Keywords

6.1 Introduction

The model in which prominent world religions and secular ideologies are seen as mutually exclusive is challenged by migration, the transformative effect of modernization, increasing validity of spirituality, New Age spirituality, syncretistic religions, charismatic religiosity, fundamentalism, and the individualization of religion (Droogers & Harskamp, 2014; Hedges, 2017). The increasingly complex global map of worldviews is further complicated on the individual level, where studies on the religiosity of youth in the West point to trends of religious decline (Uecker et al., 2007; Arnett, 2004; Voas & Crockett, 2005; Koenig, 2015; Niemelä, 2015), but also to change (Dandelion, 2010; Woodhead, 2010) and individualization (Arnett & Jensen, 2002; Arnett, 2004; Smith & Snell, 2009; Mikkola et al., 2007). The latter poses a challenge on any insistence that an individual has to fit into an existing worldview category which excludes certain other categories.

Even though we cannot automatically assume that findings in the West have validity everywhere else (Arnett, 2015), we can still use the above mentioned observations as clues to investigating outlooks that deviate from the norm. We focus on university students participating in the international research project Young Adults and Religion in a Global Perspective (YARG). The YARG-project contains 12 national studies, each yielding three to eight outlook types, or worldview prototypes (see Chap. 1 in this volume). The present study starts with the observation that many respondents did not stand out as defining respondents in the study that we conducted with the Faith Q-Sort (FQS) originally developed by David Wulff (2019). Their personal outlooks do not jive with the mainstream typology , and we considered these individuals as natural candidates in a study that explores individualized worldviews. That is the task we set to ourselves. By taking minor and hitherto unexplored outlooks seriously, we use the FQS for assessing the subjective outlook-domain. We first analyze a large sample consisting of all non-defining respondents (All Respondents, or All). After that, we investigate two sub-samples. The first one consists of respondents not associated with any initial prototypes (No Association, or NA). The second one consists of respondents associated with multiple prototypes (Confounded Association, or CA). Moreover, we explore respondent interviews in order to shed light on the above mentioned contemporary trends. Chapter 7 in this volume approaches a similar task yet differently, by focusing on unusual sorting patterns of individual worldview statements. In this chapter, the focus is on outlying patterns in whole gestalts.

6.2 Q-methodology and Unknown Territories

Q-methodology is well-suited for charting unknown territories; “making discoveries rather than testing our reasoning” (Stephenson, 1953). In the YARG-project, the particular Q-methodological application, FQS , is designed to assess the worldview domain. The point of departure for the project is to remain agnostic about the outcomes. The approach is exploratory, seeking to discover previously unknown, interpersonally shared worldview types, and to generate theories to account for what is discovered.

The theoretical assumption behind Q-methodology is that only a limited number of shared viewpoints exist on a given subject. (Brown, 1980; Smith et al., 1995; Brouwer, 1999). For the prominent viewpoints to emerge in a Q-study, two conditions have to be met. First, the instrument, in this case the FQS , needs to represent the concourse – all that can be stated about the topic. The material consists of existing opinions and arguments that lay people, organizations and researchers have to say about the topic (van Exel & de Graaf, 2005). Second, the respondents must be chosen strategically, to reflect the variety of prominent viewpoints.

To maximize the variation of viewpoints in the sample of respondents, the interview volunteers in the YARG-project were first clustered based on their scores on the 19 value types in the Portrait Values Questionnaire (PVQ ), the revised instrument for assessing basic human values (Schwartz et al., 2012). The clustering was used to assist in the selection of a heterogeneous subsample of interviewees, not as a basis for analysis. An attempt was made to have a sufficient number of clusters to reveal minority dispositions, even if that meant incorporating clusters of only a couple of cases. Individuals were then selected from each cluster, aiming at interpersonal variety based on gender, demographic factors, religious, spiritual or non-religious belongings, degrees of self-reported religiosity, experiences of discrimination, and expressed attitudes on topics such as same-sex marriage, abortion, and euthanasia.

Despite efforts to maximize the variety of viewpoints by maximizing demographic and attitude diversity, participants were not identified by preconceived types of outlooks (e.g. fundamentalists, atheists), since the spectrum and flavors of existing outlooks are precisely what was not known at the outset. Although the sample of respondents represents cultural diversity, we cannot be sure that the major viewpoints are represented in any given local case study. That being said, when all the local case studies are compared with each other, we can assess whether some viewpoints are prominent, in the sense of being closely reproduced in different cultural contexts.

A number of national samples represent an opportunity to explore whether transnationally shared viewpoints exist in cases where an intersubjectively shared viewpoint is not visible in a local case study, due to being overshadowed by the nationally prominent viewpoints. This is exemplified by the studies from Sweden and India. In Sweden, the sample of respondents consisted of 30 individuals, yielding three prototypes. Any prototype would have to be defined by at least two respondents. The Q-sorts from six individuals did not fulfil the criteria for being a defining respondent. In India, the sample consisted of 45 respondents, yielding eight prototypes. Fifteen respondents were not included as defining respondents. In Sweden, one fifth, and in India, one third of the respondents held viewpoints that we might want to explore further. In the national samples the variance not accounted for by the emerging prototypes ranged from 42% to 61%.

The results from our YARG project show that prototypes form clusters based on similar patterns, according to what was described in Chap. 4 of this volume as a family-resemblance . The major prototypes from different countries find close likenesses in other national contexts and in the five global prototypes extracted from an analysis of the whole sample (see Chap. 3 in this volume). To explore whether or not this would be the case with minor, not yet discovered prototypes, we need to go beyond the national contexts. To do this, we combine many non-defining respondents from various national samples into a larger sample. If hitherto unidentified worldview prototypes exist, this approach may reveal them.

The sample consisted of 176 non-defining respondents from 12 countries: Canada, China, Finland, Ghana, Israel , India, Peru, Poland, Russia, Sweden, Turkey and USA. This is roughly one third of all respondents who participated in the interviews. Forty-five respondents were non-defining in the stricter sense of not being significantly associated with any prototype. This sub-sample is named No Association (NA). The remaining 131 respondents were confounded, meaning that they were associated with multiple prototypes, and hence, could not be classified as defining only one prototype. This sub-sample is named Confounded Association (CA).

6.3 Worldviews of all Non-defining Respondents

We started by conducting an analysis of the combined sample of all non-defining respondents (All Respondents, or All) to get an initial impression about the outlook variation amongst our respondents. We chose a solution that yielded three prototypes, explaining not more than 35% of the study variance. Since more than half of the variance remained unexplained, we will later continue by analyzing separately two sub-samples.

We present the distinguishing features of the three prototypes. We call the first prototype Spiritual Secular Humanist. It expresses a secular humanist worldview, and rejects traditional religiosity rooted in a particular tradition. Faith in a personal divinity, religious texts, and authorities are all dismissed. This goes side by side with openness to experiential spirituality, and to the plurality of religious traditions. Emotionally, this prototype favors statements that indicate stability (see Appendix 1 for all statements).

We call the second prototype Religious Humanist. It differs from the previous one in how it relates to traditional religiosity. Persons associated with this prototype have a close relationship with the divine, invest time in their faith, and appreciate religious texts. Spiritual experiences dominate their emotional landscape. They have a humanist spirit as well, but in contrast to the first prototype, it plays a secondary role. Religiosity is the dominant feature.

The religious beliefs expressed by the third prototype, Vague Traditionalist, are vague or ambiguous. This prototype does not invest in either personal or collective religious practices, but there is an appreciation of traditions and particular beliefs. Experientially, this prototype reports the most negative emotions.

Since David Wulff conducted his first pilot FQS study, a recurring feature has been the three-pronged division into Secular Humanist, Traditional Religious, and Spiritual outlooks. With some local variations, these three tend to occupy central positions in various contexts (Wulff, 2019). This was also evident from the analysis of all respondents that yielded five global prototypes (see Chap. 3 of this volume). The first phase of the study showed that when analyzed as a group, our respondents bear some resemblances to the secular and religious types. Combined, these two prototypes explain 26% of the study variance. The third prototype explains 6%. It does not neatly fit on the secular-religious spectrum, nor does it resemble global prototype 4, Spiritually Attuned. Even though this prototype is small, it being of a less common type hints at the usefulness of further investigation. We next pay closer attention to the two sub-samples at our disposal, beginning with the respondents who in the national case studies were not associated with any of the prototypes of the national case studies.

6.4 Worldviews of Respondents Not Associated with any Initial Prototypes

The first-glance impression of the FQS analysis of the 45 respondents not Associated with any Initial Prototypes (No Association, or NA) is that it is difficult to find a dominant outlook. An eight-factor solution explains 51% of the total variance, the number of defining respondents ranging from two (NA7, NA8) to seven (NA1). The correlations between the factors are relatively negligible, giving the impression of disparate outlooks. This impression is strengthened by the fact that the analysis did not discern any statements sorted in a similar way by all prototypes. In the following, we list the distinguishing worldview statements of each prototype in order to give a general impression about their characteristics.

Prototype 1 with its seven defining respondents is the largest one. It is distinguished by experiential spirituality, feeling spiritually moved and deeply sustained by music, art, or poetry. Positively engaged by or interested in other peoples’ religious traditions, persons of this prototype have experienced moments of profound illumination. Rather than living their earthly life in conscious anticipation of a life hereafter, they are committed to following a spiritual path that is in harmony with the environment. This prototype does not value or strive to safeguard personal purity. It rejects the ideas of men and women being intended for different roles, certain beliefs being crucial for salvation, and taking comfort in the idea of those not living righteously facing suffering or punishment.

Prototype 2 has six defining respondents. This is a traditionally religious prototype that invests time and resources in religion, appreciates tradition, religious texts and authorities, and has experiences of the divine. These features combine with appreciation of other traditions. Seeing religious faith as a never-ending quest, persons with this outlook become more religious at times of crisis.

Prototype 3 has four defining respondents. Persons of this prototype believe in some way, without considering themselves religious. They value continuity of the religious traditions of family and ancestors, consider men and women to be meant for different roles, and spend time in private religious or spiritual practices.

The remaining prototypes are smaller, each with two or three defining respondents. Prototype 4 curiously understands the divine as feminine, life force or energy, yet views the divine empty of significance. Taking no interest in religious or spiritual matters, persons of this prototype nevertheless spend much time reading or talking about their convictions. Emotionally, this prototype is stable. Religion is probably not the source of that stability, as they engage in religious services mainly for extrinsic reasons. As such, it seems that this prototype is more secular than the outlooks endorsing female divinity explicated in Chap. 7 of this book.

Prototype 5 has an impersonal conception of the divine, affirms the idea of reincarnation, and feels confident of attaining salvation. Believing that one should remain loyal to the religion of one’s nation, persons of this prototype regard religion as a central means of becoming a better person.

Prototype 6 sees this world as a place of suffering and sorrow. Persons of this prototype live their lives in conscious anticipation of a life hereafter. Valuing their purity, they prefer their sexuality to be guided by a spiritual or religious outlook. These preferences combine with being critical and lacking loyalty towards the religion of their people.

Prototype 7 and individuals associated with it believe in some way, without viewing themselves as religious. Finding it difficult to believe in a benevolent divine being in the face of evil, they affirm the idea of reincarnation and sense a spiritual or higher order of reality in the midst of nature.

Prototype 8 stands for mainly associating with persons of the same outlook. Critical of the religious tradition of their people, persons of this prototype nevertheless feel the importance of maintaining continuity of the religious traditions of their family and ancestors. Divine is seen both in personal terms, and as a life force.

Based on their distinguishing features, the first two prototypes have some resemblance with global prototype 4, Spiritually Attuned and global prototype 3, Noncommitted Traditionalist in our study (see Chap. 3) and the spiritual and traditional religious worldviews found in other studies (e.g. Wulff, 2019). After the first two, the prototypes get both smaller and more idiosyncratic. Prototype 4 holds the divine to be impersonal, feminine, and empty of significance. Prototype 8 is critical of the religious tradition of “their people”, yet in favor of maintaining the continuity of the religious traditions of the family and ancestors. These are examples of apparently contradictory features within one outlook. One is tempted to wonder, whether these respondents just didn’t pay enough attention during the assessment. We will return to this later by analyzing some respondent interviews.

6.5 Worldviews of Respondents Associated with Multiple Prototypes

A total of 131 respondents in the national case studies were associated with at least two prototypes, and these are called Confounded Association (CA). In our analysis of these, seven factors satisfy the criterion of having at least two defining respondents. Three factors are prominent, combined explaining 34% of the total variance. The remaining four factors explain 17%.

With 34 defining respondents, prototype 1 is the prominent viewpoint. Its outlook is of a secular humanist type, with an activist orientation. Without considering themselves religious, persons of this prototype believe in some way. Divinity is conceived in impersonal terms, and there is positive engagement and an inclination to embrace elements from various religious and spiritual traditions. Taking delight in paradox and mystery, they do not think that certain specific beliefs are crucial for salvation.

Persons of prototype 2 are of the traditionally religious type. Being religious or spiritual is central to them. They have dedicated their life to serving the divine, whom they see in intimate and personal terms. They express their religion in private practices, which do not involve a particular diet. They have not moved from one group to another in search of a spiritual or ideological home.

Prototype 3 is similar to prototype 1, but it rejects religion more strongly, is less inspired by the plurality of religious or spiritual traditions, and is not inclined to give time or money to religious organizations or worthy causes. However, persons of this prototype may become more religious in a time of crisis. Feeling adrift, without direction, purpose, or goal, they like to associate with those who share their outlook.

Persons associated with prototype 4 are consumed by day-to-day responsibilities, leaving little or no time for spiritual matters. Without feeling closest to those who share the same faith or outlook, they participate in religious practices chiefly to meet others’ wishes or expectations. Lacking keen awareness of the presence of the divine, they do not view the divine or higher reality as a deep mystery that can be pointed to but never fully understood. They are not committed to following a spiritual path that is in harmony with the environment.

Prototype 5 longs for a deeper, more confident faith, and has a pronounced sense of guilt. This is the only prototype in this sample that is open to the idea that ritual or practice is more important than particular beliefs or mystical or spiritual experiences, yet persons of this prototype do not participate in religious practices to meet others’ wishes or expectations. For them, the divine is not a sheltering and nurturing parent.

Persons of prototype 6 express their religion in charitable acts or social action, and consider the meaning of religious texts and teachings to be clear and true. Not seeing regular attendance at places of worship to be essential, they participate in religious activities to form or maintain social relationships. Having experienced moments of profound illumination, they seek to intensify their experience of the divine or some otherworldly reality. They do not view religion as a central means for becoming a better person, nor do they battle with dark or evil inner impulses.

Individuals associated with prototype 7 sense a divine or universal luminous element within. Viewing religious faith as a never-ending quest, they think that the world’s religious traditions point to a common truth. The meaning of religious texts and teachings is clear and true for them, and not of human authorship. They do not have frequent doubts about long-held religious convictions. Persons of this prototype neither feel contempt for religious institutions, ideas and practices, nor view religion as the illusory creation of human fears and desires.

6.6 Summary of the Three Samples

In the combined sample, the three prototypes found resemblances in the further sub-samples. In the No Association (NA) sub-sample, the second prototype resembled the Religious Humanist prototype, and the third prototype resembled the Vague Traditionalist prototype. The remaining prototypes did not resemble any of the prototypes of the combined sample. In the confounded sub-sample, the first prototype resembled the Spiritual Secular Humanist prototype, and the second prototype was similar to the Religious Humanist prototype.

Are the smaller prototypes we found in the analyses of the outlier respondents truly idiosyncratic? Or would they at a closer look be similar to other major prototypes, found in the broader YARG context of national samples? To examine this, we compared the prototypes of this study with YARG prototypes derived from the national case studiesFootnote 1 by their relative location on a two-dimensional model, using multidimensional scaling. In this model, the more two prototypes resemble each other, the closer their coordinates, whereas increased distance, conversely, points to notable outlook differences.

The prototypes from the combined sample All Respondents are marked with All1–3, the prototypes from the No Association sample are marked with NA1–8, and the prototypes from the Confounded Association sample are marked with CA1–7. The center (coordinate 0,0) is indicative of an imaginary average outlook, whereas the peripheral location indicates a pronounced viewpoint. Table 6.1 lists the distances of each prototype to the three closest neighboring prototypes (mean distance) and to the center based on prototype coordinates on the two-dimensional model.

Table 6.1 Mean Euclidean distances to the center and to three closest neighboring prototypes
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The distance to the center alone does not tell us whether a prototype is idiosyncratic. Some prominent constellations are located in the opposite ends of one of the dimensions. A prototype located in such a constellation is far from the center, yet close to other members of the constellation. Nonetheless, the prototypes from the All Respondents (All1–3), and Confounded Association groups (CA1–7) tend to occupy an area closer to the center. The mean distance from the center in the No Association group is 39% and 40% more than in the All and CA groups, respectively. A similar pattern also applies to the distances to the neighboring prototypes.

What can we learn from this? By any criteria, No Association NA4 is the idiosyncratic prototype par excellence in this study. Conversely, Confounded Associations CA1, CA4, No Association NA1 and All Respondents All1 are aligned with prominent outlook constellations. Of these, No Association NA1 resembles a spiritually attuned orientation, and the other three are of a secular humanist type.

How these prototypes are related to the national YARG prototypes is illustrated in Fig. 6.1. NA4 is located in the lower right corner, far away both from the center, and from any other outlook types. To a lesser degree, the same goes for NA5, NA7, CA6 and CA3. Conversely, prototypes CA1, CA4, NA1, and All1 are located within prominent prototype constellations. It would therefore not be motivated to call these prototypes idiosyncratic.

Fig. 6.1
figure 1

The locations of the prototypes of the present study in relation to other YARG prototypes

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6.7 Examples of Idiosyncratic Viewpoints

Since the starting point was to examine uncommon outlooks, which we have found, we will let four respondents exemplify what an idiosyncratic and minor outlook may mean in real life. Utilizing the interview material, our choice of respondents seeks to illustrate prototypes that occupy distinct outlook addresses. We call the first one Sarah.Footnote 2 She is an actively religious Canadian, and associated with No Association NA6. We call the second one Feng. He is a Chinese man resisting religious involvement, with clear openness towards a spiritual orientation and experience of the world, and is associated with No Association NA5. We call the third one Jens. He is a thoroughly secular Finn, and associated with No Association NA4. We call the fourth individual Mikolaj. He is Polish and secular, with some openness to religious ideas, and associated with No Association NA7.

People like Jens, Mikolaj, Sarah and Feng are dissimilar to one another. However, they share the feature of being in minority, namely by combining in one outlook elements that we normally find distributed in distinct worldviews.

6.7.1 Sarah

Sarah grew up in a religious home in Canada. One of her parents is Protestant, and the other one is Catholic . She has a large family, and in the interview, she describes everyone except one brother as religious or spiritual. She attributes her own Christianity to familial influences, thinking that had her parents been atheists, she might not be a Christian. A young adult in her early twenties, her personal religiosity is a journey from authority-based religiosity towards personal spirituality, without an institutional framework.

At the time of the interview, she has made up her mind not to go to church at all, mainly due to unpleasant experiences with the clergy. “I don’t trust religious authorities like when I was a kid”, she says, and elaborates in more detail about a particular experience.

The priest was too […] friendly. Like, he was too comfortable with me, he rubbed my hand and too much in my space and touched me, I didn’t like it […] it’s more like the priest was trying to seduce me and I didn’t like it, it’s super unpleasant for me.

This experience is not the first one where she felt it difficult to accept the religious establishment she grew up with. She describes the religious stories she heard in her childhood as “too positive, made up, too pretty”, and explains: “I already know what it’s gonna say, I know like that on the next page there will be a bird smiling, flying and all, like I hated that […] I wouldn’t even finish reading it.”

In the interview, she repeatedly juxtaposes private spirituality with religious authorities and institutions.

I have a negative rapport to religion in particular […] I tell myself, if I can’t rationalize something, I have spirituality, but for religion, since I associate it with authorities, with other human beings, I don’t trust religion, because only man is fallible. So I trust less what is related to any religious authority , I only trust rationality and spirituality.

Questioning organized religion started in the end of her high school, and negative experiences have intensified her critical stance. In Sarah’s opinion, her sister became “brainwashed” by the local priest. Her sister became “too strict toward herself”, which finally led to panic attacks.

Even though most of the talk is about her relationship to the religion of her upbringing, at one point she makes a broader distinction between open-minded and one-sided outlooks. She mentions a particular teacher:

He was the only teacher who didn’t have preconceived views, like on any religion […] the other teachers, they had preconceived views even for their own religions, no matter which one […] It was obvious like: “I’m an atheist and I don’t believe in this nor that […] it’s like, fine, you can be an atheist but it should not influence your discourse as a teacher or influence what you teach.

However, Sarah has not lost her faith. She prays every morning for 15 min, saying that it helps her throughout the day:

It’s taking the time to stop and take time to sit in a calm spot and pray. It calms me, well I’m already calm, but like, in a better mental state […] If one day I don’t pray, I notice that I lack patience. I don’t know why, but I have less patience at work with my co-workers.

Sarah also connects her strong base of values to religion or spirituality. She tells of an incident, when she came home from a grocery shop, and noticed that unpaid items had accidentally ended up in her bag. This led her to experience agony:

It felt like I had stolen, even though I had not. Stealing and lying is the same for me […]. Amongst my siblings I’m the one who really can’t lie […] God says not to lie. I think that when I was young it started with that. Now that I’m older, I think that it’s more my rapport to spirituality, because I think about the consequences.

When we connect the interview material of Sarah with her FQS sorting patterns, we see that the outlook of Sarah, and others like her, contains elements normally associated with traditional religiosity: praying, reliance on a divine as a nurturing, parental figure, and considering certain beliefs as crucial for salvation. There is an inclination to protect one’s personal purity, and to have one’s sexuality guided by a religious or spiritual outlook. At the same time, there is rejection of religious authorities, disinterest in being active in a religious community , and lack of loyalty to the religion of the family or nation. There is a separation between private faith and communion with God, and the institutional expressions of religion. Even though there are others like Sarah, outlooks that combine personal beliefs and practices with a religious group-orientation are much more common.

6.7.2 Feng

Feng, a young Chinese man at the crossroads in his academic studies, shares with Sarah the complex relationship between the personal and the institutional aspects of religion. At the time of the interview, Feng is waiting for a decision for a scholarship to complete a PhD abroad. He elaborates at length about his relationships with religion.

Feng describes his parents as atheistic. Consequently, he has grown up in an environment where Christian beliefs stand on an equal footing with belief in ghosts, as Feng puts it. For him, family and the traditional Chinese values with the emphasis on honoring one’s parents are important. He sees his family as more tangible than religion, yet it seems that this is also a source of conflict for him. During the interview, Feng repeatedly discusses his relationship with organized religion, and with Christianity in particular.

Many of his earlier friends and classmates were exploring Christianity. There was a period when Feng participated in meetings with Bible reading. He did not, however, get baptized. After his encounters with Christianity in college, he read existential philosophy, mentioning Nietzsche a number of times. Ultimately, he does not seem to share the Nietzschean criticism of religious institutions.

To date, Feng has not committed to religion, yet one gets a feeling that he feels drawn to it. He recognizes the value of religious institutions in the lives of the believers. He thinks that religious ideas and gods are not subject to falsification. As a response to a question about personal religiosity, he nevertheless states: “I do not feel religious.”

However, he continues to explicate how not all traditions are the same. There is some resistance in his mind towards monotheism, and openness towards Shintoism and Buddhism, “because [I] always feel that all things have spirit.” He says these traditions would suit him better, if he were to become religiously committed.

Feng has had, and still has, religious friends, and he says it often ends up that the persons he got acquainted with afterwards turned out to be Christian. He gave Christianity a chance, and resists personal involvement. Besides the potential conflict with his parents’ views, Feng feels religious involvement would entail relinquishing his personal independence, something he does not want to do.

Recognizing the value of religion for believers, Feng sees it as a force that enables people to share similar beliefs and practices all over the world. This helps people to come closer to one another. Besides religion’s role in social integration, it can also relieve anxiety. It can create a feeling of equality, and guide one’s life. In contrast, science, philosophy or art, according to Feng, may only help one to temporarily escape the challenges of secular life, after which one has to face them again.

After having so much positive to say about religion, he again considers his personal non-involvement.

There is some fear, that is, fear of delivering yourself to a god that you do not believe exists. When you personally make this decision, it is equivalent to a complete turning point in life, you are afraid of this turn, you do not know what will happen. It is possible that you think that it is positive, but you do not know.

Feng rejects the ideas of centering one’s life on a religious quest, yet he also rejects the ideas of religion being hypocritical, stupid, or religious scriptures being outdated. And while we have seen that Feng does not find himself at home with a monotheistic God, he nevertheless connects the idea of divine to experiences of awe with the mysteries of the universe, knowledge of astronomy, or a large natural landscape: “You may feel that there are sacred things in it.”

While for Sarah, religion was expressed in a monotheistic faith, personal practices, and rejection of institutions despite growing up with them, for Feng, religious institutions and particularly Christianity are rejected due to the fear of losing one’s personal independence and lack of faith in a personal God. Feng does not engage in spiritual practices, even though he has given a chance to congregational engagement. For him, it seems religion and spirituality are connected with an internal feeling of a spiritual presence and wonder of nature, something he finds better expressed in Eastern religions than in Western monotheism. Whereas for Sarah, religious institutions are a subject of criticism due to personal negative experiences, Feng speaks highly about religious institutions and their value for the believers, despite not feeling ready for personal commitment.

6.7.3 Jens

Jens grew up in a small town in Finland. He describes his familial background and childhood environment as safe, economically well-off, and favoring education. In fact, in his closest circles, everyone goes to college, most family acquaintances having an MA, and some a PhD. Lacking personal interest in religion, Jens is not antagonistic either. He mentions a mild religious influence from the side of his family. Despite describing himself as someone who is “tired with God”, he nevertheless mentions several ways through which religion can contribute positively to others. During a family holiday in Africa, he saw religion playing an important role in peoples’ lives. He mentions how a close friend felt support and help from religion during a time of personal crisis, and adds that he is “totally OK with” religion having such an influence on people.

Not being active in the church, and choosing to disaffiliate from it, he adds: “I don’t see it as something negative, that I disaffiliated. I do visit the church.” He is also active in the Scouts, which he recognizes as an organization with a good purpose and a religious profile. Indeed, he does not say anything negative about religion during the whole interview. Even though most of his associates share a similar outlook, there are also deeply religious individuals in his inner circle.

The discussion about religion illustrates a more general pattern. It is the tendency to approach any topic in a versatile, many-sided way, without strong opinions for one stance and against another. Rather than lacking insights, Jens has many which he considers valuable. For someone else, these might represent opposite ends of the spectrum. Not so for Jens, who likes to take different perspectives on the same topic.

This is illustrated by Jens’s discussion on immigration. Nationalism is not important for him. He has never felt a sense of strong belonging to his own national or ethnic group. Even so, he appreciates many aspects of the national culture, such as loyalty to the welfare society, participation in philanthropic activities, and following the laws. He first associates increased immigration with crimes of passion, pointing to statistics according to which immigrants are more likely to commit such crimes. Yet he sees the situation as complex: It is the immigrant women who are more often the victims of violent crimes. Other social factors play a much greater role than the ethnic background. Having stricter immigration laws would probably not prevent terrorist organizations from infiltrating. Populistic references to immigration in the national politics can be seen as another kind of a weapon. His family has probably benefited from immigration. Then again, Jens changes the perspective by considering his own gender: “It is difficult for me to present my viewpoint since I am, after all, I mean I am not a woman and I will perhaps never, have to confront the problem, in such a horribly direct way.”

Absence of a strongly articulated stance is clearly not due to the lack of information or interest. The topic of immigration exemplifies how Jens likes to take many perspectives, which someone else might view as contradictory. In FQS , an example is viewing the divine both as feminine, life force or energy, and empty of significance. Another example is giving substantial amounts of time or money to some religious organization or worthy cause, while at the same time not being an active, contributing member of a religious or a spiritual community . As we saw with Jens, secular outlook elements combine with openness, or at least with the lack of negativity towards religion. Without being religious, he is nevertheless active in Scouts, which he recognizes as an organization with a religious profile.

6.7.4 Mikolaj

Like Jens’s, Mikolaj’s worldview is secular rather than traditionally religious. A Polish man pursuing a PhD in cognitive science, Mikolaj was until his early youth actively involved with the Catholic church, with regular weekly engagement as an altar boy. This involvement faded away as he grew up. The high school lessons in religion offered a comparative perspective to many faiths. The ability to compare different worldviews offered a means of establishing the viewpoint based on its merits, which in Mikolaj’s mind is not the case if one tradition has a dominant position.

Growing up without siblings and with a single mother, Mikolaj’s most important social group consists of his friends. He even considers family as “imposed upon us”. Except for major holidays such as Christmas and Easter, he thinks he would probably not have much contact with his relatives.

Mikolaj describes himself as rational, drawn to logic, science, and objectivity. He would prefer people to be more rational, although he also recognizes that, from an evolutionary point of view, emotions have a purpose. It is not surprising that he thinks science should have priority, if scientific and religious claims conflict: “[R]eligion […] should go along with the evidence.” Rather than seeing religion as source of morality, Mikolaj thinks that atheists are morally superior. They have to reason their way to an ethical standpoint, whereas a religious person would follow a commandment without understanding the reason behind it. Even so, everyone is entitled to one’s own worldview, as long as one does not harm others.

Up to this point, Mikolaj’s outlook seems grounded in secular humanism. However, he repeatedly recognizes the limits of rational and scientific inquiry. What lies beyond those limits could very well be what religions talk about. “I do not think we will ever be able to apprehend the world as it is. There will always be some boundary which cannot be crossed by our mind or brain. And perhaps behind that boundary lies divinity.”

Mikolaj’s openness towards the unknown goes for the physical universe, the destiny of humanity in it, and scientific discoveries. The very fabric of the universe seems to prevent us from ever knowing the ultimate nature of things.

Taking into consideration a temporal nature of the universe meaning continuous shrinking and expansion, and our limited means not allowing us to research everything in time before the universe will start to wind up, I do not think that we will ever be able to cross that boundary because of this constant restart of the universe, although we may come close by the end of time. And then we will have to start the whole work anew.

This is neither comforting nor disheartening. He describes it as a time perspective that is beyond himself and the future generations. The same uncertainty goes for the human civilization. After stating that humans as a species have become physically stronger, Mikolaj points out that depression has become more commonplace, and concludes that it is hard to predict humankind’s ultimate destiny. “Either we can go back to earlier stages of our civilization and again we will sit and break stones or evolve in such a way that all these castes will expand or everything will become more or less equal.”

The fate of the universe and humanity are examples of the general principle, where conceiving things in an organized way may reflect human limitations instead of reality. He plays with the idea that perhaps the ultimate truth is chaotic rather than orderly.

In order to function, we try to be organized. But as I said, perhaps it lies beyond our knowledge and perhaps it is related to the fact that we try to think in a certain systematic order, and what is real is disorganized and chaotic.

One gets an impression that Mikolaj appreciates, even relishes the ultimate unknowability of things. And here he also finds a possibility for entities and principles described in religious terms.

Physical laws, chemical laws are something inanimate and are subject to other laws and it works on a different level, but I allow myself to think that there may be some spark which guides it – the theory of evolution does not have to be contradictory to the Church. Nobody says that the force who initiated all those processes could not be God […] I assume that perhaps there is some kind of entity, but what form it assumes is hardly definable.

In Mikolaj, we see a secular disposition rather different from Jens’s. Both refuse to make one-sided statements about certain issues. What those issues are, however, is a different matter. For Jens, multiple perspectives are applied to pragmatic issues: politics, immigration, and the benefits of religion. For Mikolaj, where scientific inquiry ends, there seems to be the realm of possibilities, speculation, and positive uncertainty, that might well accommodate metaphysical beings described by religions.

Jens illustrates how someone with no personal interest in religion refrains from critical comments about religion, and to some extent participates in activities that have a religious connotation. This seems to reflect a more general approach, which goes beyond religion. He likes to consider any topic involving subjective preferences in a versatile way, seeing no internal conflict or problem in doing so. Mikolaj, on the other hand, appreciates logic and science, yet beyond the limits of rational inquiry, he sees a realm of fascinating uncertainty and metaphysical, perhaps even spiritual possibilities. For Sarah, a very different context illustrates a similar complexity and multiplicity of perspectives: religious faith is important to her. She is from a religious family, and holds certain religious claims to be important for salvation. She prays every day. Her expressed values are rooted in a religious discourse . At the same time, she has come to doubt and distance herself from religious authorities and institutions. Feng, on the other hand, is a person who appreciates religious institutions, playing with the idea of becoming committed, but so far not quite doing it. Unlike Sarah, who values private engagement yet dislikes institutions, Feng is the opposite. He appreciates religious institutions, yet avoids personal commitment.

People like Jens, Mikolaj, Sarah and Feng represent an important minority. Dissimilar to one another, the one feature they share is high complexity, exemplified by the combination of features rarely found in one outlook. In a national FQS sample, complex outlooks may be overshadowed by more clear-cut ones. Combining non-defining sorts from many local samples has allowed us to explore the possibility of the existence of such idiosyncratic prototypes.

6.8 Conclusion

In the FQS samples from the 12 countries included in this study, many respondents held viewpoints that did not find correspondence with the nationally prominent prototypes in their respective countries. This allowed us to use a large population of non-defining respondents that might potentially form a resource for identifying new, previously undiscovered viewpoints.

Based on this study, if respondents are non-defining by confounded associations, they seem more likely to yield prototypes that are close reproductions of viewpoints found in other studies. To find unique viewpoints, we found it more fruitful to turn to respondents not associated with any prototypes. The multinational context and the large number of respondents of the YARG-project allowed us to combine many such respondents into combined samples. We found that many of these respondents stood for truly idiosyncratic outlooks. Things could, of course, be taken further. First, we could analyze the viewpoints of the respondents who did not define any prototypes in the present study. Second, finding shared worldview elements to the extent we do, may sometimes overshadow the equally important fact that each individual worldview is unique. The ultimate regard to this would be to analyze Faith Q-sorts as stand-alone viewpoints, since these would still hold value as unique expressions of individual subjectivity. Such an approach is interested in individual rather than in interpersonal subjectivities.

We took a step into this direction by giving a voice to those who were not counted as defining respondents in the previous studies. We found that many of these outlooks were only defined by a few respondents, which still allows us to talk about shared preferences. Minor prototypes may not look like important voices on the global outlook map. However, when many such outlook types are presented together, one cannot escape the impression that we live in a world where major outlooks may well explain half the variance, but the less known other half is anything but uninteresting. By focusing on particular examples of truly uncommon outlooks, we have seen that an outlook that on the surface appears contradictory, may in fact result from deep reflection and from taking one’s outlook seriously.

One of the challenges for the study of worldviews today is that binary and exclusive categories, where an individual is either religious or secular, or identifying with one tradition and not another, do not work for everyone. It seems that the global map of worldviews is undergoing a change , and it is important to be attentive to new configurations in studies targeting young people, who represent the future. We suggest that contemporary inquiries into the worldviews take the more idiosyncratic viewpoints seriously. The results can be informative about the limitations of fixed categorizations and schemes consisting of predetermined ideologies. In the present study, we found a number of unusual outlook types. The personal narratives illustrated how apparently contradictory components can in fact involve deep reflection, not a lack of intellectual rigor. This would motivate further studies of outlier individuals, which can be done in several ways: by identifying trans-national minority worldview prototypes or by analyzing those individuals who identify with uncommon positions, as exemplified in Chap. 7 of this volume.