"Our religio-secular world"

I have found a piece of recent writing concerning religion and secularism, which I think is good, and applies to the situation in American society. It is by Martin Marty, a longtime recognized academic, theologian, and professor of religious history, now at Univ. of Chicago. Marty’s words are clear—it would be best to just quote him. Here is an excerpt from the preview of the article (I can’t seem to access Jstor for the rest even though it is said to be free):

“In recent decades, many experts have marshaled empirical data demonstrating a secular trend in modern societies. Still other experts, marshaling different data, have documented a resurgent religiosity in these same societies. As a result of these paradoxical findings, my book shelf is crowded with contradictory titles: next to The Secular City is The Unsecular City; a volume that refers to Secular Man adjoins one exploring Unsecular Man.

. . . From my perspective—that of a theologian who has spent a lifetime pondering the impact of secularism on religion—we need a new model for describing the world that we actually inhabit. It is neither exclusively secular nor exclusively religious, but rather a complex combination of both the religious and the secular, with religious and secular phenomena occurring at the same time in individuals, in groups, and in societies around the world.

The old debates revolved around binary categories: societies were either secular or religious; worldly or otherworldly; materialist or spiritual; favoring immanence or transcendence, etc. The use of such polarizing concepts is valid in some contexts, but it does not adequately express the ways that individuals, groups, and societies actually behave; most people blur, mesh, meld, and muddle together elements of both the secular and the religious, the worldly and the otherworldly, etc. In adjusting to the complex world around them, people confound the categories of the social scientists, theologians, and philosophers: they simply ‘make do’ with a syncretic and characteristically modern blend of attitudes—call it religio-secular.”

I think Marty’s summation is good, but also idealistic. It sounds very broad, but how else can we explain both the spiritual urge and the material concerns in human experience? If a person can only see one side, then they are in a sense handicapped. The “both/and” view that sociology uses works well here—America being both secular and religious. I think the scope of American society is so huge—in size, pluralism, and modernity, that religious and secular attitudes mingle, and, as Marty describes, things get muddled and blurred. There are many angles to explore in relating this topic to American society.

For instance, a really big ongoing issue in the U. S. is keeping religion out of school curriculum. The combination of freedom of religious expression with the large diversity of religions, seems to cause a lot of friction and controversy in our society, among differing points of view. When does one person’s freedom of expression start to infringe on another person’s rights? In order to protect everyone’s rights, the U. S. government tries to keep the educational system neutral and secular.

I call Marty’s view idealistic, because he is referring to attitudes, and the realities of pluralistic society are that some religious views try for more—they want action, and want to change other people.

What would happen if, in America, all religious groups could agree to get along, and allow others to be different? Seems it would relieve our society of a lot of difficulties.

*Final note re. the religion vs. secularism debate: fivebooks.com has a transcribed interview with Martin Marty (Apr 19, 2011) in which he talks about five books on religion vs. secularism that he thinks “fuel the debate.” The interview contains interesting ideas on this subject.

Cited:

Marty, Martin. “Our religio-secular world.” Daedalus Vol. 132, No. 3, On Secularism & Religion (2003) pp. 42-48. MIT Press. 5/11/2013.

http://fivebooks.com/interviews/martin-marty-on-religion-versus-secularism-history?page=3