'You can vote with your feet if you want'. Users' responses to religious services in the context of food charity in a Finnish city. (March 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Salonen, Anna Sofia
• Is Part Of: Social compass. Volume 63:Number 1(2016:Mar.)
• Page Start: 109
• Page End: 124
• Publication Date: 2016-03
• Subjects: charity -- choice -- food assistance -- poverty -- religion; assistance alimentaire -- charité -- choix -- pauvreté -- religion; Religion and sociology -- Periodicals; 306.605
• DOI: 10.1177/0037768615611995
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0037-7686

Abstract

Drawing on an ethnographic study of the food charity venues in a Finnish city, the article explores how food assistance recipients respond to the religious services they are presented with when seeking material assistance from a religious organization. The study shows that the religious services integrated into the food delivery system are rarely directly criticized, but rather responded to favourably. Any criticism of them is expressed through tacit resistance. The reciprocal relationship between receiving food and participating in religious practice remains mostly implicit, the food recipients' responses to the religious services being framed by the notion of choice, which undermines the possibility of open criticism of the integration of religious services into the food delivery programmes.