The Contribution of Religion to Volunteer Work

Abstract

The connection between church membership, church activista, and volunteering is explored us. ing a three-wave panel study of young adults. Volunteering to help others solve community problems is more likely among members of churches that emphasize this-worldly social coneerns, especially among those socially involved in these churches. Among Catholics, the connection between church involvement and volunteering is formed early and remains strong. Among liberal Protestants, the connection is made only in middle age. Among moderate and conservative Protestants the.re is little connection at aU. Conservative Protestants who attend church regularly are less likely to be involved in secular volunteering and more likely to be involved in volunteering for church-related work. The results suggest caution in generalizing about the connection between religious preference or involvement, and volunteering because this connection depends on the theological interpretation of volunteering and the significance attached to frequent church attendance.

Secular Volunteerism among Texan Emerging Adults: Exploring Pathways of Childhood and Adulthood Religiosity

“…It is not surprising that studies of religion have specifically focused on linkages between religion and volunteerism in the United States, a society characterized by both high rates of volunteerism and charitable contributions to religious organizations [37]. The general research finding confirms this pattern, namely, there is a positive association between religion and volunteerism [36], while being careful not to generalize to all forms of religiousness [38].…”

From Pews to Participation: The Effect of Congregation Activity and Context on Bridging Civic Engagement

“…Since differences in the theological orientation of these religious traditions largely motivates their congregations to adopt contrasting strategies for interacting with the outside world, this context should moderate considerably the extent to which congregation activity mobilizes involvement in bridging civic organizations. Although somewhat less so than in the early and middle twentieth century, the evangelical Protestant tradition generally favors withdrawing from the wider community to focus on otherworldly concerns, most importantly, personal salvation (Greenberg 2000;Wilson and Janoski 1995). When evangelical Protestants do engage with the wider community, they generally focus on developing personal relationships, with the ultimate goal of proselytizing, rather than collective action to benefit the broader community (Emerson and Smith 2000).…”

“…They also often use crude categorization schemes, such as dichotomization, to measure religious service attendance and may lose valuable information as a result (Wuthnow 2004). Other studies that regress civic engagement on congregation participation (usually only religious service attendance) for each religious tradition separately only compare the slopes of the lines (Hoge et al 1998;Wilson and Janoski 1995;Wuthnow 1999). For instance, Wuthnow's (1999) study showing that the slope of one interaction is steeper than the rest simply tells us that religious service attendance has a stronger effect on civic engagement for members of a particular tradition.…”

“…When scholars have analyzed the effect of congregation participation on civic engagement, they have tended to focus on attendance at religious services (Becker and Dhingra 2001;Musick, Wilson, and Bynum 2000;Wilson and Janoski 1995;Wilson and Musick 1997;Wuthnow 1999Wuthnow , 2004. Our observations suggest that, with the exception of occasional sermons or announcements about civic engagement, the mechanisms through which congregations mobilize civic engagement are most often associated with congregation activities outside religious service attendance.…”

Bonding and bridging among first generation Asian migrants in Australian protestant churches

“…Although some theory suggests developing bonding capital may detract from developing bridging capital in some denominations (Beyerlein andHipp 2006, Wilson andJanoski 1995), previous studies of Australian churches suggests the opposite maybe true (Leonard and Bellamy 2010). Work with immigrant and multi-ethnic churches suggests migrants can develop networks in the wider community through the contacts that they make within their congregation (Allen 2010, Ley 2008.…”