What does it mean to live in a secular age?
Taylor's definition of the secular age: An age in which belief in God is one possibility among others
Church is separate from government
Religion vs Spirituality
We have gone from a place where belief in God was a given and mandatory, to a place where belief in God is one of the many possibilities available to each one of us
This does not mean that people are not religious, it means that religion is now a choice
You will not be excluded or an outcast for not believing in God, you have a choice
Individuals are no longer believers by default
We live in a world now where unbelieving is the default condition
We have to be convinced to believe in religion
Berger: Secularization is the process by which religious authority is broken. The religious institution no longer controls many aspects of society
We are in an age of authenticity
We all have to pursue our own happiness, it is the greatest goal in life
Society does not rely on God, revelation, or the rules of religion
Spirituality
religion
authoritative
Sacrifice for the community
You have to obey the rules to be part of the community
freedom of choice
we become the final authority
People are choosing to be spiritual over religious because you can choose to construct yourself and become authentic
Choice is our highest expression of freedom and authenticity
“This kind of search is often called by its practitioners ‘spirituality,’ and is opposed to ‘religion.’ This contrast reflects the rejection of ‘institutional religion’, that is, the authority claims made by churches which see it as their mandate to preempt the search, or to maintain it within certain definite limits”
Humans are world builders
We are “curiously unfinished” at birth which is why we have to project order onto it
Building a world is giving your environment meaning and order
It is through the externalization of ideas that persist longer than we live that we build order and give purpose to individuals
Religion is one instance of world building
Religion eases the sense of lack of order
Our awareness of ourselves leads us to create worlds because we want to make our lives significant
The human condition is unsolvable (we will always be mortal), we have to give our lives meaning in other ways
The most dominant institution in the past used to be the Catholic church in the West. They dominated and controlled economic, political, scientific, and religious aspects of society
Religion is no longer the authority that we look to to give meaning to our lives --> we have entered an age of secularization
modern science secularization
We can rely on science as authority more so than the Bible
Secularization of the Economy
The capitalist system separates the economy from religious authority
The development of modern science has separated knowledge from religion
Capitalism doesn’t rely on divine order, birthright, or God-given authority; it relies on the free market
Leads a major component of society away from religious components