"Religion is a range of social-cultural systems, including designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relate humanity to supernatural, transcendental, and spiritual elements."
Examines the various religious practices observed by different religious groups.
Types of Religions: This topic covers the different types of religions, such as monotheistic, polytheistic, animistic, and non-theistic religions.
Religious Beliefs: This topic covers the core beliefs and doctrines of different religions, such as the belief in God or the afterlife.
Religious Rituals: This topic covers the religious practices and ceremonies that are involved in a religion, such as prayer, meditation, and fasting.
Religious Institutions: This topic covers the organizational structure of religious institutions, such as the roles of priests, imams, and other religious leaders.
Secularization: This topic covers the process of secularization, the decline of religion in society, and the impact it has on religious practices.
Religious Diversity: This topic covers the different religious traditions and practices, their diversity, and how diverse religions interact with one another.
Religious Identity: This topic covers how people identify with religions, how they express their religious identity, and how identity affects their religious practices.
Religious Conflict: This topic covers the conflicts between different religious groups and how these conflicts affect religious practices.
Gender and Religion: This topic covers the relationship between gender and religion, including the roles of women in religious practices.
Globalization and Religion: This topic covers how globalization has affected religious practices, including the spread of religious practices around the world.
Religious Tolerance: This topic covers the concept of religious tolerance, including how it is promoted, its benefits, and its limitations.
Religious Pluralism: This topic covers the idea of religious pluralism, where there are multiple religions and they are all equally valid.
Religious Fundamentalism: This topic covers religious fundamentalism, the extreme adherence to religious beliefs, and how it affects religious practices.
Science and Religion: This topic covers the relationship between science and religion, including conflict and cooperation between the two.
Religious Freedom: This topic covers the concept of religious freedom, including its importance, how it is protected, and its limitations.
Rituals: These are ceremonies or symbolic actions that are performed to connect to the divine, to bring blessings or positivity to the group or individual, or to heal certain aspects of the human experience.
Prayer: This is a form of communication with the divine; it can be done solo or in a congregational setting with others.
Meditation: This is a practice of focusing the mind and body to find mental clarity, inner peace, and an understanding of oneself and the world.
Sacred music: Music that is considered holy, often used in religious practices as a way of worshipping or connecting with the divine.
Fasting: This is a practice of abstaining from food or other worldly pleasures for a set period of time, often done as an act of penance or for spiritual enlightenment.
Pilgrimage: A journey to a sacred site or destination that is believed to have spiritual or transformative powers.
Offerings: This is a way of giving or making sacrifices to the divine or deity as an act of gratitude or seeking blessings.
Divination: A practice of seeking insights or information from the divine through various methods like tarot cards, psychic readings, etc.
Charity / Alms-giving: A practice of giving to those in need as an act of compassion, charity or as a religious obligation.
Fellowship and Community: This is the idea of forming a supportive community of like-minded individuals who can provide emotional support, guidance, and friendship.
"Different religions may or may not contain various elements ranging from the divine, sacredness, faith, and a supernatural being or beings."
"Religious practices may include rituals, sermons, commemoration or veneration (of deities or saints), sacrifices, festivals, feasts, trances, initiations, matrimonial and funerary services, meditation, prayer, music, art, dance, or public service."
"Religions have sacred histories and narratives, which may be preserved in sacred texts, symbols, and holy places, that primarily aim to give life meaning."
"Some followers believe these [symbolic tales] to be true stories."
"Four religions—Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism—account for over 77% of the world's population."
"92% of the world either follows one of those four religions or identifies as nonreligious."
"There are an estimated 10,000 distinct religions worldwide."
"The religiously unaffiliated demographic includes those who do not identify with any particular religion, atheists, and agnostics, although many in the demographic still have various religious beliefs."
"Most definitively including the Abrahamic religions Christianity, Islam, and Judaism."
"The study of religion comprises a wide variety of academic disciplines, including theology, philosophy of religion, comparative religion, and social scientific studies."
"Scholars have indicated that global religiosity may be increasing due to religious countries having generally higher birth rates."
"Theories of religion offer various explanations for its origins and workings, including the ontological foundations of religious being and belief."
"Although there is no scholarly consensus over what precisely constitutes a religion."
"A portion of the world's population, mostly located in Africa and Asia, are members of new religious movements."
"The study of religion comprises a wide variety of academic disciplines, including... social scientific studies."
"Religion is a range of social-cultural systems... that generally relate humanity to supernatural, transcendental, and spiritual elements."
"Traditionally, both faith and reason have been considered sources of religious beliefs."
"Religions have sacred histories and narratives, which may be preserved in sacred texts, symbols, and holy places."
"Nearly all of them [religions] have regionally based, relatively small followings."