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Addressing the Spiritual Journey of Jews Beyond Midlife

Jeff Levin, will present the opening plenary on Thursday, November 19, 2009/Kislev 5770
Presented by UJA-Federation of New York’s Caring Commission and Hiddur: The Center for Aging and Judaism of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, this full-day conference will be a dynamic exploration of meaning, purpose, and later life.
To learn more about conference [more...]

Religious Practice in America: What the Research Says

"Religious Practice in America: What the Research Says" is an annual conference series dedicated to sharing high-quality social science data and analysis addressing these questions and to exploring next steps for research that will inform American public discussion, hosted by The Heritage Foundation, with research partners the Baylor Institute for the Studies of Religion, and Child Trends.The 2009 conference "Religious Practice and The Family: What the Research Says" will be held October 29th at the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center in Washington, D.C.,[more...]

Gallup releases new ISR study linking religious attendance to generosity worldwide.

Religious Attendance Relates to Generosity Worldwide: Religious and the secular more charitable if they attend services. Gallup data collected worldwide and across all the major world religions reveal that religious attendance is associated with more generous behavior, even for those unaffiliated with a particular religion. Study written by ISR scholars, Buster G. Smith and Rodney Stark. [For complete article go to Gallup World News...]

Jeff Levin joins Baylor ISR as Director of Program on Religion and Population Health

Dr. Jeff Levin has accepted a distinguished chair at Baylor University’s Institute for Studies of Religion, where he will serve as University Professor of Epidemiology and Population Health as well as Director of ISR’s Program on Religion and Population Health. Levin will also serve as Professor of Medical Humanities at Baylor. [Read More...]

Philip Jenkins will Co-direct Institute's Initiative on Historical Studies of Religion

Dr. Philip Jenkins, one of the world's leading religion scholars, has agreed to be a Distinguished Senior Fellow at Baylor University's Institute for Studies of Religion and to co-direct ISR's Initiative on Historical Studies of Religion. Jenkins also will offer seminars in Baylor's Department of History. He will split his time between Baylor and Pennsylvania State University where he is the Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of Humanities. [Read More...]

J. Gordon Melton Joins ISR

Dr. J. Gordon Melton, the leading authority on American religious bodies, has agreed to be a Distinguished Senior Fellow at Baylor University’s Institute for Studies of Religion (ISR). The author of more than 40 reference and scholarly books, Melton is famous for his Melton’s Encyclopedia of American Religions first published in 1979 and now in its 8th edition (2009). [Read More...]

Sherman Announced As Senior Fellow at Baylor ISR

Dr. Amy L. Sherman, one of the country's leading scholars on the role of faith-based organizations in society, has agreed to be a Senior Fellow at Baylor University's Institute for Studies of Religion. Sherman is currently the Director of the Center on Faith in Communities at the Sagamore Institute. She previously held a similar post at the Hudson Institute, a public policy think tank, and has been a fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Sherman plays key leadership roles in the national Faith and Service Technical Education Network (FASTEN), where she seeks to uncover what's working for faith-based groups at the grassroots level and communicates lessons learned to policymakers and practitioners. [Read More...]

Science of Generosity Project Offers $3 million in Research Grants - Deadline April 1, 2009

The University of Notre Dame recently announced a $3 million research grants project on the Science of Generosity, supported with funding from the John Templeton Foundation and open to social science researchers worldwide. This is a reminder that the deadline for letters of inquiry (LOIs) proposing research on generosity in the human and social sciences is April 1,2009 (postmarked). [Read More...]

Prosocial Studies of Religion

Baylor ISR Study Cites Youth Advisor Program As Likely Cause of Decreased Violence and Suspension - January 13, 2009

Byron Johnson has spent years studying crime and delinquency, and when he heard about the program South Division is using he was intrigued. So the Baylor University sociology professor took a closer look at Violence Free Zone. Johnson says as violence at South Division decreased by 38 percent, suspension rates plummeted too. There's even some evidence that grade point averages improved slightly. For more information about the study release, please browse the media links below:

VIEW/DOWNLOAD CASE STUDY

MPS Sees Fewer Suspensions & Less Violence In Some of Its Schools
Violence Down At Milwaukee Public Schools
Program helps battle violence in Milwaukee schools
MPS Violence-Free Zones (Video)
Violence Suspensions Down In MPS (Video)

Former Director of U.S. Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives Joins Baylor's Institute for Studies of Religion
Jay F. Hein, an internationally recognized public policy scholar, has accepted the position of Distinguished Senior Fellow and director of the Program for Faith and Service at Baylor University's Institute for Studies of Religion (ISR). In this capacity, Hein will lead ISR's effort in promoting cutting-edge approaches to social problems through faith-based organizations.[Read More...]

ISR Co-Sponsors BEIJING SUMMIT and SUMMER INSTITUTE

The Baylor Institute for Studies of Religion (ISR) recently partnered with scholars from Peking University, Purdue University, Renmin University, and the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences to organize and sponsor the Beijing Summit on Chinese Spirituality and Society: A Symposium on the Social Scientific Study of Religion. [Read More...]

White House Faith-Based and Community Initiative National Conference on Research, Evaluation and Outcomes, "Innovations in Effective Compassion"

Dr. Byron Johnson, co-director of the Institute for Studies of Religion (ISR) at Baylor University, will present at the White House National Conference June 26-27th in Washington DC.

ISR's Byron Johnson Contributes to For a New Thrift: Confronting the Debt Culture

Research findings were made public at a conference in Washington, DC this May and were released in a report called For a New Thrift: Confronting the Debt Culture. The report addresses the linked problems of overindebtedness, lack of savings, and growing inequality in the United States. A multiyear initiative of the Institute for American Values, under the leadership of David Blankenhorn, this John Templeton Foundation grant supports interdisciplinary research and public education to examine the history of thrift as an American value. It also aims to bring together leaders from across the political spectrum in a national conversation on thrift. Byron Johnson, Co-Director of ISR is among the distinguished scholars and leaders from across the political spectrum, who jointly authored, For A New Thrift. This publication powerfully addresses the linked problems of overindebtedness, lack of savings, and growing inequality in the United States. [Read More...]

Honoring Thy Fathers

Wall Street Journal Article, Honoring Thy Fathers, written by ISR Non-Resident Scholar, W. Bradford Wilcox, [Read More...]

Lecture: The Lost History of CHRISTIANITY

Dr. Philip Jenkins, Professor of History at Pennsylvania State University, gave a LECTURE, Friday, April 18th 2:00 pm, Bennett Auditorium, Baylor campus entitled The Lost History of CHRISTIANITY, he reveals a vast Christian world to the east of the Roman Empire and how the earliest, most influential churches of the East - those that had the closest link to Jesus and the early church - died. In this paradigm-shifting book... [Read More...]

Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion has released Articles on the Baylor Survey of Religion Findings

The Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion has released four articles written by the Baylor ISR research team based on the findings of the Baylor Survey of Religion: American Piety in the 21st Century[Read More...]

White House Director of Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives to Keynote Baylor Forum on FACTS: A Faith-Based and Community Solution to Reduce Domestic Violence

Jay Hein, director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, keynoted a forum on "FACTS:A Faith-Based and Community Solution to Reduce Domestic Violence." The forum highlighted the FACTS program, a one-year rural pilot program that is a collaboration between staff at the Office of Victim Services (OVS) in Helena, Mont., and the principal project staff at the Program on Prosocial Behavior, a unit of the Baylor Institute for Studies of Religion (ISR).[Read More...]

In Europe God Is (Not) Dead - The Wall Street Journal

The Wall Street Journal, July 14, 2007 -- Late last year, a Swedish hotel guest named Stefan Jansson grew upset when he found a Bible in his room. He fired off an email to the hotel chain, saying the presence of the Christian scriptures was "boring and stupefying." This spring, the Scandic chain, Scandinavia's biggest, ordered the New Testaments removed. In a country where barely 3 percent of the population goes to church each week, the affair seemed just another step in Christian Europe's long march toward secularism. Then something odd happened: A national furor erupted.[Read More...]