Salience and congregational growth : revisiting the strictness thesis.

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Date
2013-09-16Author
Ferguson, Todd W.
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Since Kelley’s (1972) Why Conservative Churches Are Growing, scholars have
examined the relationship between congregational strictness and growth. This paper
seeks to further develop the strict church thesis by suggesting that strictness leads to
growth when it addresses salient issues. Using binary logistic regression to analyze data from the 2000 Faith Communities Today survey, I find that, while overall strictness
continues to be positively associated with congregational growth, only prohibitions that
are salient within a religious tradition have an impact on congregational growth.
Therefore, this study supports a more nuanced understanding of strictness. Strictness
does not always lead to congregational growth. Instead, growth is contingent upon an
issue’s salience.