It’s no secret that two trends are on the rise: Americans are as distrustful of political, religious, and cultural institutions as ever, and many Americans are also lonelier than ever. In a country so seemingly divided along political and cultural lines, what role can faith play in healing our communities? That’s what Rebecca Glazier seeks to find out in her new book, Faith and Community: How Engagement Strengthens Members, Places of Worship, and Society, which came out in July from Temple University Press.
Glazier, who is a professor in the School of Public Affairs at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, has been gathering data on faith and community since 2012 as part of the (ongoing) Little Rock Congregations Study. She and her team have surveyed more than 4,000 congregants from a variety of traditions and faiths. It all started with the religiously contentious election not of 2016, but 2012, which was marked by controversial sermons by Barack Obama’s pastor, Jeremiah Wright, and the notably public faith of Mormon Mitt Romney.
“We wanted to figure out what was going on with religion and politics in that election,” Glazier told me in an interview for Common Good.
As Glazier and her students began their research, the project became less about politics and more about community. The results showed a surprisingly optimistic view of faith and community, especially, as Glazier noted, in a city like Little Rock that was so starkly divided by politics, race, and socioeconomic status.
She said, “What I’m finding in my city is congregation after congregation working to help make their communities better.”
In Faith and Community, Glazier reports that when congregants take action in their communities, the community reaps rewards on multiple levels. Community-engaged churchgoers report being happier and healthier, as well as feeling closer to God. Churches and places of worship that exhibit outward-facing services have warmer congregational cultures, more consistent and frequent attendance, and higher levels of giving. The communities of these congregants see benefits too: Congregations with high levels of community engagement have higher levels of political efficacy, and their members were more likely to say, “My voice matters,” and “I can do something.”
Community engagement from those of faith is “really good for democracy,” said Glazier. “It really counters those feelings of disconnection, disillusionment, and jadedness that we see so much in the political system these days.”
What Is Community Engagement?
Glazier and her team define community engagement as “anything that is looking outside of the congregation.” For some Little Rock churches, community engagement looks like large-scale initiatives to combat homelessness, food pantries, or health screenings. For others, community engagement meant creating community gardens, holding interfaith panels and events, or preserving and recording a complicated history (one church sits across the street from Little Rock’s Central High School, the site of a 1957 desegregation crisis).
It was important to Glazier that Faith and Community drew upon an accurate sample of the faiths of Little Rock. So while the large majority of respondents were from various Christian traditions, Muslims, Jews, and Buddhists were also represented.
Faith and Community also studied specific topics within Little Rock congregations over the years, including researching the issues that were most important to congregations. One survey asked respondents what issues were most important to them: Education, healthcare, and marriage and family took the top spots. However, a follow-up question asked what issues congregants would like to see their church address.
The top response? Race.
“This was in October of 2020,” said Glazier. “When things were especially fraught, I think people were returning to their places of worship and saying, ‘We want to do something about this from a faith perspective.’”
This finding pointed toward a larger theme Glazier found time and time again in her 12-year study: that faith “can be a powerful force for good” in our communities. Community engagement is so much more than a bonus item in the mission of a church. Instead, as Glazier found, “When those congregations look outside themselves, their members are happier and healthier, their congregation flourishes, and our democracy and society are better off.”