Religious Congregations and Communities

Abstract

Although recent research reveals a rise in emerging adults who report no affiliation with a specific religious tradition, religious communities still remain important to many emerging adults. This chapter examines trends in emerging adults’ involvement with both formal religious congregations and informal religious communities, and discusses how these communities are an important resource for some in making meaning, discovering a sense of purpose, and identity exploration. Attention will be given to how identity formation and religious development occur within these congregations and communities, while positing that religious congregations and communities are complex ecological systems that provide opportunities for meaning-making through various ideological, social, and transcendent contexts.