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(a) Explain sociological challenges to religious belief. The sociological approach to religious belief looks at how society behaves on a whole, to answer the question, "Why are people religious?" Durkheim tried to show that religion, despite its importance to the religious individual, was a separate social experience. He defined religion as a "unified system of beliefs and practices related to sacred things." Therefore we must understand sacred symbols and what they represent. As a Functionalist, religion maintains social stability by removing tension that can disrupt social order. Religion is seen in a positive light, promoting harmony in society. He studied the Australian Aborigines, where each clan had a symbolic, usually of nature, totem, to identify itself by and used in sacred ceremonies. He therefore concluded that since the totem was involved in scared ritual, it was a symbol of both society and God, so the Aborigines worshiped both God and society....

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