The Concept of Lived Religion in Living Faith: Everyday Religion and Mothers in Poverty by Susan Crawford Sullivan
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.61942/msj.v4i3.636Keywords:
lived religion, everyday religion, poverty, sociology of religion, Susan Crawford SullivanAbstract
This article examines the concept of “lived religion” as developed in Susan Crawford Sullivan’s Living Faith: Everyday Religion and Mothers in Poverty. The study focuses on how religion is practiced in the everyday lives of low-income mothers in the United States. Drawing on Sullivan’s qualitative-ethnographic study, the article shows that religion for these women does not depend primarily on institutional participation but is sustained instead through personal, flexible, and context-sensitive practice. The article analyzes Sullivan’s principal findings and assesses her contribution to the sociology of religion, arguing that religion functions simultaneously as a coping mechanism, a source of meaning, and a resource for moral negotiation under conditions of structural constraint. The discussion closes by considering the concept’s relevance for contemporary religious studies more broadly, including its potential application to Islam as a discursive tradition.
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