Citation

Wood JR, Bloch JP. Sociol. Relig. 1995; 56(2): 121-136.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1995, Association for the Sociology of Religion)

DOI

10.2307/3711759

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

This paper argues that church assemblies, as examples of "private legislatures," help to build a civil society by modeling civility in discourse on controversial societal issues and by devising concrete means for effecting the resolution of those issues. We examine the UMC General Conference's debate on homosexuality and the products of that debate.