Celebrating new life – A literature review of research on birth rites in Western societies

During the 21st century, birth rites have dramatically shifted from the strongly dominant infant baptism in Protestant and Catholic Western churches to private birth rites (Furseth, 2019). Private birth rites, such as child naming ceremonies, placenta rites, baby showers and other welcoming rituals for the baby that occur before or after birth, involve ceremonies conducted with close family members or solely by the mother or along with a few near relatives or friends. These rituals take place away from faith communities and secular organizations, such as humanist associations.

The ritual shift form infant baptism to private birth rites upsets power positions, making individuals, not religious or secular institutions, in the power of birth ritualization. It also actualizes the need for research that may uncover the complexity of today’s religious and family landscape, taking the many dimensions of religion and non-religion and families’ different social circumstances into consideration. Becoming a parent often gives rise to existential meaning (Prinds et al., 2014; Wojtkowiak and Crowther, 2018; Høeg, 2020). However, in contrast to the extensive research on death, scholars have hardly paid attention to understanding, analyzing and theorizing birth and new life as an existential transition in Western societies (Hennessey, 2021).

This paper aims to overview current sociological and social scientific research on birth rites in Western societies and identify and discuss empirical, theoretical and methodological gaps in the research field of birth rites. Conducting a literature review within the field of birth rites is essential for building a comprehensive understanding of this multifaceted and culturally significant topic. Birth rites are deeply embedded in diverse traditions, worldviews and social practices, influencing individual and community childbirth experiences and welcoming the child. By examining the existing body of research, this study sheds light on how these practices influence individuals, families and communities.

The literature review was conducted by combining a scoping review with the snowballing method to summarize the existing knowledge in the research field of birth rites in Western societies. In the paper, we first give an overview of the main themes in previous research and then we discuss ways we find fruitful to improve research on birth rituals empirically, theoretically and methodologically.

We have combined two methods for making literature reviews: a scoping review and a snowballing method. A scoping review is a method used to map the breadth and scope of research on a particular topic. It provides an overview of available knowledge and is particularly useful for emerging or interdisciplinary fields where the goal is to identify research gaps, clarify key concepts or refine research questions. Arksey and O’Malley (2005) formalized the methodology for scoping reviews, which was later refined by Levac et al. (2010). According to these frameworks, a scoping review involves defining clear objectives, conducting a comprehensive literature search, selecting relevant studies and synthesizing the findings thematically.

The snowballing method is a non-systematic approach to identifying relevant literature using references from key studies to discover additional sources. Forward snowballing involves examining studies that cite the key article, while backward snowballing looks at the references cited within the key article. We have used both methods in this review. While effective in uncovering hidden or less indexed studies, the method carries a risk of bias, as it depends heavily on the initial selection of studies. To mitigate this, Wohlin (2014) suggests combining snowballing with systematic search strategies to improve comprehensiveness and rigor. This approach is beneficial for summarizing a wide range of research results and informing subsequent research or policy development.

The scoping review’s starting point was the following research question: How do family, ritual practice and (non)religion intersect in birth rites? To identify relevant literature, relevant criteria were formulated, a search strategy was developed and a test search was done before the final search. This paper has examined a search from 03.12.2024 in the literature databases SocINDEX (EBSCOhost), ATLA Religion Database (EBSCOhost), Social Work Abstracts (EBSCOhost), Oxford Handbooks Online and Google Scholar. After test searching, we had 220 results on the following words in English: Civil naming ceremony, naming ceremony, child naming ceremony, baby-naming ceremony, birth rite, birth ceremony, birth ritual, welcoming ceremony and ceremony for welcoming a baby. Within each search, the search terms were combined with OR. Finally, the elements were combined with And. We did not limit by year because we wanted to include all literature on the topic. In this review, however, we focus on current research to get an overview of what is done and what is still lacking.

The selection of relevant studies among the search results was made by assessing the individual studies according to the title and abstract and then, later on, the full text. The final select was 48 publications. Finally, the publications were sorted and analyzed. The relevance criteria for the search were parents or caregivers who have conducted private birth rites. The concept is their experiences with ritual design and implementation or performing in a social setting in contemporary Western world. The research method for the knowledge summary is existing research in empirical sociology or conducted research based on social science methods and theory. The format of the publications is peer-reviewed articles or book chapters published in English or a Scandinavian language. The exclusion criteria led to empirical studies of midwifery being omitted. Based on the overview of the individual studies in the scoping review and the studies collected through the snowballing method, we made an analytical categorization in themes.

In research on birth rites, we have identified five themes in the literature review: (1) Birth rites within religious institutions, (2) Religious birth rites beyond religious institutions, (3) Women’s birth rites and baby girls’ naming rites, (4) Constructing identity in private pre-birth and birth rites and (5) Doing family in life-cycle rites. In the following sections, we present the main findings for each theme. In the discussion part of the paper, we highlight the knowledge gaps, address the lack of relevant theoretical perspectives and critique the insufficient methodological approaches.

For the last decades, analyzing people’s understandings of life cycle rites, such as baptism, in the dominating Christian congregations has been a way of studying religion in contemporary Western societies (Furseth, 2019). A central question has been: Who are the parents who would like to baptize their child and how do they perceive the rite? These have become particularly vibrant questions as 20th-century baptism has become less elaborate. For the last decade, there has been a steady drop in the continuity of infant baptism. In the Church of England in the UK and the Lutheran churches in the Nordic countries, annual baptisms in the churches have plummeted. The Catholic population is growing worldwide, but the number of baptisms has declined ^[1].

Comparing results from studies in the USA and Europe with a UK-based study of religion and spirituality, Heelas and Woodhead (2005) constructed a theory of religious transformation that has significantly impacted research on religion and society since then. According to the theory, distancing from traditional ritualization within religious organizations indicates subjectivization, which, according to the authors, is increasing in Western societies (Heelas and Woodhead, 2005, pp. 112–113). During the same period, research on life cycle rites was extensive in the Nordic countries where the Lutheran churches, until then, heavily dominated the religious landscape. The studies were primarily quantitative, investigating how community members understand rites according to predetermined criteria (e.g. Lüchau and Andersen, 2012; Bromander, 2005; Bäckström et al., 2004; Pettersson, 2000). One of the significant studies (Bäckström et al., 2004) describes baptism as a mediator of identity and belonging within the Nordic cultural tradition. The authors argue that participation in these Church rituals persists because they carry tradition and meaning, regardless of their religious or cultural significance to individuals.

These survey studies also reveal knowledge of rites and social stratification. For example, they show that the decision to have a rite is gendered in the way that the mother’s wishes seem to be of particular importance (Jonsson et al., 2020). Ethnicity, social class and residential area are also relevant to opting out of infant baptism (Lüchau and Andersen, 2012; Leth-Nissen and Trolle, 2015). While people in large cities tend to choose other rites, Lutheran Church ceremonies are still very common in rural areas (Jonsson et al., 2020; Helgesson Kjellin et al., 2021; Høeg and Gresaker, 2015). Parents’ civil status and socioeconomic situation also influence the choice of birth rite (Leth-Nissen and Trolle, 2015; Høeg and Gresaker, 2015). Children in higher-income households are more likely to be baptized than children in the lowest-income group and cohabiting or married parents more often baptize their children than parents living alone (Jonsson et al., 2020).

We found only a few qualitative studies on birth rites within religious institutions (Reimers, 1995; Høeg, 2011). These focus on the existential dimensions of the birth rite, but as they are pretty old by now, more current research is needed to understand religious transformation. We see a need for qualitative studies considering social stratifications, especially from an intersectional perspective, analyzing how individuals’ social circumstances affect them. Individuals and groups are affected by hegemonic ritual traditions and family norms. Queer death studies see the movement at play at broader social forces and point to the fact that religious rituals are deeply connected to the family. Their studies reveal that heteronormativity is strong in ritual culture in the Nordic countries (Svensson, 2007) and that the established role of the Lutheran Church in life-cycle rites guides the ways people can and will feel and behave (Alasuutari, 2020). We ask for research on birth rites from intersectional and queer perspectives, making it possible to understand how heteronormativity and religious norms, for example, affect parent’s ritualization. If inclusion is wished for, such studies are essential.

As mentioned, studies on ritualization within religious institutions have focused on the major Christian churches with the most members. There is a lack of studies on non-dominating Christian congregations and minority religions. In a pluralistic society, studies within these groupings are essential. For example, studies on how ritualization transforms when it is moved from one context to another and how religious norms of the majority society on the one hand and the minority society on the other affect ritualization may contribute to the knowledge of ritual and religious transformation and experiences of exclusion and inclusion in today’s society. Critical feminist theories, such as queer theory (Ahmed, 2006), may be helpful in the analysis.

Changes in religious and cultural contexts have led to the emergence of welcoming rituals in various family settings and more and more worldview societies offer welcoming rites for newborns. Studying these rites outside so-called religious institutions focuses on organized rites in atheist, agnostic and other “nonreligious” societies in Britain and the USA (e.g. Cragun et al., 2017; Frost, 2022; Lee, 2015). These studies have tried to tease the complexities and strength of the relationship between worldview and ritual.

From a Norwegian context, non-religion in the context of private birth rites is not restricted to purely secular rites without any religious content or references but can shape interreligious birth rites, re-invent traditional rites or incorporate elements from different religious traditions (Høeg, 2009, pp. 161–163). From a North American context, secular activists and organized nonbelievers invent new rituals for events like weddings and memorials (Blankholm, 2021, p. 597). However, for researchers who have examined non-religion and secular ritual innovation, welcoming rituals for the newborn have been rarely researched (Hoesly, 2017; Engelke, 2015; Copeman and Quack, 2015). However, the “secular people” who opt for these rites are described as ambivalent toward ritual and tradition (Blankholm, 2022). Sociologist Jacqui Frost, who has examined the role of ritual in secular spaces, sees that religious rites held in religious institutions are copied, thereby “secularising religious rituals” (Frost, 2022). Hennessey (2021) has found that in secular rituals it functions both ways with religious and non-religious objects. Hennessey examines the significance of materiality in contemporary secular birth rites across various cultures. She discovers that religious objects used by participants can often be re-sacralized. Furthermore, these non-religious objects, which are typically distinct from religious practices, can acquire a sacred status, even when the ritual itself is secular or humanistic (Hennessey, 2021, p. 5).

Ritual experimentation also illuminates power relations. Some new, re-invented rites have origins in indigenous or traditional cultures. Religious studies scholars Wojtkowiak (2020) and Hennessey (2021) discuss the extent to which the reuse of existing cultural tools and objects represents cultural appropriation and Wojtkowiak calls for more research on this issue (Wojtkowiak, 2020).

In the Nordic countries where the Lutheran churches and Christianity as a general cultural premise have eroded, most previous studies ignore rites conducted beyond the majority churches or describe them as non-religious or secular (e.g. Helgesson Kjellin et al., 2021, p. 24). However, a few qualitative studies on private birth rites problematize the binary relation between religion and secularity, revealing that rites performed outside faith communities can both express a connection to and a distance from what is considered religion (e.g. Jarnkvist, 2019). In the Norwegian context, similarities with infant baptism could be observed in name-giving ceremonies. Rules for etiquette, including the menu, invitation lists and gifts for the child, are not separate from baptism norms. The parents opting for these innovative naming rites see them as a signal of tradition, in line with baptism, in contrast to not having any ceremony, which is also a choice (Høeg, 2009, p. 191). Having godparents and the child wearing baptismal clothes was a way of adhering to the tradition of a welcome ritual for a newborn child (Høeg, 2009, pp. 318–325). Sociologist Agata Rejowska, studying humanist marriage ceremonies in Poland, shows that these rituals performed outside of the Church have a distance to organized religion, containing an openness regarding form and content, which makes them suitable for displaying and constructing personal existential configurations (Rejowska, 2020). Although this is at weddings and in the context of entering into marriage, one can ask whether it could also apply to birth rites.

Birth is a fundamental human experience; these experiences are not only meaningful but can also lead to ritual practices, which are pluralistic and possibly conflicting meaning frames; we see a need to expand such studies. Exploring birth rites beyond faith communities uncovers new aspects of religiousness and secularity, contributing to and challenging the ongoing discussion on religious transformation in Western countries. Instead of understanding private ritualization as an expression of non-religion, we see a need for addressing research that problematizes the categorizing of people as either religious or non-religious, asking for an understanding of “religiosity” and “secularity” (non-religion) that considers expressions of complexity, contradiction and (in)congruity (Lee, 2015; Reuter and Murray, 2022). This is what we call a non-binary understanding of (non)religion.

The growth of feminist knowledge in the past decades has highlighted the gendered nature of all social experiences, including religious ones, without necessarily focusing on institutions and settings where women share the arena with men or take on inherited ritual functions in doctrinal rites.

Cheyney and Davis–Floyd (2021) argue that, despite cultural variations between and within societies, rites play a central role in childbirth. The social anthropologist Sered’s (1993) fieldwork among Jewish women in a childbirth clinic in Jerusalem shows the mother’s ability in modern society to perform birth rites by herself and become a ritual agent across religious borders and communities. The women in pregnancy, childbirth and the postnatal period were from diverse cultural backgrounds (ethnicity, religious affiliation). They chose rituals from an extensive and somewhat fluid cultural menu (drawn from different religious and non-religious cultures). The primary purpose of the ritual performed by the women was to facilitate birth and safeguard pregnancy and the newborn. They did not seem to feel that they were adopting foreign or heterodox rites (p. 109). The study points to the pluralism of modern society as a necessary condition for adopting rites from cultures perceived as similar enough to one’s own and that women are more complementary in cultures lacking absolute ritual requirements and cultures without authoritative ritual requirements for selection or implementation for birth rites.

Even though medicalization suggests a departure from the central role of ritual practices, medicalized childbirth remains highly ritualized, with these rituals reflecting power structures that often disempower birthing individuals. Cheyney and Davis–Floyd call for an explicit acknowledgment of childbirth as a rite of passage and stress the importance of cultural systems in shaping how birth is carried out. Finally, they call for more equitable systems in which “[a]ll birthing people everywhere … have the respect, freedom, and resources they need to negotiate the complexities of birth on their own cultural and communal terms as they actively appropriate, modify, and co-create meaning in childbirth” (p. 491).

Religion often prescribes which rites belong to which stages, situations and events, often divided after gender and age. Not all situations, occasions and moods are followed by religious doctrines for instruction and explanation for performing a particular rite. Non-official religious actors or a community of followers can prescribe rites for every occasion and situation and decide which rites are needed. In line with the women’s liberation movement of the 1970s, a new genre of welcoming rituals for newborn Jewish girls (often called “Simchat Bat”; a celebration of a daughter or “Zeved Bat”; the gift of the daughter) emerged in several Jewish Ashkenazi communities as a counterbalance to the welcoming rituals for boys. Siegel (2012), who explores the collections, anthologies, websites and liturgical texts for welcoming rituals for newborn Jewish girls in North America, sees that the driving force behind this grassroots genre was the belief that daughters should be formally welcomed into the Jewish nation or the divine covenant. In creating Simchat Bat ceremonies, Jewish feminists used a fluid, open and non-hierarchical composition that more generally describes feminist rituals across religious backgrounds. The exploration of ritual resources for newborn Jewish girls, which are tools that parents use to create unique ceremonies, follows the emerging model of feminist rituals. Characteristic is the individualization and personalization that have become prevalent features of feminist rituals (p. 338). The rituals are based on a dialectic between, on the one hand, creativity and innovation and, on the other, the identification and exploitation of common elements and themes in Jewish religion. At the same time, Siegel’s study of these rituals shows the irony of incorporating the expectation that each ceremony should be distinctive but how quickly it remains fixed.

Feminist historians have also observed the lack of ritual in traditional Jewish settings for baby girls in a European setting, promoting the study of hidden naming rituals in folk traditions that explore the divine feminine. Jill Hammer explored the folk ritual Hollekreisch, used for girls and boys, performed from the fifteenth to the twentieth centuries among Christians and Jews in central Europe, like Austria, the Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Liechtenstein, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia and Switzerland. Hollekreisch was wide open to women and children (Hammer, 2005). Jews who performed them did it on the fourth Sabbath after the child’s birth when the mother first returned to the synagogue. Family and friends gave the child a name (usually a secular name), raised the infant’s cradle three times and in some areas and periods, called the name of Frau Holle to guard the child from fearsome and goodwill qualities (Hammer, 2005, p. 63). In contrast to other studies of historical naming rites, Hammer sees this as an ability for women giving birth to be celebrated along with the new child.

By giving the scope of birth rites broader focuses, studies reveal that women, newborns and particularly baby girls get visible and more importantly, they become ritual agents across religious borders and communities. The few empirical studies of birth rituals in a Jewish setting point to an essential characteristic of ritual novation, namely an association with one or more religious cultures, but first and foremost, a plural world with several cultural impulses and rites that are meant to reflect the personal choice of their creators (Sered, 1993; Siegel, 2012). The overview proves that rites are contextualized and gendered, making meaningful rites for meaningful events which do not include the whole nuclear or extended family but are restricted to some groups of members. The literature review, some of which is historically based on old empirical research, shows that there is still a need to study rituals for girls and rites performed only by women connected to birth. We call for studies on gendered situations and which rites can address these situations.

A few studies on private pre-birth and birth rites outside faith communities and Humanistic Associations focus on identity constructions. Studies from North America highlight the importance of pregnancy rituals, such as babymoons (Gallivant et al., 2019) and baby showers (Courtney et al., 2023, p. 631, Fischer and Gainer, 1993) for the construction of identity. Babymoon is a quite recently developed pregnancy ritual similar to the honeymoon concept, where the becoming parents go for a holiday before birth. The rite is promoted as a private getaway for expectant parents (Gallivant et al., 2019).

Some decades ago, Fischer and Gainer (1993) conducted an empirical study on modern baby showers in Canada. Baby showers is a form of consumption that has largely been a uniquely female domain but appears to have served and continue to serve as a modern rite of passage for women. The study reveals that the different forms of showers, which can be both gender mixed and workplace-based, are distinguished by the all-female format and celebrate motherhood as a stat, quite distinct from parenthood (Fischer and Gainer, 1993, p. 323). In contrast to the traditional shower, which emphasizes community support for a personal, private transition from wife to mother, the new forms of baby showers, however, all suggest somewhat more modern gender role attitudes and also remind participants of the woman’s other, potentially conflicting roles with an emphasis on “professionalization” in the lives of women.

Along with baby showers, babymoons have become a vital pregnancy ritual ingrained in US culture (Courtney et al., 2023, p. 631). Exploring the experiences of pregnant women in the USA during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, Courtney et al. (2023) found that participants were compelled to cancel celebratory pregnancy traditions, such as baby showers and gender reveal parties, which led many to feel anxious, upset and deprived of a typical pregnancy experience. These disruptions were specifically frustrating for women expecting their first child. In response to this stressor, most women redefined what was considered normal and created new and creative virtual pregnancy rituals (Courtney et al., 2023, p. 626).

Jarnkvist (2019) and Høeg's (2009, pp. 305–313) studies on name-giving ceremonies in Sweden and Norway highlights their importance in the construction of parenthood and the newly established family. Jarnkvist (2019) also observes that intersecting identities are performed in name-giving rituals, primarily white heterosexual middle-class motherhood. Birth rites, such as baby naming and child dedication ceremonies, may also be used to affirm lesbian identity (Manodori, 1998). A study by Mandori (1998) reveals that the respondents reported experiences of strengthening and support from oppression when performing these rituals.

Our review reveals a lack of studies on private pre and post birth rites in general and on identity construction in particular. These rites coincide with the social transformation of society –where there is a general rise in individualization (Beckford, 2003) and an increased heterogeneity in the types of families in Western countries (Gouveia and Castrén, 2021). Following up on studies that find an increasing number of people looking outside of the majority churches for something more individualistic, network-based or experiential (de Groot, 2020), the private rites serve the function of set motherhood, parenthood and the family at play, contesting, displaying what the new status encompasses and activate identity constructions. Studying these rites in their different forms and contexts may very well serve to study, for example, sexual and gender identity formation and the performance of identities in intersection.

Separation and re-partnering in society produce multi-fold configurations of new family formation and relationships. Building a family’s we-ness is a process in which family boundaries are constructed (Castrén and Widmer, 2015). Sociological studies of the family focus primarily on relatedness, intimacy and personal life (Chambers, 2012). In practice, “doing the family” is central to studying family (Morgan, 2011). Family is a socially constructed concept constituted by activities, relations and experiences that provide an empirical basis for analyzing the role of ritual actions, particularly related to the significant event of the newborn baby.

Studies of doing family in life-cycle rites primarily focus on the rites’ functions of shaping experiences of belonging and strengthening social relations (Marks and Dollahite, 2016). The few studies problematizing how “family” is conceptualized and negotiated in life-cycle rites reveal interpretations of family in doing and displaying. Family scholars have noted the importance of “doing family things”. Attending celebrations is of high importance to build and maintain family (Hedin, 2014, p. 170; Chambers, 2012; Ursin et al., 2017). The family scholar Finch (2007) finds that doing family also contain more communicative aspects to “convey to each other and to relevant audiences that certain of their actions do constitute doing family things” and thereby confirm that these relationships are “family relationships” (p. 67). Such family displays may include family narratives as well as rituals such as meals, gifts, weddings and funerals (Finch, 2007).

Some studies of foster care children depicted an understanding of family based on doing family things through everyday rituals such as spending time together, shared meals, vacations and celebrations. The sociologist Hedin’s (2014, p. 172) study of foster care adolescents in Sweden showed that successful rituals in the foster family influence the sense of belonging. The Spanish sociologist Judite Ié supports previous findings. She has examined Spanish youth who spent years in foster care. Their narrative emphasizes Spanish family culture and the value individuals attach to family. One of the three key themes related to how young people “do” family were identified as a family as everyday practice, describing the family as determined by rituals and family displays (Ie, 2023, p. 512).

In their study on doing family in funerals, sociologists Walter and Baily (2020) found conventional understandings of family in the narratives they studied, stratifying mourners into family and nonfamily, making kinship dominant over other kinds of relations. The gender scholar Alasuutari’s (2020) study, on the other hand, reveals complex relationships between LGBTQ people among both chosen and biological kin and the living and the dead (Alasuutari, 2020, p. 239). Studies on weddings show that family relations influence ritual practices. Interfaith couples often choose to blur their religious identities in the wedding ritual if their parents are not pleased with the couple getting married (Bromberg, 2005). While kinship is central in traditional rites, such as the Lutheran infant baptism, other relations are often dominant in private birth rites. Often, the mother-to-be or the parents choose who should be invited. For example, the female community is important in the re-invented “mother blessing” (Burns, 2014).

Studying family and family boundaries between those considered family and those excluded, as studied in the framework of birth rites, can create new approaches to understanding contemporary family life. Paradoxically, while the family is becoming more diverse in Western societies, ritual research on the beginning or the reforming of family life, the event of a newborn and the following birth rites’ social functions are rarer. A focus on the implications of a family and studies considering family formation in birth rites make such studies of particular importance. Such studies have been called for (Wojtkowiak, 2020).

Our overview of previous and current research on birth rites in Western societies identified a few themes: birth rites within religious institutions, religious birth rites beyond religious institutions, women’s birth rites and baby girls’ naming rites, constructing identity in private pre-birth rites and doing family in life-cycle rites. According to the review, sociological research has been quantitative and primarily focused on baptism by same-religion and heterosexual core families in the Protestant churches. Little is known about the diverse families’ social and religious/worldview dynamics and how social stratifications affect ritualization. Moreover, qualitative studies and research on ritualization in minority religions and private birth rites are lacking. Studies on social relations in private birth rites are significantly absent. Furthermore, we observe that critical feminist approaches and a non-binary understanding of (non)religion are infrequently employed in studies on family rites and we advocate for these perspectives in research on birth rites. This section discusses how such perspectives may contribute to and develop research on birth rites.

The literature review encompasses some conducted research where central issues within critical feminist theory have been addressed. We suggest further applying feminist theories, scarcely used in studies on family rites and (non)religion, to challenge ingrained notions of, in this case, birth rites and problematize them by contributing to an understanding of how birth rites may reinforce and challenge norms, faiths and values and affect societal power relations. Moreover, we urge intersectionality (Christensen and Jensen, 2012; Collins and Bilge, 2020) to contribute to this research by revealing how intersecting power relations affect ritualization. Queer scholars criticize normative ways of doing family (e.g. Lewis, 2022) and imperatives of what counts as a happy family (Ahmed, 2010). Queer theory (Ahmed, 2006, 2012), highlights experiences of being “in line” or “out of line”, that is, what it is to act or not act according to the norm, such as norms regarding family, religion or ritualization. We find such perspectives necessary for understanding the social and existential complexities of family, religion and ritualization in the private sphere.

The literature review shows that birth rites are a lens to explore the intersection of family and (non)religion in contemporary Western societies. Taking into consideration how different social categories and actions intersect in the change for the family, the intersectional and queer perspectives allow us to open space for exploring how to do family. The perspective of those involved in these birth rites will be vital to understanding the changes in family life. Instead of focusing on only normative families in Western Society – two heterosexual, white, middle-class parents with the same Christian beliefs or Christian cultural background or who have a dismissive attitude toward spirituality and organized religion, we suggest in future research involving diverse parents/caregivers in such studies. This means so-called mixed religious/non-religious couples, single, ethnic and sexual minority parents/caregivers. Parents and caregivers who are “out of line” with the norm and expectations, in combination with families who are in line with the norm, will uncover normative ways of family lives. Examining the family from the bottom up, observing and conducting interviews with the actors’ experience will bring how power operates to the fore of family life.

The ritual shift from rites in religious institutions to birth rites in private, often in homes or worldview organizations, does not only have religious or worldview implications. The literature review shows that it also has a social impact – it affects social relations and the family unit. Critical feminist studies on birth rites provide knowledge on differentiated family-life conditions, particularly when understanding kinship and the diverse kinds of affective normativity, by adopting a critical perspective on family (Ahmed, 2010; Collins and Bilge, 2020; Lewis, 2022). Drawing on theories on how rites both unite and divide groups and their members, societies and communities (Bell, 1992; Wuthnow, 2023), it is essential in future research to situate the study of birth rites within their broader social environment, considering both how different people and groups ritualize the new-born and family in diverse ways and how ritualization triggers social outcomes in terms of cohesion or fragmentation.

An innovative way of capturing the family in the intersection of religion and rituals is to look at how to do families. The doing refers to practice or what the sociologist David Morgan calls family practices in everyday life (Morgan, 2011). This is not to view what sociology comes up with as a pre-given family with different relationships, gender roles, kinships, cohabitants and expected (non-)religion and ethnicity. Conducted research on families and the importance of family rites for constituting the family, focusing on the family’s lives as they are lived – what the family does and how these actions build and maintain significant family ties. The practice perspective of what counts as a family is not on kinship and family ties (Gouveia and Castrén, 2021, p. 260) but on how personal relationships and relational arrangements in the family lives bind people together. This needs a specific focus across relatives and those who are not relatives but are involved in actions that count as “family actions.” However, we have found in the literature review that research on family relations easily ignores how power relations intersect family lives. Even though we see what comes with a diverse and inclusive definition of family with a focus on actions, we mean that taking on a power perspective will not only face the various ways of sharing daily life but different conditions for families in which lived experiences can be articulated.

Queer phenomenology (Ahmed, 2006) highlights experiences with what act or not act according to the norm, such as norms regarding family, religion or ritualization. Using queer phenomenology is rarely used in the body of research. We suggest that such perspectives make it possible to analyze the practices that form today’s “straight tendencies,” that is, ways to act in a world that presumes normative social conditions (Ahmed, 2006, p. 560) and shape experiences of inclusion and exclusion in ritualization. Queer scholars criticize normative ways of doing family (e.g. Lewis, 2022) and imperatives of what counts as a perfect family (Ahmed, 2010). Studying the doing of family in private rites from queer and intersectional perspectives will reveal experiences of how parents might reproduce or negotiate normative definitions of family and how the family is negotiated in the dynamics of ritualization.

In previous studies, religion has often been understood as a binary concept, contrasting to secular or non-religious. We argue for non-binary, open concept, making it possible to study the construction, performing or distancing of different worldviews in ritualization. We suggest that studying emerging birth rites will reveal how “existential configurations” can be developed and expressed through ritualization (Gustavsson, 2020). In birth rites, ritual participants can construct and express these existential configurations through their actions, words, materials and artifacts and through the locations where the rituals occur. Birth rites are social and cultural events, which means there must be a solid social component in personal existential configuration if birth rites are relevant for the formation. Existential configuration expresses an understanding of life that takes shape through human experience and finds its expression when related to and in community with, other people (Gustavsson, 2020, pp. 29, 31). This means that the existential configurations see the importance of social contexts and interactions for meaning making. However, in the conducted research we found a limitation of the concept considering the influence of social settings, such as social institutions and the family and social actions, such as rites. We suggest that the study of “existential configurations” should focus on the dynamic relations between social actions and existential configurations. The concept of existential configuration must enable a deeper understanding of how individuals act, interpret and understand life when related to others. As the literature review shows, the experiences of performing birth rites together with other people trigger the process of “existential configurations”. We also assume that the parents’ and caregivers’ decisions to hold a collective birth rite and the preparation for the rite make granted perspective of “existential configurations” less granted, the unconscious more conscious and what has been less reflected more reflected.

Social cohesion and inclusion are at the core of society and are deemed urgent and critical to citizens, regardless of geographical location, religion, ethnicity or sexuality. The literature review of the conducted body of research shows that these rites have a key role to play in defining and fostering inclusion. The rites impact society and society’s development by constructing, performing and shaping social relations on an institutional and societal level. Acknowledging this may contribute valuable insights for policymakers regarding family policy and policy addressing believers and non-believers and their needs.

Knowledge revealed from research on birth rites is significant for local community leaders and worldview and faith communities, contributing to the understanding of the dynamics of inclusion of people and groups in society to be captured while learning about the parents’ and caregivers’ experiences and visions for inclusion. Furthermore, such knowledge is essential to faith and worldview organizations that fail to address meaningful public birth rites (baptism, baby blessing, naming rituals, etc.) for the expected or newborn child. The current and future research in this field would also provide the state, religious and worldview stakeholders with knowledge on why parents and caregivers trust their authority more than the authority of public institutions.

This paper has been developed in several stages. Ida Marie Høeg and Karin Jarnkvist have, in several articles, argued for a need for research on different life cycle rites and the efforts of using perspectives from critical feminist theories in studies (Høeg and Jarnkvist, forthcoming 2025). The present paper differs from the previous by doing a literature review to summarize the existing knowledge on the ritualization of pre- and post-birth rites, exploring the intersection of birth-giving, motherhood, family and (non)religion in ritualization and discussing the relevance of using a non-binary understanding of (non-)religion in studies of private rites. As a result, the present article is more complex in its argumentation than the named articles were.

This paper’s limitation is that its review of existing research is confined to Western countries, which means countries in Europe, USA, Canada, Australia New Zealand and Israel. In our increasingly globalized world, where interactions extend across national borders, future reviews of research on birth rites should also incorporate studies conducted in non-Western countries. Another limitation of this research is that, due to linguistic limitations, it has only reviewed research conducted in English or a Scandinavian language.