In HIV and AIDS and life skills education in southern Africa peer education has been advocated as a way of democratizing relations between educators and students and encouraging participatory pedagogies. But what makes a peer educator, or rather how do people make themselves peer educators? Similarities in terms of age, social status and…

Despite increased attention to religious organizations as an ally in America's welfare-to-work revolution, faith- based employment assistance programs have garnered little attention from scholars. This study seeks to fill this gap by examining intake and follow-up survey data collected from clients of Employment Resource Centers sponsored by the…

Background: Northern Ireland is a province that remains deeply divided between Protestants and Catholics and maintains a segregated system of schools. Purpose: The research builds on a series of studies conducted in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s to monitor the attitude toward Christianity of males and females educated in Protestant and Catholic…

This study addresses eight models for "doing" ecclesial adolescent ministry in the United States from both a Catholic and ecumenical perspective. The article offers youth ministers in the field with creative insights to further enhance their ministry with adolescents. The eight models represent an inclusive theological and pastoral…

In 2001, more than 1.2 million worshipers in over 12,000 congregations in four countries participated in the International Congregational Life Survey (ICLS). The ICLS was an expansion and revision of previous surveys conducted in Australia (the National Church Life Survey) to include congregations and worshipers in New Zealand, England and the…

Issues like faith and Church, religion and religiousness are not valued particularly highly among the young. At the same time a search for the meaning of life and an orientation in one's own behaviour still seem to be significant and transcendent focal points are being sought to deal with these issues. This article questions the value that…

This article presents the efforts of one Christian school to counteract secular societal norms and foster Christian values in its students. Anecdotal observations led to an empirical study to ascertain students' thinking about values. In turn, the study results led to the school staff taking specific actions to address the realities discovered in…

Examined how current religious preference, attendance at religious services, importance of religion, and Christian rebirth were related to perceived stress among college students (N=195) in a communitywide survey. Found no association between any of the religiousness variables and perceived stress. (Author/ABL)

Christian therapists were surveyed concerning beliefs and behaviors regarding sexual attraction and sexual expression toward their clients (N=500). Responses are compared with those from a similar survey of 456 psychologists selected without regard to religious values. Religious factors that may increase the stigma of admitting sexual attraction…

Recent changes in oath-taking in Kirundi-Kinyarwanda are presented and interpreted. Shows that new oath variants create quantitative and qualitative variability in form, significance, and use in the conceptualization and meaning of oaths. Such changes were initiated largely by European Christian missionaries who arrived in Burundi and Rwanda at…

While praxis-oriented educational methodologies have become nearly normative in adult Christian religious education, an individualist framework still colors many of the approaches involved. Participants gather for reflection, but are sent individually for action in the world. Yet, the complexities of issues that Christians are called to address as…

The research methods of hermeneutics and semiotics were used to analyse maps of the Holy Land. The main conclusion of this study is how those methods could help us to read and understand maps. Other issues of concern are which religious elements actually appear and their form of representation in the range of maps. Narratives identified on the…

Survey data from a southwestern metropolitan area are used to analyze whether the ability of personal Christian religiosity to predict social conformity is spuriously due to self-control. Results indicate that both personal religiosity and self-control display statistically significant, independent negative net relationships with many forms of…

The past decade has shown a surge of interest in faith-based resources for a variety of social problems. However, these resources have not been systematically studied for children with emotional and behavioral problems. We investigated religious activity and use of pastoral counseling among Protestant youth with serious emotional disorders (SED)…

Numerous events have provided evidence that the cultural values and assumptions of intercollegiate athletic departments are often incongruent with those of their host institutions. This discrepancy has even been evident in Christian institutions which seek to integrate faith into the learning experience. Using the organizational culture…