Globalization and religion from sociological perspective

Today, globalization is one of the most widely studied topics in the world. It is being discussed intensively that globalization has positive or negative effects on all social organizations and structures. There are many who accept globalization as salvage and consider themselves bound by it, while many others seem to oppose to.Globalization, which has recently gained an important acceleration also with the development of mass media, influences more or less the whole world with its economic, political, social and cultural dimensions. Then what?s globalization? Globalization is a multidimensional process. So it shouldn?t be considered unidimensionally by isolating it from its historical context. Globalization is a process in which technological as well as historical and social developments are decisive, and societies and cultures interact each other very closely. One of the social organizations which were exposed the effects of globalization is religion. This interaction process sometimes creates a homogeneous culture and sometimes gives regional cultures an opportunity to explain themselves globally. From this point of view, sometimes religions of ruling cultures effect regional religions and occasionally regional religions could reach the dimensions that can threat them.In this study, globalization has been analyzed in political, economical, cultural and technological aspects. Afterwards, influences of these aspects of globalization on religion were discussed in the context of the expression ways of religious experiences. Finally, effects of globalization on the religious life in Turkey were examined. Thus, our thesis is trying to explain with a sociological perspective in what ways the religion was affected in the globalizing world.Key Words:1) Globalization 2) Religion 3) Culture 4) Secularization