Religious coping with contingency as a resource for democracy?

Abstract

AbstractThis quantitative study empirically examines the mediating factors between Christian religiosity, political trust, and populist attitudes. As a novel approach, we ask whether religious coping with contingency reduces anxiety among religious citizens. Given that anxiety can reduce institutional trust and increase the appeal of populism, religiously reduced anxiety could support democratic attitudes. In addition, generalized social trust and acceptance of immigration are tested as further mediators between Christian religiosity and its political outcomes. Based on a recent representative sample of the German population (6th Membership Survey of the Protestant and Roman Catholic Churches in Germany), regression analyses find limited evidence for the coping thesis. Overall, religious coping, generalized social trust, and acceptance of immigration together explain to a large extent the higher prevalence of political trust and the lower prevalence of populist attitudes among liberal Christians in Germany.