SHIFTING BELIEFS
According to data in 2000, Centre County, home to Penn State, has 174 religious groups, ranging in type from Baha'i, to Old Order Amish, to the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Out of the 174 total, 25 are Evangelical Protestant. Out of that total, the Wesleyans were the county's fastest growing religious group, with a 490.07 percent increase since 1990. The fastest decreasing group were the Friends, who lost 208 adherents from 1990–2000, or 63 percent. During that same time period, the country was home to 9,024 Catholics, 150 Jews, 400 Muslims, and twenty members of the Free Methodist Church of North America.
And where does this bevy of religious information reside?
At the American Religion Database Archives (ARDA), an online database started in 1997 by Roger Finke, professor of religious studies and history. The idea behind the archive is simple: Finke realized that when someone collected data for a book or article, the information was usually then discarded, left indefinitely on someone's hard drive or backup files. Finke began contacting the authors of these books and articles and asked them if they would donate their material to the archive, which is free to the public. Launched in 1998, ARDA began with 33 data sets; it now has over 300. The ARDA is now housed at Penn State and is funded by the Lilly Endowment.
Chris Scheitle, one of Finke's graduate students, works with Project Manager Gail Ulmer and fellow graduate student Heather Kindell to keep the archive up to date, entering data, and tracking down authors. The archive, which gets a tremendous number of daily users—between 50,000 to 60,000 hits each day—has evolved over the years, he says.
“At first, ARDA was purely a data archive, geared primarily toward researchers and statisticians,” he explains. “But we've made it much more accessible since we realized it's used not just by researchers but by ministers, community group leaders, and the media.”
So besides the type of information cited above (which was found under “Interactive Maps and Reports for Religious Congregations and Membership 1990–2000”), you can review the lineage and membership trends of over 600 religious groups, read and download over 300 surveys including a 2004 ABC Poll on Religion and Politics, the 1999 Gallup Poll of Catholics, or a 2002 survey from the American National Election Studies and much more. Scheitle, who fields calls from the media at least three times a week, helps make the information more user-friendly, determining which parts of surveys may be the most interesting.
“We always make sure to describe the data set fully,” he says. “We provide the full questions, when it was collected, who funded it, and then provide links to the topics.”
Scheitle just recently finished his Master's thesis using Web site links to study the social networks of congregations. His interest in religion began while he was at Trinity University, in San Antonio. Although he says it's still early to firmly decide on a dissertation topic, he thinks he wants to focus on so-called para-church groups, or groups that have religious missions but aren't based in congregations, such as Focus on the Family.
But whatever aspect he chooses to study, Scheitle emphasizes that he's not in it for the theology.
“My friends will ask me ‘What do the so-and-so believe in?'” he laughs. “And I'll say I have no idea. It's hard for them to remember that religious study doesn't necessarily mean belief systems.”
Visit ARDA at: http://www.thearda.com/