ABSTRACT

Rational choice theory has been encountered quite extensively in discussing secularisation. It is perhaps the most systematic recent attempt to provide a general theory of religion. The earliest statement of the rational choice approach was set out by Stark and Bainbridge. Religion, Stark and Bainbridge argue, is essentially an attempt to gratify desires or, as they put it, secure rewards. For Stark and Bainbridge religion is the attempt to secure desired rewards in the absence of alternative means. There is a certain slipperiness in Stark and Bainbridge’s use of the concept of reward. Not only is everlasting life in paradise a reward but so is the explanation of how it can be attained and the sense of meaning it can give to life. Stark and Bainbridge treat scientific propositions as if they were unproblematic with regard to verification and the reasons people have for believing them are similarly seen as unproblematic.