Religious aspects

This thesis explores how the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) has used media technology as part of its missionary communication strategy. Particular attention is paid to the Internet as a space for religious practice and how the LDS Church has sought to extend its media practices and missionary efforts online. By utilizing new media technology to find individuals interested in hearing its message, the LDS Church faces new challenges to its traditional face-to-face missionary program, its centralized hierarchy of control and its ongoing struggle for identity within American Christian culture. Throughout its history, the LDS Church's missionary communication strategy has used several different methods for finding people to teach but has consistently focused on ensuring that such methods ultimately lead to face-to-face lessons with missionaries, viewed as the most transformative communication exchange for both the missionary and the potential convert.

This thesis examines the first two novels of Frank Herbert's Dune series, Dune and Dune Messiah, in order to consider these two novels from the framework of postcolonial theory and analyze how religious violence becomes a source of subjugation, military power, and colonialism within the works. The three chapters of this thesis chart the creation of a colonial project through epistemic violence, physical power, and cultural control enabled by religion. This thesis argues that, in the Dune novels, religious violence functions as a colonial project that closely resembles the goals of real-world colonial enterprises, and the failure to manage this colonial project by those who initiated it shows that the effects of colonial projects based on religious violence are dangerous and uncontrollable.

The Second Vatican Council of 1962-1965 initiated the translation of the Roman Catholic liturgy into languages other than Latin, spurring numerous ethnic musical settings which have seemingly departed from the unitive nature of a universal Latin liturgy. Following an examination of the musical history of the Latin liturgy, this document examines the changes introduced into music for the Roman Catholic liturgy after Vatican II, discussing how different parishes have subsequently incorporated the teachings of the Council with regard to music for the liturgy. The study then addresses specific post-Vatican II musical settings for the liturgy through an analysis of examples from different cultural backgrounds and a discussion of their positive usage and unifying effects within Catholic communities, in order to demonstrate that through their inclusion of diverse musical and cultural styles united with fidelity to Church teaching, post- Vatican II settings can continue the Church's catholic (universal) mission.

This study investigates the relationship of three protective factors : self transcendance, social interest, and spirituality to well-being among adults living with HIV or AIDS. It is the first study to explore the relationships of these protective factors to well-being. A convenience sample of 115 adults living with HIV or AIDS completed the Self-Transcendance Scale, the Social Interest Index- Short Form-Revised, the Spiritual Perspective Scale, and the Index of Well-Being. The participants were adults diagnosed with HIV or AIDS residing in a large southeastern U.S. city. Data were analyzed with correlational and multiple regression methods. Statistically significant positive moderate to strong relationships were found between well-being and self transcendance (r=.66, p<.001 ), social interest (r=.51, p<.001), and spirituality (r=.39, p<.001). A stepwise regression demonstrated that self transcendance held the highest variance on well-being among the three protective factors (43%). Additionally, self-transcendane and social interest accounted for 45% of the variance in well-being. In short, the hypothesized positive relationship among these protective factors with well-being was supported. This study provides theoretical and empirical support for linking self transcendance, social interest, and spirituality to well-being among adults living with HIV or AIDS. The clinical implications of these findings are also discussed.

A Child's Prayer is a Creative Work of 28 poems. This collection examines the relationship between religion and the familial, the habitual and the sublime. Through the reconfiguring of stories, often from a child's point of view, this collection seeks to question the past through the process of retelling it. Themes that are prevalent include memory, alienation, nourishment, and the sacramental. A Child's Prayer gently questions patriarchal religion and its multi-generational effects.

The number of adults over the age of 65 years living with one of more chronic illness in the United States is an acknowledged health challenge for the 21st century. This qualitative research investigation examined the lived experience for adults living with one or more chronic illnesses in the context of a community of faith with access to a faith community nurse. Interpretative hermeneutic analysis was used for the phenomenological study. Findings indicate that the adults expressed their primary essence is living in abundance while living faith and living caring. The findings from this study describe the relationship between adults living with chronic illness, the community of faith and the faith community nurse. Further, findings from this study contribute to essential knowledge necessary for developing models of health care in the community for adults living with chronic illness and nursing care in the community that are distinct and complex. Findings will also support the development of interventions in contexts of faith communities to support and strengthen adults living with one or more chronic illness. The emerging specialty practice in nursing labeled faith community nursing holds promise to come alongside current models of health care to support living in abundance.

Christian churches in the United States are very diverse. The diversity seen often goes unmentioned by religion and immigration scholars who write about the key role churches play in the assimilation of Hispanic immigrants. Scholars use the word "church" in order to refer to all Christian religious institutions. The use of one word to encompass the broad range of institutions can misguide readers to believe that all Christian churches in the United States help Hispanic immigrants assimilate in the same way. This comparative study includes Anglo, Immigrant, and Transnational Christian churches throughout the United States The focus is to explore the particular methods by which immigrants forge identities in Christian churches, identities with assimilation potential into an already multi-cultural, American society. Whether immigrants build an ethnic identity, a religious identity, or a mix of both, there is no guarantee that the identity developed will help immigrants assimilate.

The surge in granting equal rights to gays and lesbians in the United States is remarkable. Yet with this surge comes a conflict : the civil rights of gays and lesbians against the rights of religious individuals, predominantly Christians, refusing to tolerate a behavior they think immoral. My thesis focuses on two hypothetical situations : a county clerk refusing to issue a marriage license to an engaged lesbian couple and an inn owner refusing a night's stay to a gay couple. In both cases, the clerk and inn owner refuse service for religious reasons. Normatively, I argue that we must move beyond a framework of toleration to a system of equal respect and understanding of our fellow human beings. Legally, I argue that the rights of religious expression and exercise should not trump the civil rights of gays and lesbians in the public sphere.

This paper tests the religious economy model for predicting Church behavior which predicts that religious firms will become more politically active on behalf of potential members in areas where competition for those members is most fierce. An analysis of data from a survey of 106 U.S. Catholic dioceses and archdioceses on outreach to Hispanic immigrants does not support this hypothesis. Religious competition and Church activism on immigration issues did not correlate. Rather, demand for services (measured as Hispanic presence within each diocese) was a better predictor of Church activism on immigration issues. This finding suggests that the "inelastic demand" assumption of the religious economy model must be dropped, re-opening demand side explanations for Church behavior across national and local contexts.