Toward Faith: A Qualitative Study of How Atheists Convert to Christianity
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Authors
Langston, Joseph
Powers Albanesi, Heather
Facciani, Matthew
Issue Date
2019
Volume
21
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Journal Article
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Abstract
The study of religious conversion has historically neglected how nonbelievers (i.e. atheists) come to adopt a belief in a god or gods, and thus cannot address whether findings and theories from previous research apply to atheists. In order to assess how atheists converted to Christianity, we performed a thematic analysis of 111 biographical narratives obtained from the open Internet. Our analysis yielded 10 recurring thematic elements, which we termed: hardship; authentic example; unfamiliarity/pseudo-familiarity (with Christianity or Christians); contra atheism; religious study; intellectualism; numinous experiences; openness to experience; ritual behaviors; and social ties. We draw logical connections between these themes and connect them to previous research. Our results impress the need for a more flexible, and therefore less sequential or stage-based, theoretical approach to conversion.|Keywords: religious change, atheism, Christianity, conversion, qualitative
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Rabbi Myer and Dorothy Kripke Center, Creighton University
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1522-5658