Toward Desacralizing Secularization Theory

Abstract

The theory of secularization is a product of the social and cultural milieu from which it emerged. The expectation of receding religious influence fits well the evolutionary model of modernization. Critical reexamination reveals secularization to be an orienting concept grounded in an ideological preference rather than a systematic theory. This paper examines the historical context which permitted the idea of secularization to go unchallenged for so long, and then develops four discrete types of evidence to account for the present challenge to the theory.