Several recent works have addressed the issue of the origin of religion. Some have linked this occurrence to evolutionary mechanisms, others to sociological processes, and still others to psychological functions. Each position has interest and sheds a different light on a necessarily complex process. The paper examines several of these theories and offers a synthetic perspective which integrates psychological, sociological, evolutionary, and theological concepts in a new manner.

As evidenced by this conference, the intersections between religion and information are beginning to be recognized and explored. However, the literature on information seeking and religion has tended to focus on the information behavior of religious leaders (see Michels, 2009, 2012; Roland, 2007; Roland & Wicks, 2009; Wicks, 1999). Several papers from the previous two CSIR Conferences on Information and Religion focus on information seeking, use and evaluation, but the emphasis continues to be placed on examining these topics from an historical or clergy-centered perspective.

This paper offers an alternative approach to the study of information and religion by exploring information seeking practices in the context of religious conversion. Based on a search for peer-reviewed articles and conference proceedings in the major library and information science (LIS), religious studies, anthropology, and sociology databases, this paper includes what Marcia J. Bates has called a “rigorous systematic bibliography” (1976). I identify ways in which the concept of information seeking in the religious conversion process has been presented in the literature under subject terms, in combination with keyword searching. Using this method, I draw attention to the presence of information and information seeking in the existing literature on religious conversion.

By highlighting the ways in which these articles illustrate the concept of information seeking in the process of religious conversion, I develop a thorough definition of religious conversion and discuss its implications for our discipline’s understanding of “the social construction of religious knowledge” – the theme of this year’s Conference on Information and Religion. My findings build upon Jarkko Kari’s work on spiritual information phenomena (Kari 2011, 2009, 2007, 2001; Kari & Hartel 2007), and will further contribute to scholarly knowledge about information practices in religious contexts.

The missiological strategies developed in the Middle Ages by the adherents of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity were centripetal in approach, drawing persons inward to a central structure. Multiplex institutions—kahals, zawiyas and monasteries—were constructed as outposts for the spread and/or maintenance of these religions’ respective beliefs and practices. In addition to the standard religious structures were collections of religious documents – libraries, in other words – that served as repositories for both Scriptures and other spiritually-oriented information. Those who made use of such collections added to them and in their comprehensive form they served as resource material for the education of successive generations. In this essay the origins and histories of the Jewish kahals, the Muslim zawiyas and the Christian monasteries will be explored with particular attention paid to the role played by the document collections in each. The authors will show how these institutions operated on the basis of a combination of both centripetalism (i.e. “coming in to a center”) and centrifugalism (i.e. “going out from a center”). The Muslim zawiyas and the Christian monasteries were intentionally spread throughout their respective regions as “missionary outposts.” The Jewish kahals were spread less intentionally but served in certain cases as “advertisements” for Judaism. All three institutions played vital roles in shaping, maintaining and spreading their respective religious beliefs and practices, and their equivalents can still do so in the present day.

In Information Science studies, the Data/Information/Knowledge/Wisdom (DIKW) hierarchy is a conventional construct for making sense of the terms. However, when examined with any rigor, the distinctions become challenged and the hierarchy appears to fail. I suggest that the reason for this is the tacit classification of this hierarchy as a disciplinary ontological narrative. With context-appropriate definitions and delimitations, the DIKW hierarchy can still be useful as a model for specific applications in information literacy pedagogy. This is illustrated in the context of theological education by using the construct to differentiate the identification of primary sources in the Seminary disciplines.

Keywords: information literacy, research methods, primary sources, critical thinking, discernment, DIKW

This paper examines the intersection of religion and information delivery in the early 1970s, specifically regarding how Christian denominations reacted to the Watergate Scandal during Richard M. Nixon’s presidency. As church bodies determined to voice their opinions about the controversy swirling in the American political system, they first grappled with how best to communicate to a large audience, which included first, their lay constituencies, next their leadership networks and clergy, and finally the larger American public. Understanding how they engaged in this communication at that time can assist scholars today who study the past and want to examine it as accurately and thoroughly as possible.