22 Robert Wuthnow
that rendered it difficult to prove or disprove convincingly with empirical evidence
(Smelser 1994, 1995). For those interested in studying religion, the insights it yielded
also proved extremely limited. A student interested in sibling differences in religious
behavior, for instance, might learn that one sibling had a stronger “preference” for re-
ligious gratifications, but remain curious about the reasons behind this preference, the
extent to which upbringing played a role, and the ways in which siblings with different
beliefs manage to negotiate their relationships with each other.
Most sociologists, however, do not in practice appear to be seeking a unified theory
of human behavior (Martin 1999). In the discipline at large, theory-building now ap-
pears to be understood in practice as ameansto an end, rather than as an end in itself.
That is, textbook depictions of theory as a parsimonious set of deductive propositions
that organize a large number of the regularities of social life seem to have virtually no
counterpart in the ways in which empirical sociology is actually conducted. Instead,
theory is better described as a set ofsensitizing conceptsthat help one to make sense
of some empirical findings. These concepts may be loosely translated from one study
to another, but their role is mainly to generate empirical insights, rather than to be
welded into a theory that explains all aspects of human behavior. Ideas about social
class, gender, race, ethnicity, identity, self, movement, subculture, power, mobiliza-
tion, social capital, community, and individualism all function largely in this manner
as sensitizing concepts.
Understood this way, theory is seen more as atoolfor the study of religion, rather
than an endeavor that diverts attention from truly attempting to understand religious
behavior. A student interested in siblings need not seek to cast her project as a contribu-
tion to secularization theory or rational choice theory, but can find her study enriched
by considering such sensitizing concepts as birth order effects, sibling rivalry, gender
differences, and styles of parenting.
If sensitizing concepts are selected almost entirely on the basis of how much they
contribute to our understanding of one small aspect of the world, the question that
then must be asked is how much does the study of religion contribute to our under-
standing ofotheraspects of social life? In other words, is the study of religion relatively
isolated from work in the wider discipline, or is there fruitful exchange and, if so, is the
study of religion a borrower that depends mostly on insights from other subfields or a
contributor that generates theoretical insights of wider interest?
Much of the work that has been done by sociologists of religion over the past quarter
century or so, it surely must be conceded, has had relatively little impact on the wider
discipline of sociology. And, to the extent that this is the case, some tension is likely to
be perceived between the study of religion (no matter how sociological) and the study
of other aspects of social life. Yet this is understandable because religion itself is such
a rich field of social inquiry. Describing the internal workings of an immigrant church
or explaining why young people join esoteric religious movements are examples of
important research topics in the sociology of religion – whether or not they happen
to be of interest to students of criminology or economic sociology. Indeed, a proper
understanding of theory as a set of sensitizing concepts helps to reinterpret the meaning
of an accusation that someone’s work is “not theoretical.” What the critic is probably
saying is that she or he has a certain set of concepts that happen to be of interest
(organizations, power, crime) and that a study of some aspect of religion happens not
to deal with those concepts.