Believe it or not, the world is more religious than ever before. Everybody seems to take it for granted that the world is getting more secular-that faith is doomed by modernity. Scientists, secularists, and atheists applaud the change; religious believers and social conservatives lament it. But here's the thing: they're all wrong-and bestselling author Rodney Stark has the numbers to prove it.

The Triumph of Faith explodes the myth that people around the world are abandoning religion. Stark marshals an incredible amount of data-surveys of more than a million people in 163 nations-to paint the full picture that both scholars and popular commentators have missed. And he explains why the astonishing growth of religion is happening and what it means for our future.

Stark's lively, eye-opening book is full of insights that defy the conventional wisdom. He reveals:

• Islam is not overtaking Christianity
• 81 percent of people around the world claim to belong to an organized religious faith
• Half attended a worship service in the past week
• Despite all the attention paid to the "New Atheists," atheists remain few, anywhere
• Latin America has never been so Catholic-and that's because there are now so many Protestants there
• Of all the great world religions, only Buddhism may not be growing

As Stark shows, secularists have been predicting the imminent demise of religion for centuries. It is their unshakeable faith in secularization that may be the most "irrational" of all. In addition to being the author of acclaimed and popular books like How the West Won and The Victory of Reason, Rodney Stark is a scholar who has completely reshaped the social scientific study of religion. He puts all those talents on full display in The Triumph of Faith.

About the Author
Rodney Stark is the award-winning author of How the West Won, The Victory of Reason, The Rise of Christianity, God's Battalions, and many other books. He serves as Distinguished Professor of the Social Sciences at Baylor University, USA where he is co-director of the Institute for Studies of Religion. Stark is past president of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion and of the Association for the Sociology of Religion. Before earning his PhD at the University of California, Berkeley, he was a staff writer for several major publications. Stark's books have been translated into Chinese, Dutch, French, German, Greek, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Spanish, and Turkish. He lives in Texas.


Book Information
ISBN 9781610171380
Author Rodney Stark
Format Hardback
Page Count 240
Imprint ISI Books
Publisher Regnery Publishing Inc
Weight(grams) 571g