Grace Davie is Professor Emeritus in the Sociology of Religion at the University of Exeter UK and a senior adviser to the Impact of Religion Research Programme at Uppsala University. She is a past-president of the American Association for the Sociology of Religion (2003). Her publications include Religion in Britain since 1945 (Blackwell 1994), Religion in Modern Europe (2000), Europe: the Exceptional Case (2002) and The Sociology of Religion (Sage 2007 and 2013).

List of Figures and Tables ix

Preface xi

Part I Preliminaries 1

1 Introduction: A Framework for Discussion 3

2 Contexts and Generations 19

3 Facts and Figures 41

Part II Religious Legacies 69

4 Cultural Heritage, Believing without Belonging and Vicarious Religion 71

5 Territory, Politics and Institutions 91

6 Presence: Who Can Do What for Whom? 113

Part III Shifting Priorities: From Obligation to Consumption 133

7 An Emerging Market: Gainers and Losers 135

8 Proliferations of the Spiritual 155

Part IV Public Religion and Secular Reactions 175

9 Managing Diversity 177

10 Religion in Public Life 197

Part V Thinking Theoretically 219

11 Religion and Modernity Continued 221

References 237

Index 255