Methods of Measuring Religiosity and Prospects of Their Application for Analyzing the Effectiveness of Catechetical Programs of the Russian Orthodox Church

Abstract

The paper deals with the problem of methodology of measuring churchliness in Ortho­dox Christians. The prospect of using such a methodology to evaluate the effectiveness of cat­echetical programmes is considered. An overview of psychometric testing methods used to study religiosity, spirituality and churchliness in psychology and sociology is presented. The issue of terminology and conceptual framework of such studies is discussed. Based on patristic anthro­pology and in accordance with the goals of catechetical programs, general requirements for the methodology of measuring churchliness are formulated. These criteria are then applied to critical analysis of three methodologies, namely the «Centrality of Religiosity Scale» by S. Huber, «V-In- dex» by V. Chesnokova, and «Life Activity Benchmark» by M. Y. Dvoretskaya. Positive aspects of these methods are noted, as well as shortcomings that prevent their use for assessing the degree of churchliness. The prospect of developing a new multi-parameter system for measuring the degree of churchliness is outlined, which can incorporate adapted versions of existing methods.