Formen individualisierter Religion in der virtuellen Welt des Second Life

In early 2007 the media hype about the virtual world "Second Life" (SL) was overwhelming. Some months later it was declared dead and only every once in awhile appears an article in the media about how dead it actually is. Nevertheless, life in the virtual world, and particularly religious life in such a world, is still active. This text will show that 3D virtual environments give new possibilities to actively experience religious life and therefore create an interesting field for the comparative study of religions. In the chapter on theory the focus lies on the theses of individualization and secularization. Furthermore, some notes are made about social research on the internet in general and the research on the internet for comparative study of religions in particular.