New Age and fundamentalism

Most scholars in their definitions stress the doctrinal aspects of this phenomenon and its distinctive moral consequences. Usually, however, it is not the content of beliefs, which is more important but the way in which religious beliefs are held and put into practice. Literalism in the interpretation of sacred texts, holistic and absolute character of religious authority and its exclusive character as the only source of truth setting absolute standard of life and thoughts are emphasized by the majority of authors writing on fundamentalism (Lawrence, 1989; Hunter, 1991; Almond et al. 1995; (Iannaccone, 1997; Riesebrodt, 2000). Even more common is stressing the oppositional character of this phenomenon as a reaction to modernity (Lawrence, 1989; Hunter, 1991; Almond et al. 1995; (Iannaccone, 1997; Luckmann, 1999; Riesebrodt, 2000). Less common are such criterions of fundamentalism as confrontational attitude towards opponnents (Lawrence, 1989; Hunter, 1991), strict patriarchal order (Riesebrodt, 2000), millennialism (Almond et al. 1995), close relationship between religious ideology and national identity (Hunter, 1991).

New Age is even less clearly defined than fundamentalism. Descriptions of New Age stress the privatized and individualized character of this phenomenon and diversified character of beliefs and practices and loose organization (Iannaccone, 1995; Hanegraaff, 1996; Luckmann, 1999). Belief system is almost universally characterized by a formal quality of inclusiveness (Iannaccone, 1995; Hanegraaff, 1996; Luckmann, 1999). Less common are characteristics related to the content of beliefs: elements of the Western occult tradition (Hanegraaff, 1996), central role of the symbolism of the self (Hanegraaff, 1996) and immanent concept of the divine (Cush, 1996).

Although fundamentalism and New Age are usually analyzed separately, we may also find interpretations considering them as phenomena having a common axis of variation formulated explicitly or implicitly.

In the “market” model of religion the axis of variation is most clearly formulated, differentiating between both phenomena on the basis of costs related to religious involvement. For Laurence Iannaccone (1997:152) “high cost, sectarian religion constitutes the purest case of collective religion. Sects demand exclusivity in order to limit free-rider problems, but thereby generate high levels of commitment and participation, which sustain high levels of benefits. Low cost, portfolio religion lies at the other extreme, offering private products on a fee-for-service basis. Individual consumers are free to diversify their consumption, mixing and matching religious commodities from numerous competing suppliers, but this leads to low levels of commitment, limited brand loyalty, and a weak sense of collective identity” Fundamentalism as a form of sectarianism is, therefore, close to the high tension pole and New Age, as a portfolio religion, close to the low tension pole. Fundamentalistic pole of this axis represents collectivistic exclusivism and New Age pole – individualistic inclusivism.

            According to Iannaccone (1997) fundamentalism may be defined in terms of sectarianism. Such concept stresses the religiously oppositional character of the explained phenomenon and its high level of tension with its surroundings, but is less ambiguously defined, and has a longer tradition in the sociology of religion as well as greater explanatory value: “Sects demand high levels of commitment and high rates of participation, require strict and distinctive codes of conduct, emphasize "particularistic" beliefs and practices (which distinguish their members from those of other religions and, presumably, make them superior to all others), and view secular society as corrupt, dangerous, and threatening. Sects emphasize “volitional membership” (personal conversion as opposed to membership through birth), and they attract a disproportionate share of their converts from among the less advantaged segments of society — ethnic minorities, the poor, and the less educated” (Iannaccone, 1997:104). He emphasizes that his interpretation is confirmed by basic findings of “Fundamentalism Project” especially in selective use of tradition and modernity, recruitment from less “modern”, educated and privileged parts of the society (Almond, Sivan, and Appleby, 1995: 437).

Another strategy of religious risk reduction may be described, in terms of model derived from economy, as the portfolio diversification of assets. Collective risk reduction strategy is used by sects, whereas porfolio diversification is a strategy common to New Age. It reduces the risk of religious involvement in a single religion or class of religious acts in societies in which an access to a variety of religious and parareligious goods is possible. As a consequence of this risk reducing strategy appears a private religion with specialized sellers, no congregational structure, client/practitioner relationships, fee for service transactions, no brand loyalty, acknowledged diversification but less capable of generating high level of religious commitment.

For Thomas Luckmann (1999) New Age and fundamentalism are holistic reactions to the pluralism a market of world views and structural differentiation introduced by modernity. “The new, privatized, and, in a manner of speaking, invisible social form of religion can be best illustrated by certain diffuse recent developments usually collected under the same label: the ‘New Age’ movement—which of course is anything but a movement in the accepted sense of a social movement—including the ‘‘new occultism’’, and various programmes favoring the ‘‘spiritual’’ development of the individual. They are highly syncretistic. They gather diverse psychological, therapeutic, magic, and marginally scientific as well as older ‘esoteric’ materials, repackage them, and offer them for individual consumption. (...) In fact, this may be a precondition for the successful maintenance of a vague holistic approach, an approach expressly designed to overcome the ‘alienating’ specializations of science, religion, art, etc. into institutional spheres and segregated cultural domains. (...) The conditions favoring the spread of the highly subjectivized forms of the New Age also gave rise to another ‘‘holistic’’ option. It looks like the opposite of individual syncretism and subjective bricolage but it shares one feature with the former: it is an individual option. (...) If one of the ‘‘holistic’’ responses to these conditions is the New Age, the other is ‘‘fundamentalist’’. This fundamentalism differs from the kind of fundamentalism which besets the traditional societies in transition. But even the less pervasively disorientating challenges of life in modern societies, under the substantially more favorable material conditions, gave rise to Protestant and Catholic versions of fundamentalism. These have chosen traditional models of ‘‘wholeness’’ in reaction to ‘‘modernity’’, which is seen by them as segmenting human existence and alienating the individual from God and a just society, as resulting in ‘‘immorality’’ of economic and political life, and as removing the necessary outer and inner controls for private life” Luckmann (1999: 255-6).

Although Thomas Luckmann does not formulate more detailed interpretation of fundamentalism, to differentiate it from New Age, it seems that the latter represents a less traditional and more individualized form of reaction to modernity. In this sense, it is rather a continuation of social and cultural trends inherent in late modernity, whereas fundamentalism is opposing them by an attempt to revive the more traditional and collective type of religion. Although both represent an individual option because is primarily a matter of individual choice, the individualism in the New Age is manifested much stronger. Individual choice is extended to to the greater scope of materials from various religious traditions and other cultural domains but also is manifesting in the individualized ways of constructing world-view from this heterogenous materials.

Some of the predictions concerning fundamentalism and New Age based on these interpretations are similar and some quite different. Similarities are related mainly to the social and religious background of New Age and fundamentalism, although Luckmann is more specific in the first case and Iannaccone in the lattter. On the basis of the model proposed by Iannaccone (1997: 106), we may expect that fundamentalism is related to less favorable social position because the opportunity cost of accepting fundamentalistic beliefs is substantially lower for people with limited secular opportunities. Because of the same reasons fundamentalism will also flourish in a less economically prosperous societies. As it represents a committed form of a collective religion we may expect here higher levels of religious participation in contrast to lower levels of commitment to conventional religion in New Age (Iannaccone, 1995).

Similar predictions (although differently interpreted) may be formulated on the basis of Thomas Luckmann’s theory of invisible religion. According to this interpretation the conventional form of church religiosity is being replaced by new forms of invisible religion in the most modernized sectors of society (at least in Europe). The social basis of church religiosity is shrinking and relegated to the structural peripheries of modern society (among less educated, living in a smaller communities, older and females). New forms of invisible religion are more common to the most modernized sectors of society, which are, at the same time, the least committed to church religiosity. On the basis of both models we may therefore expect that New Age beliefs will be more widespread among less frequently attending church services, more educated, older, males, living in bigger communities and in a a more economically prosperous societies. In case of fundamentalism and church religiosity, we may fomulate the reverse predictions.

More differentiated are expectations related to religious pluralism and state regulation of religious market. According to Thomas Luckman religious pluralism contributes to the decline of institutionalized religiosity and to the growth of its non-institutionalized forms exemplified by New Age. In the market interpretation of religion religious pluralism influences positively mainly the growth of of collective (and sectarian) forms of religiosity. It favours more demanding forms of religion, which usually win the competition in a the pluralistic religious market. Religious pluralism should therefore have the the opposite effects on church religiosity and fundamentalism in both theories: negative in the first case and positive in the second. Its positive influence on New Age is explicitly formulated in the interpretation of Thomas Luckmann, and seems implicitly assumed in the interpretation of Laurence Iannnaccone.

The level of state regulation of religious market is one of the most important factor inluencing religious activity according to the market model of religion. In the unregulated religious markets we may expect better chances for growth for the more demanding forms of religion (fundamentalism and church religiosity) and less chances for succes for less demanding forms such as New Age.

Although Thomas Luckmann does not use this term, it may be nevertheless assumed that it reflects the degree of the structural differentiation. The level of state regulation of religion may be considered as one of the forms of structural differentiation: the less structurally differentiated society, the greater the state intervention on the religious market. The predictions based on this interpretation are contrary to those formulated on the market model in case of church religiosity but similar in case of the New Age. Greater structural differentiation manifested in the lower level of state regulation of religious market should contribute to the decline of church religiosity and to the growth of New Age.

      In the quantitative research on fundamentalism and New Age a number of different strategies were used: self-descriptions as a New Ager or a fundamentalist, actual participation in a fundamentalist or New Age groups, and, most often, scales related to the form and content of beliefs (Doktór, 1999; Doktór, in press; Mears and Ellison, 2000).

No attempt, however, has been made to measure New Age and fundamentalist orientations on a common axis of variation. In the present study we will try to operationalize such a measure as a scale composed of items related to form and content of religious beliefs. Formal qualities of this dimension include the meta-beliefs related to the epistemological value of the other belief systems and the hermeneutics of one’s own beliefs (the way in which they are derived from its source).

In relation to other beliefs fundamentalists are particularistic in their view of other religions, denying their validity in contrast to their own religion considered as the only source of truth. New Agers are more universalistic and acknowledge the possibility of truth existing in many religious traditions. Therefore for fundamentalists one religion is sufficient as the source of inspiration, whereas New Agers are more inclusive and seek inspiration also in other traditions. Elements of these traditions are often included in ones own worldview on a voluntaristic basis in a manner of bricolage.

In their relationship to the foundations of religious thruth, fundamentalists treat the Bible as the only source and use the most simple method of interpretation, stressing the literal interpretation. For New Agers the Bible is only one source of truth among many and they prefer a more abstract and metaphorical interpretation, which permits to integrate diversified elements at least at the minimal level of coherence.

New Age and fundamentalism may be also differentiated according to the contents of beliefs: concept of divinity and the degree of acceptance of the teodicee based on the idea of God punishing us for our sins.

A personal concept of God is typical for fundamentalism (but also for all abrahamic religions), whereas impersonal concept of divinity - to the New Age type of spirituality. A “God within each person” concept takes an intermediary position on this continuum. It may be interpreted in a way typical for Hindu tradition (more typical of the New Age understanding) and in a way, which is more close to the Christian mainstream tradition articulated in a phrase of saint Paul “not I but Christ within me”.

In their theodicee (beliefs about the sources of suffering) fundamentalists emphasize the interpretation of God’s punishment for our sins, whereas in the New Age thinking this interpretation is usually rejected and suffering is more often attributed to karma or to psychological causes.

In the present study we will attempt to evaluate the validity of the proposed scale by relating it to beliefs and behaviors often mentioned in the descriptions of fundamentalism and New Age. We may expect that New Agers (persons who tend to accept beliefs close to New Age pole of belief spectrum) will more often believe in reincarnation, consult horoscopes and take them into account and less often believe in dramatic form of millenialism. Fundamentalists (persons who tend to accept beliefs close to fundamentalist pole of belief spectrum) will be less inclined towards these occult beliefs and more often accept beliefs in dramatic form of millenialism. They will be also differentiated according to their social characteristics specified by the predictions related to theoretical interpretations of these phenomena formulated by Laurence Iannaccone and Thomas Luckmann mentioned earlier.

Data and measures

We will test these predictions on the RAMP (Religious and Moral Pluralism) data, which were collected in 1998 in 11 European countries, using random representative sampling and face-to-face interviews with people aged 18 years and over. The total sample includes 12342 respondents.

The index of New Age/fundamentalist beliefs constructed on the basis of RAMP questionnaire consists of four items and in an earlier version (consisting of four items) was already used in earlier research (Doktór, 2001: Doktór, in press):

a) Biblical literalism (consisting of three forced choice items: “The Bible records the actual word of God, so everything it says should be taken literally, word for word” (1), “The Bible was written by humans who were inspired by God, but not everything in it should be taken literally” (2), ‘The Bible is simply an ancient book of religious stories, historical events and moral teachings” (3) “I don’t know’ answers were excluded from the analysis and coding of answers were reversed.

b) Religious particularism consisting of four forced choice items: “There is only one true religion” (1), “There is only one true religion, but important truths can be found in some other religions as well” (2), “There are important truths to be found in some religions” (3), “There are important truths to be found in all religions” (4). The last answer possibility: “here aren't any important truths to be found in any religion” was excluded from the analysis) and the coding was reversed.

c) Religious exclusivism measured on the seven points Likert scale (1 - strongly agree to 7 - strongly disagree):”Even if people belong to a particular religion, they should still feel free to draw on teachings from other religious traditions”.

d) Personal/impersonal idea of divinity consisting of four three choice items: “I believe in a spirit or life force” (1), “I believe that God is something within each person rather than something out there” (2), “I believe in a God with whom I can have a personal relationship” (3). Items “I don't believe in any kind of God, spirit, or life force” and “I really don't know what to believe” were excluded from the analysis.

e) Punishing God image measured on the seven points Likert scale (1 - strongly disagree to 7 - strongly agree): “Most human suffering in this world is because of God punishing us for our sins”.

By computing the mean of the standardized scores for answers to these five items a scale has been constructed with pooled Cronbach's alpha =,63. Due to exclusion of nonbelievers and persons having no opinion in that matters the sample has been diminished to 8372 persons. High scores on this scale indicate fundamentalist orientation and low scores – New Age Orientation.

New Age/fundamentalist beliefs and other indicators of religiosity

            Many scholars emphasize the fact that fundamentalism is a form of religious orientation, whereas in case of New Age the opinions are more differentiated, although the most widespread interpretation of this phenomenon treat it as a form of alternative religion, inversely related to church religiosity. To check the possible interrelationships we have used exploratory factor analysis of different indicators of religiosity in RAMP data.

Table 1. Factor analysis of different indicators of religiosity (rotation varimax, N=7425).

		1	2	3
A	Religious beliefs influence my daily life	,777	,249	,241
B	Religious beliefs influence important decisions	,754	,243	,237
C	Self assessment of religiosity	,662	,179	,338
D	Frequency of church attendance	,636	,227	,341
E	Frequency of praying	,557	,240	,382
F	Volunteering in religious organizations	,527
G	Experienced something beyond everyday reality	,501		-,261
H	Importance of religious service for death	,124	,879
I	Importance of religious service for marriage	,192	,859	,165
J	Importance of religious service for birth	,138	,859	,144
K	Religious exclusivism			,710
L	Religious particularism)	,138		,687
M	Punishing God		,199	,524
N	Biblical literalism	,315	,146	,480
O	Personal God	,392	,129	,400

Notes:

A - “My religious beliefs have a great deal of influence on my daily life” with aswers ranging from “definitely no” (1) to “definitely yes” (7).

B - “My religious beliefs have a great deal of influence on how I make important decisions” with aswers ranging from “definitely no”(1) to “definitely yes” (7)

C - “Whether or not you go to a church or place of worship, to what extent would you say that you are a religious person? Choose a number from this scale” with aswers ranging from “not at all religious” (1) to “very religious” (7).

D - “Apart from ceremonies for birth, marriage or death, roughly how often do you attend religious services these days?’ measured on the eigth-point scales: ‘every day’ (0), ‘more than once a week’(1), ‘once a week’ (2), ‘at least once a month’(3), ‘a few times a year’ (4), ‘once a year’(5), ‘less than once a year’ (6), ‘never’(7). The direction of coding has been reversed.

“Do you do regular voluntary work for any religious organisations?” With answers “no” (1) and “yes”(2).

E - “About how often do you pray?” measured on the eigth-point scales: ‘every day’ (0), ‘more than once a week’(1), ‘once a week’ (2), ‘at least once a month’(3), ‘a few times a year’ (4), ‘once a year’(5), ‘less than once a year’ (6), ‘never’(7). The direction of coding has been reversed.

F – “Do you do regular voluntary work for any religious organisations?” “No” (0), “Yes” (1).

G - “Have you ever had an experience of something that exists, but transcends (goes beyond) everyday reality, and which you may or may not call God?’ (with answers on a five point scale ranging from ‘never’ to ‘all the time’)

H - “How important do you think a religious service is to celebrate death?” with answers ranging from “not important at all” (1) to “very important” (7).

I - “How important do you think a religious service is to celebrate marriage and death?” with answers ranging from “not important at all” (1) to “very important” (7).

J - “How important do you think a religious service is to celebrate birth?” with answers ranging from “not important at all” (1) to “very important” (7).

K - Religious exclusivism measured on the seven points Likert scale (1 - strongly agree to 7 - strongly disagree):”Even if people belong to a particular religion, they should still feel free to draw on teachings from other religious traditions”.

L - Religious particularism consisting of four forced choice items: “There is only one true religion” (1), “There is only one true religion, but important truths can be found in some other religions as well” (2), “There are important truths to be found in some religions” (3), “There are important truths to be found in all religions” (4). The last answer possibility: “here aren't any important truths to be found in any religion” was excluded from the analysis) and the coding was reversed.

M - Punishing God image measured on the seven points Likert scale (1 - strongly disagree to 7 - strongly agree): “Most human suffering in this world is because of God punishing us for our sins”.

N - Biblical literalism (consisting of three forced choice items: “The Bible records the actual word of God, so everything it says should be taken literally, word for word” (1), “The Bible was written by humans who were inspired by God, but not everything in it should be taken literally” (2), ‘The Bible is simply an ancient book of religious stories, historical events and moral teachings” (3) “I don’t know’ answers were excluded from the analysis and coding of answers were reversed.

O - Personal idea of divinity consisting of four three choice items: “I believe in a spirit or life force” (1), “I believe that God is something within each person rather than something out there” (2), “I believe in a God with whom I can have a personal relationship” (3). Items “I don't believe in any kind of God, spirit, or life force” and “I really don't know what to believe” were excluded from the analysis.

Among three factors which have emerged in factor analysis: the first one represents religiosity in general (including practices, experiences, community ties and moral consequences of religiosity), the second – probably the most secularized aspects of church religiosity, limited to the acceptance of the importance of rite de passage, and the third – a dimension related to form and content of religious beliefs. With the exception of the personal/impersonal image of God, where loadings on the general religiosity factor and New Age/fundamentalism are similar, other belief items loadings are more differentiated, although usually with the same sign. Only in a case of religious experience the loading are in different direction. The correlation of intensity of religious experiences with New Age/fundamentalist beliefs is, however, positive although much lower (,06) than the correlation with the 7-item general religiosity scale constructed by computing mean of the standardized scores for answers with highest loadings on this factor (,45). General religiosity scale has also higher reliability (pooled Cronbach's alpha =,83) than New Age/fundamentalism scale. Both scales are positively correlated (,48), which supports the opinion that New Age beliefs are inversely related to general religiosity, whereas fundamentalists beliefs - positively.

One of the main characteristics of New Age beliefs is opinion on the question of afterlife. The oriental solution to this problem in a form of the belief in the transmigration of the soul is often preferred, whereas in case of fundamentalism we may expect more conventional Christian view in that matter.

Table 3. New Age/fundamentalist beliefs and afterlife (“What do you think happens to us after death?”)

	Mean	N	SD
Nothing - death is the end	-,19	1155	1,01
There is something, but I don't know what	-,09	3372	,90
We go either to heaven or to hell	,86	1206	,89
We all go to heaven	,45	330	,95
We are reincarnated - that is, after our physical death we are born in this world again and again	-,39	560	,92
We merge into some kind of eternal bliss after this life	,09	417	,92
Other	-,27	163	,99
I do not know	-,39	1098	,88
Total	,00	8301	1,00

 

The results presented in the table 2. show that the most common options for ‘New Agers’ (as indicated by the mean scores of the scale) is ‘reincarnation’ and ‘I don’t know’, whereas for ‘fundamentalists’ it is ‘either heaven or hell’. ‘New Agers’ are therefore more incline to adopt the oriental or occult solution to the question of afterlife, which may confirm the validity of the proposed scale.

The other possible difference between two world views is related to millennialism as an expectation of a dramatic change, most often stressed in the biblical fundamentalism.

Table 3. New Age/fundamentalists beliefs and expectations of the millenium (“Some people believe in religious prophecies which predict that, around the time of millennium (or the year 2000), a really dramatic and fundamental change is going to occur to the world. Which of the following positions is the nearest to your own belief?”)

	Mean	N	SD
I don't believe in such religious prophecies of dramatic change	-,14	4879	,96
I believe that such a dramatic change will happen in my lifetime	,51	584	1,05
Such a dramatic change will probably happen in my lifetime, but possibly after my death	,14	1649	1,01
It will most probably happen after my death	,10	1072	,98
Total	-,00	8184	1,00

 Results presented in table 3, indicate that the most millenialistic are respondents with the higher scores on New Age/fundamentalistic beliefs scale. Respondents more close to the New Age of this dimension are inclined to disbelief in the religious prophecies of dramatic change. As millennialism is often mentioned as one of the criterions of fundamentalism, it adds further validity to the proposed scale. It must, however, be noted that in some New Age beliefs we may also found millenialistic expectations, but usually they are not so dramatic as in the case of fundamentalism and not related to ‘religious prophecies’.

Among other beliefs and practices often mentioned as elements of New Age is astrology. In RAMP data we have two questions one this topic: one is related to the frequency of astrological practice (‘How often do you consult your horoscope in order to know about your future?’ with answers possibilities ranging from ‘every day’ – 1 to ‘never’ - 5) and the other related to the degree of acceptance of astrological beliefs, which was asked only to those respondents, who consult their horoscopes (‘How often do you take this into account in your daily life?’ with answers possibilities ranging from ‘always’ – 1 to ‘never’ -5). In both cases the correlations coefficients indicate a negative but very week relationship of astrology and New Age. In the case of the frequency of astrological practices it is -,02 and is unsignificant and in the case of beliefs (after recoding by introducing the value of 0 to those, whom this answer has not been asked because they never consult their horoscopes) it is -,04 and is significant below the ,000 level. These results may seem problematic, regarding the validity of the scale as a measure of New Age beliefs. Belief in astrology is, contrary to our expectations, related more to fundamentalistic than to New Age pole of this dimension.

The background of New Age/fundamentalist beliefs

The conditions favouring the growth of church religiosity, fundamentalism and New Age postulated in the interpretations of these pheneomena proposed by Thomas Luckmann and Laurence Iannaccone most often are similar, although differently interpreted. In some points, however, they formulate quite different predictions, especially in case of church religiosity. We will attempt here to test some of these propositions.

Table 4. Regression analysis with New Age/fundamentalist beliefs (N=7542) and frequency of attendance (N=10725) as dependent variables.

		New Age / fundamentalism (model 1)	New Age /fundamentalism (model 2)	Frequency of attendance (model 1)	Frequency of attendance (model 2)
			Beta		Beta
A	Sex (female)	,045	,050	,141	,114
B	Year of birth	-,059	-,079	-,112	-,166
C	Highest level of education	-,308	-,272	-,053	,004 n.s.
D	Community size (administrative)	-,069	-,051	-,105	-,058
E	Friends with different religious views	-,124	-,083	-,087	-,036
F	GDPP		-,067		-,046
G	Religious pluralism in the country		-,170		-,281
H	State regulation of religious market		-,063		-,248
	Rsq.	,155	,191	,066	,167

Notes:

A - sex (0=male 1=female), year of birth (18 years and older),

B - education (1) incomplete primary, (2) primary completed, (3) incomplete secondary, (4) secondary completed, (5) university incomplete, to (6) university degree completed, C- community size, measured on a scale from (1) 'less than 500 inhabitants' to (10) 'more than 1 million inhabitants'.

D - Friends with different religious views - ‘How many of your closest friends have views on religion that differ from yours?’ with answers ranging from ‘none of them (1) to ‘all of them’ (5)

E - As an indicator of economic developpment is used OECD statistics on GDPP - gross national product per capita based on purchasing power parity for the year 1998, dissagregated on the individual level of measurement with the following values USD): Belgium-23571, Denmark-25689, Finland-21751, GBritain-21675, Hungary-10288, Italy-21346, Netherlands-24133, Norway-27186, Poland-7687, Portugal-15790, Sweden-21857.

F - The Herfindahl index as a measure of religious heterogeneity was computed on the basis of RAMP data for each country (by squaring the percentage of members of each major denomination and then summing the resulting numbers) and dissagregated on the individual level of measurement with the following values: Belgium=,60; Denmark=,27;Finland=,36;Great Britain=,76; Hungary=,72; Italy=,38; Netherlands=,70; Norway=,25; Poland=,15; Portugal=,45; Sweden=,32.

H - State regulation of religion is measured by a six- point scale proposed by Chaves and Cann (1992): '(a) there is a single, officially designated state church, (b) there is official state recognition of some denominations but not others, (c) the state appoints or approves the appointment of church leaders, (d) the state directly pays church personnel salaries, (e) there is a system of ecclesiastical tax collection, and (f) the state directly subsidizes, beyond mere tax breaks, the operating, maintenance, or capital expenses for churches. Each item is coded 1 if answered in the affirmative and 0 if answered in the negative'. The scale was extended to Portugal, Poland and Hungary. (Netherlands - 0; Poland - 1; Portugal and Hungary -2; Belgium, Great Britain and Italy - 3, Norway and Denmark - 5, Finland and Sweden - 6).

            The most significant predictor of New Age/fundamentalism is the level of education. Respondent with a higher level of education tend to accept New Age beliefs and the opposite tendency may be observed in the case of fundamentalism. This relationship is much stronger, than in the case of the frequency of attendance, where it is significant only in the case of the first model (without contextual variables). Frequency of attendance is stronger inluenced by sex, age and community size than New Age/fundamentalist beliefs. Women, older respondents and living in a smaller communities are attending more frequently and are more fundamentalistic. The results confirm therefore the interpretation of fundamentalism proposed by Laurence Iannaccone as sectarian option for those with more limited secular possibilities. However, the influence of these variables on frequency of attendance is greater than on acceptance of New Age/fundamentalist beliefs, and therefore the confirmation in a strict sense is restricted only to the influence of education as contributing to the growth of secular opportunities.

The results of regression analysis are more convincing in relation to Thomas Luckmann theory of religion, if we interpret the sociodemographical variables as individual indicators of modernity. Higher education, living in a bigger communities, younger age and being male are indicators of social position in a more modernized sectors of society, the most conducive, according to Luckmann, to the transformation of institutionalized church religion into invisible religion of New Age. The influence of all indicators of ‘modernized’ social localization on the frequency of attendance and New Age beliefs is in accordance with the predictions based on this interpretation. The influence of contextual measure of modernization (gross national product per capita based on purchasing power parity) further confirms Thomas Luckmann’s theory. The level of economic development in a country influences negatively fundamentalism (stronger) and church religiosity (less strongly, but still statistically significant) in the same direction as sociodemographic variables. Respondents from more affluent countries are less religious in the institutional way and less fundamentalistic, and more New Age oriented. These results confirm also the market interpretation of fundamentalism as sectarianism. The influence of economic development on fundamentalism postulated by Iannaccone is stronger than on church religiosity, although the difference is not great.

The results from regression analysis in relation to a measure of religious pluralism on a individual level support the interpretation of Thomas Luckmann and disconfirms the market model. Religious heterogenity in the country as measured by Herfindahl index influences negatively church religiosity and fundamentalism and contributes to the growth of the New Age beliefs as predicts Thomas Luckmann theory.

The degree of state regulation of religion is negatively related both to fundamentalism and church religiosity. The greater the degree of state regulation, the lower level of church religiosity and fundamentalism and the higher level of acceptance of New Age beliefs. The influence of this variable is four times stronger on church religiosity than on New Age/fundamentalist beliefs and when church religiosity is introduced to the regression equation as one of the independent variables, the influence of state regulation on New Age /fundamentalist beliefs becomes insignificant. It therefore confirms the expectations based on the market model of religious change only in in relation to the church religiosity. Prediction based on the Thomas Luckmann theory are falsified the most strongly in relation to church religiosity and in the case of New Age/fundamentalist beliefs they are significantly confirmed only, when freqency of attendence is not introduced into the regression equation.

Conclusions

The reliability and validity of the proposed scale measuring New Age/fundamentalist beliefs seem to be satisfactory. The correlation with the other criterions are significant and positive. Only in case of the acceptance of astrology we have found higher level of belief in horoscopes among fundamentalists than among the New Agers. This, however, may be attributed to the fact, that both astrology and fundamentalism may be related to authoritarian personality traits as interpreted by Adorno et al. (1954). In the RAMP data we have no adequate measure of authoritarianism for controlling its influence, so testing this interpretation have to be left to another study.

            As it is expected in both theories, fundamentalism is more closely associated with church religiosity and greater religious commitment, whereas in case of the New Age we may observe a negative relationship: the lower level of conventional religiosity, the higher level of acceptance of New Age beliefs. The New Age pole of the scale represents therefore an alternative to church religiosity, whereas fundamentalist pole seem to represent its specific form. To some extent it may be a result of the wording of some items related to the belief content, especially the belief in the personal God, which is common for both fundamentalism and church religiosity. In contrast to other items, especially exclusivism, particularism, punishing God image and biblical literalism, it has the weakest discriminatory value in differentiating New Age/fundamentalist beliefs from general religiosity.

            The influences of the sociodemographic variables on New Age/fundamentalist beliefs confirms the expectations based on theories of Thomas Luckmann and Laurence Iannaccone, which have similar predictions, although differently interpreted. Higher education, living in a bigger communities, younger age and being male as indicators of social position in a more modernized sectors of society (Luckmann) or having more secular opportunities (Iannaccone) are conducive to greater acceptance of New Age beliefs. Among these variables, education has the strongest influence on New Age/fundamentalist beliefs, in contrast to church religiosity, where its influence is either very weak or insignificant.

The degree of religious pluralism manifesting in interpersonal networks and in a macrosocial context also contributes to the greater acceptance of New Age beliefs, which supports most clearly predictions based on Thomas Luckmann theory and disconfirms predictions based on the market theory. Having more friends with different religious views contributes to the decline of fundamentalism ( to a greater extent) and church religiosity (to a lesser extent) and to the growth of New Age orientation as predicts the theory of invisible religion. This result may be, however, also interpreted as the result and not as a cause of beliefs held by individuals. Fundamentalist may tend to associate with persons with similar beliefs as a result of their worldview. More obvious is the interpretation of religious pluralism as a contextual variable, where the same direction of influence is observed. Greater religious pluralism contributes to the greater acceptance of New Age beliefs and to the decline of church religiosity.

The influence of the level of state regulation of religion on church religiosity is quite strong and negative, which is in accordance with the predictions of the market model and contrary to the predictions of Thomas Luckmann, where it may be considered as one of the forms of structural differentiation (the less structurally differentiated society, the greater the state intervention on the religious market). The influence of the level of state regulation of religious market on the acceptance of the New Age/fundamentalist beliefs is weaker and significant only, when church religiosity is not introduced to the regression equation (as in the table 4.). We may therefore conclude that the influence of state regulation of religion is restricted mainly to church religiosity and its influence on New Age/fundamentalist beliefs may be the secondary effect of its influence of church religiosity. It may contribute to the growth of New Age, through the weakening of of church religiosity. New Age seems to grow on the ruins of traditional churches and higher state regulation of religious market eroding the activity of the churches may contribute to the growth of the New Age, especially in more affluent and pluralistic societies and among more educated segments of the population. On the contrary, fundamentalism seems to grow in those segments of the population, which are less modernized and less priviledged in material terms and therefore more traditionally religious. In this way our results confirm both Luckmann’s and Iannaccone’s interpretations of these phenomena, which are quite similar in respect to the social and religious background of New Age and fundamentalism. There is, however, one significant exception. The most striking divergencies between these two perspectives were observed in the case of religious pluralism. The results falsify predictions based on the market model and confirm predictions based on the theory developped by Thomas Luckmann. Religious pluralism, which is a crucial variable in both theories, does not stimulate the growth of more traditional forms of religiosity, as expects the market theory of religion. On the contrary, it contributes to its erosion and to the growth of New Age, as predicts the theory of Thomas Luckmann. Therefore, we may conclude that the theory of invisible religion better fits our data than the market theory.

 

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