Brad Wright is associate professor at the University of Connecticut where he studies the sociology of Christianity. I enjoy reading Brad’s blog which offers up an interesting mixture of sociological analysis, Christian reflections, great photography and just plain fun.

Brad has written an excellent 13-part review of the recently published book, UnChristian: What a New Generation Really Thinks about Christianity… and Why It Matters, by David Kinnaman (president of the George Barna Institute) and Gabe Lyons (of the Fermi Project). The book is based on research from the Barna Group.

Here are the links to Brad’s series. Part five is especially good as Brad questions the lack of peer-review process in much research on Christianity and the church. Parts seven and eight are also very interesting as Brad compares the supposed “image problem” of Christianity with other groups, such as Atheists, Muslims, Hispanics and Jews. Finally, part thirteen raises the issue of the purpose of applied research on Christianity: Should research on Christianity be primarily useful or accurate? The whole series is excellent, and I encourage you to read through all the posts as time allows.

Part 1: Review of UnChristian
Part 2: Summary of Findings
Part 3: Reactions to UnChristian
Part 4: What Works Well
Part 5: Critiquing Research about Christianity
Part 6: Do Christians have an image problem? Compared to whom?
Part 7: Comparing the image of Christianity to other groups (I)
Part 8: Comparing the image of Christianity to other groups (II)
Part 9: Comparing the image of Christianity to other groups (III)
Part 10: Have attitudes toward Christianity changed over time?
Part 11: Age vs. cohort effects
Part 12: Evangelicals embrace of negative stereotypes
Part 13: Should research on Christianity be primarily useful or accurate?

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