Religion in Britain

Grace Davie is Professor Emeritus in the Sociology of Religion at the University of Exeter UK and a senior adviser to the Impact of Religion Research Programme at Uppsala University. She is a past-president of the American Association for the Sociology of Religion (2003). Her publications include Religion in Britain since 1945 (Blackwell 1994), Religion in Modern Europe (2000), Europe: the Exceptional Case (2002) and The Sociology of Religion (Sage 2007 and 2013).

“Davie is well worth reading to offer an analysis on the changes currently being experienced in British religion. The Irish contexts are different, but still close enough to need to take note of her arguments.”  (Irish Methodist Newsletter, 1 February 2015)"Davie writes (and speaks) so clearly and with manifest knowledge and common sense. It is not surprising that she is popular at diocesan conferences. Buyers of this new edition will not be disappointed. Of course, she has critics, and would not be worth reading if she did not. None the less, many will still conclude that overall this is a well-researched and judicious sociological assessment of religion in modern Britain, and one that outstrips most of its rivals. I recommend it strongly."  (Church Times, 11 September 2015)"But now, says Grace Davie, a sociology professor at Exeter University, the picture has completely changed, in ways that nobody could have foreseen in 1994 when she brought out the first edition of her book ... The position of Christianity (as measured by church-going, rites of passage and answers to opinion polls) has suffered steady though not yet catastrophic decline in its presumed strongholds: rural areas with a settled population, schools favoured by the middle class, and so on. But church-going in London, along with the practice of many other religions, has risen quite sharply. In a new and massively revised version of her work, Ms Davie says she has to take account of the 'huge religious market-place' which London has become." (Bruce Clark, The Economist's Erasmus blog)

• List of Figures and Tables ixPreface xiPart I Preliminaries 11 Introduction: A Framework for Discussion 32 Contexts and Generations 193 Facts and Figures 41Part II Religious Legacies 694 Cultural Heritage, Believing without Belonging and Vicarious Religion 715 Territory, Politics and Institutions 916 Presence: Who Can Do What for Whom? 113Part III Shifting Priorities: From Obligation to Consumption 1337 An Emerging Market: Gainers and Losers 1358 Proliferations of the Spiritual 155Part IV Public Religion and Secular Reactions 1759 Managing Diversity 17710 Religion in Public Life 197Part V Thinking Theoretically 21911 Religion and Modernity Continued 221References 237Index 255