RELIGIOUS IDENTITY AMONGST EMERGING ADULT CATHOLICS IN SINGAPORE

Abstract

Religious identity is commonly referred to as religious affiliation. However, even within the same religious group, there can be differences in religious identity. It is shaped by many different factors, leading to variations to how religion is practised, viewed and understood by individuals. Further, this conscious formation of personal religious identity is made between the stages of adolescence and adulthood, termed as emerging adulthood. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the different agents of religious socialisation that have shaped the religious identity of emerging adult Roman Catholics today. Catholicism has more than 200 years of history in Singapore, yet there are no studies to account for the variation in Catholic religious identity. Through qualitative in-depth interviews with both emerging adults and experts, three types of emerging adult Catholics became apparent: Core Catholics, Intermediate Catholics and Distant Catholics. This novel categorisation of emerging adult Catholics seeks to understand how different agents of religious socialisation, namely the family, peers, school and church, have a role in the formation of their religious identity. In this period of emerging adulthood, religious identity is explored, negotiated and unstable, which lends a sense of agency in the development of their personal religious identity.