This study examines the religious-secular party cleavage in German morality politics from a new perspective by tracing politicization patterns at the individual level. It builds on the idea of issue competition and explores whether conflicts between Christian Democrats and secular parties align with the traditional denominational divide between Catholics and non-Catholics or with religiosity. By means of logistic regressions of Member of Parliaments’ politicization behavior in the German Bundestag (1998–2002) with regard to three morality policies, the study provides evidence that German politics is still structured by a conflict between Catholics and non-Catholics, whereas the influence of religiosity is secondary. If party competition is at work, non-Catholics draw attention to morality policies, while Catholics refrain from doing so. This finding contradicts research pointing to a decreasing significance of Catholicism for Christian Democracy. Moreover, the study proposes an innovative way to re-examine party cleavages at the individual level and in between elections.

There is a lively debate on the relative impacts of Islam, oil wealth, and Middle Eastern institutional legacies regarding democratization and the spread of liberal values. We examine this issue using religious repression. We argue that oil-wealthy rulers use religious monopoly to control dissent. Our results show that oil wealth increases religious repression above the effects of Muslim dominance and a host of sundry controls. The Middle East and North Africa region seems to matter more than Islam. Interestingly, the conditional effect of oil and the Middle East and North Africa region is positive on religious freedom. The data suggest that several Gulf monarchies have more religious freedoms than other Muslim dominant states, such as Saudi Arabia and Iran, or even Israel and Jordan. The worst religious repression is among oil producers in Central Asia. The results are robust to a host of intervening factors, different measures of oil wealth, alternative data on religious freedom, and estimating method.

Four decades after the Court's landmark decision in Roe v. Wade, the issue of abortion persists as a point of contention for elected officials. The Catholic Church has taken a leading role in the pro-life movement, putting many Catholic representatives in a difficult position as they can be cross-pressured by their party, their constituents, and their own beliefs. Given these pressures, how do Catholic legislators explain their positions on abortion? We address this question via an analysis of public statements about abortion made by Catholic representatives and senators in the 108th Congress. We examine which members comment on abortion and use automated text analysis to measure legislators' certainty and use of moral and religious terms when discussing abortion. Multivariate analysis shows that gender, ethnicity, and an interaction between a member's position on abortion and the number of Catholics in their constituency shape how Catholic legislators discuss abortion.

In this study, we contend that distinguishing individuals who support bans on minority religious symbols from those who want to ban all religious symbols improves our understanding of the roots of opposition to minority religious symbols in the public sphere. We hypothesize that both groups are likely driven by markedly different motivations and that opposition to the presence of minority religious symbols in the public sphere may be the result of an alliance between “strange bedfellows,” clusters of individuals whose political outlooks usually bring them to opposite sides of political debates. Drawing on a survey conducted in the province of Quebec (Canada), we find that while holding liberal values and low religiosity are key characteristics of those who would ban all religious symbols, feelings of cultural threat and generalized prejudice are central characteristics of those who would only restrict minority religious symbols. Negative attitudes specifically toward Muslims, however, also appear to motivate both groups.

The American religious landscape is transforming due to a sharp rise in the percentage of the population that is nonreligious. Political and demographic causes have been proffered but little attention has been paid to the current and potential political impact of these “nones,” especially given the established link between religion, participation, and party politics. I argue that the political impact of nonreligious Americans lies in an unexplored subset of the nonreligious population called committed seculars. Committed seculars de-identify with religion, they adopt secular beliefs, and join organizations structured on secular beliefs. Using a unique survey of a secular organization, the American Humanist Association, I demonstrate that committed seculars are extremely partisan and participatory, and are driven to participate by their ideological extremity in relation to the Democratic Party. These results point to a long-term mobilizing dimension for Democrats and indicate the potential polarizing influence of seculars in party politics.

Most research on the social gospel, a religious interpretation that obliges people to care for the less fortunate and correct social inequalities, has focused on elite rhetoric. However, it is not clear the extent to which members of the public also adhere to this socioreligious philosophy. The moralistic tone of the 2010 health care reform debate has led many to argue that there is a revival of the social gospel. To what extent has this debate gained traction among citizens writ large? Which individuals will be most likely to be influenced by elite discourse that draws social gospel? Using two unique surveys and an experiment, we demonstrate that Social Gospel adherents have distinctive political attitudes. Specifically, they are more attentive to social policy issues and are more supportive of expanding the social safety net. Second, we demonstrate that elite rhetoric that draws from the Social Gospel tradition can influence policy preferences.

Nationalism theory has long acknowledged that in its relation to nationalism, “religion” can refer both to a reflexive identity attached to a people group, and to a reasoned value-based position articulated by an élite. Even this bifurcation remains insufficiently precise. Religio-nationalisms reasoned ex patria—that is, beginning with the nationalist and proceeding from there to incorporate religion—tend toward values of exclusivity and animosity toward “the other”. They have been charged with hijacking religion as an identity while being at odds with those who actively practice that religion or lead its practicing community. The exploratory case of the relationship between Russian Orthodoxy and Russian nationalism allows a comparison of ex patria religio-nationalism with its ex religio counterpart. It supports the hypothesis that when reasoned religio-nationalism begins with the religious and proceeds to the nationalist, emphases such as inclusivity and benevolence—rather than exclusivity and animosity—are to the fore.