Richard W. Flory

Richard Flory (Ph.D., University of Chicago) is executive director of the Center for Religion and Civic Culture at the University of Southern California. He is a sociologist whose research focuses on religion and social change, religious and cultural change, the role of faith groups in developing and maintaining civic society, and the religious and spiritual lives of youth and young adults. He has published several books, including most recently, Religion in Los Angeles: Religious Activism, Innovation, and Diversity in the Global City (Routledge, 2021) and Back Pocket God: Religion and Spirituality in the Lives of Emerging Adults (Oxford University Press, 2020). Flory has written for publications such as The Conversation, Religion Dispatches, Patheos and Zócalo Public Square, and has been quoted by a variety of publications, including the Wall Street Journal, the L.A. Times, the New York Times, the Washington Post, Newsweek, Buzzfeed News and NPR.