Can religion help us through the slump?

The Guardian on who really steps up to the faith to help others when times get tough. Its people of faith. Who would of thunk it?

The UK government's 2006 citizenship survey noted that the religiously observant were nearly 50% more likely to be volunteering than their secular or non observant counterparts. Meanwhile, in research that I completed earlier this year, I was astonished to discover that in every county and city in the UK the Anglican and Presbyterian churches alone had turned many of their buildings into community centres, running rural post offices, GP practices, public libraries, community work, and business start-up units for those of all backgrounds. I even discovered that Maeve Sherlock, a sometime Downing Street Advisor and chief executive of the Refugee Council, had decided to write a Phd in theology because she had been so convinced by how much of the best work wit asylum seekers was being undertaken by people of faith.

Now that Woolworths and MFI are down – along with hundreds of other firms whose names we do not know and whose factories, workshops and retail units we may never have entered – such findings take on a new significance.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/dec/02/religion-recession