Summary Of Bruce Lincoln's Thinking About Religion

In the book Thinking about religion after September 11, Bruce Lincoln explains the polythetic and flexible definition of religion according to four domains (2003). The first domain he states is “Discourse” which refers to the spoken and written words in a religion. The second domain Lincoln talks about is “Practice” which refers to the ritual and behavior performed in a religion. The third domain Lincoln explains is “Community” which refers to a group of people in a religion closely tied to identity. Finally, the fourth domain he explains is “Institution” which refers to the officials that regulate the discourse, practices and community (Lincoln, 2003).
During our visit to the Holy Mass at GSU, we observed all of these four domains that Lincoln