Secular religion

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Secular religion is the ideas, theories or philosophies that involve no spiritual component yet possess qualities similar to those of a religion.[citation needed] Such qualities may include elements such as dogma, a system of indoctrination, the prescription of an absolute code of conduct, an ideologically tailored creation story and end-times narrative, designated enemies, and unquestioning devotion to a higher authority.[citation needed] The secular religion operates in a secular society by filling a role which would be satisfied by a church or another religious authority.[citation needed]

Communism and Nazism

In 1936 a Protestant priest referred explicitly to Communism as a new secular religion.[1] A couple of years later, on the eve of World War II, F. A. Voigt characterised both Marxism and National Socialism as secular religions, akin at a fundamental level in their authoritarianism and messianic beliefs[2] - as well as in their eschatological view of human History.[3] Both, he considered, were waging religious war against the liberal enquiring mind of the European heritage.[4]

After the war, the social philosopher Raymond Aron would expand on the exploration of communism in terms of a secular religion;[5] while A. J. P. Taylor for example would characterise it as "a great secular religion....the Communist Manifesto must be counted as a holy book in the same class as the Bible".[6]

Contemporary characterizations

The term secular religion is often applied today to communal belief systems — as for example with the view of love as our postmodern secular religion.[7] Paul Vitz applied the term to modern psychology, in as much as it fosters a cult of the self, explicitly calling “the self-theory ethic ... this secular religion”.[8] Sport has also been considered as a new secular religion, particularly with respect to Olympism.[9] For Pierre de Coubertin, founder of the modern Olympic Games, belief in them as a new secular religion was explicit and lifelong:[10]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Gentile, p. 2
  2. ↑ F. A. Voigt, Unto Caesar (1938) p. 37
  3. ↑ Voigt, p. 17-20, p. 71 and p. 98-9
  4. ↑ Voigt, p. 203
  5. ↑ Aron, Raymond. The Opium of the Intellectuals. London: Secker & Warburg, 1957, pp. 265-294
  6. ↑ Quoted in Chris Wrigley, A. J. P. Taylor (2006) p. 229 and 202
  7. ↑ U. Beck/E. Beck-Gernsheim, The Normal Chaos of Love (1995) Chap. 6
  8. ↑ Paul C. Vitz, Psychology as Religion: The Cult of Self-worship (1994) p. 145
  9. ↑ H. Preuss/ K. Liese, Internationalism in the Olympic Movement (2011) p. 44
  10. ↑ B. W. Ritchie/D. Adair, Sport Tourism (2004) p. 1988

Further reading

  • A. Bergesen, The Sacred and the Subversive (1984)
  • E. B. Koenker, Secular Salvations (1965)
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