The Meaning of Experiences of Religious Conversion Process
Abstract
This research is aimed to reveal people’s religious conversion experiences and the meaning of those experiences for people who decided to change their religion. This research used qualitative approach interpretive phenomenological analysis. There are two research questions to be solved in this research: (i) how experience of people decides to change their religion; (ii) what the meanings lead them to change their religion. Participants were two people who had experienced religious conversion in the recent two years. Data were collected by conducting a semi-structured interview. In order to validate the data, communicative validity and argumentative validity method were used in this research. The meanings which lead people to change their religion were gained from the participants’ religious conversion experiences, and can be interpreted as (i) the soul’s call to achieve convenience and peace; (ii) the choices in life to achieve convenience, though it contains some risks; (iii) to release the burden of life.
Keywords: Conversion, Experience, Meaning, Process, Religious.
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