qualitative, quantitative and comparative perspectives (Francis, Robbins & Astley, 2009), and The public significance of religion (Francis & Ziebertz, 2011).…”

Assessing attitude toward religious diversity among Muslim adolescents in the UK: the effect of religious and theological factors

“…Empirical theology is rooted in the theological tradition of the academy, and may be particularly skilled at identifying the nuanced self-understanding of religious believers. This approach has been influenced by the insights of van der Ven in the Netherlands and by Francis in the UK (see Cartledge, 1999). Concepts offered by empirical theology for shaping a more nuanced understanding of religious people include the notion of the theology of religions, that is, the variety of ways in which religious traditions reflect on and express their self-understanding of their relationship with other religious traditions.…”

Reading and proclaiming the Birth Narratives from Luke and Matthew: A study in empirical theology amongst curates and their training incumbents employing the SIFT method

“…This leads both to fruitful interdisciplinary enquiry and to the intradisciplinary adoption of such approaches within the theological academy (see Cartledge 1999). The SIFT method has developed from both interdisciplinary and intradisciplinary enquiry.…”

“…Within the quantitative research traditions some of the insights of the SIFT approach were anticipated in a pioneering study reported by Bassett, Mathewson and Gailitis (1993) who examined the link between preferred interpretations of scripture and psychological preferences established partly by psychological type theory and partly by a measure of problem solving styles. Participants were asked to read four passages from New Testament epistles and then offered a choice of interpretations that were intended to express preferences for 'thinking' or for 'feeling' (as defined by psychological type theory) and preferences for 'collaborative', for 'deferring', or for 'independent' (as defined by this problem solving typology).…”