The Epoch of the Secular City
Core Idea: The Epoch of the Secular City
Rise of urban civilization and collapse of traditional religion are two core hallmarks; urbanization enabled by scientific/technological advances from the wreckage of traditional views.
Secularization is the parallel movement, marking a change in how people grasp life together; it occurs when cosmopolitan city life reveals the relativity of myths once considered unquestionable.
The pattern of the city reflects and shapes how people live and envision the gods; the polis influences future experience of life and perception of the divine.
The secular metropolis is both the pattern of our life together and the symbol of our world view; the cosmos becomes the city of man, a field of human exploration with the gods absent.
Secularization is defined as delivering man from religious and metaphysical control over reason and language; it loosens the world from religious understandings, dispels closed worldviews, and breaks supernaturally grounded myths.
It represents defatalization of history: humans are left with the world in their hands, unable to blame fortune or the furies for what they do; the process occurs when attention turns toward this world and this time (saeculum = this present age).
Bonhoeffer’s idea of 1944, “man’s coming of age,” is a theological interpretation of a trend already noticed by poets, sociologists, and philosophers for decades.
The epoch of the secular city is not anti-clerical or anti-religious fanaticism; anti-religious zealotry is anachronistic in this context.
Secularization does not persecute religion; it bypasses and undercuts it, often revitalizing religious worldviews while rendering them innocuous.
Religion becomes privatized as a personal or group prerogative, with gods of traditional religions persisting as private fetishes rather than public life foundations.
What is Secularization? Definitions, Mechanisms, and Consequences
The Dutch theologian C.A. van Peursen: secularization is the deliverance of man from religious and metaphysical control over his reason and language; it is the loosening of the world from religious understandings and the breaking of all-supernatural myths and sacred symbols.
It marks a shift from supernatural explanations to a focus on this world and this time (saeculum = this present age).
Bonhoeffer’s phrase “man’s coming of age” captures a long-standing recognition of this shift.
Secularization leads to the privatization of religion: belief becomes a matter of private worldview, not public life or state-molded morality.
The gods of traditional religions survive as private symbols but play no significant role in public life.
It is not about eradicating religion but re-siting it; religious worldviews can be revitalized yet remain personal rather than universal public frameworks.
The era’s secular currents can appear alongside religious phenomena (e.g., religious revival, sects) yet are not threats to secularization; they are integrated into a broader secularizing context.
The attempt to force religion to act as the basis for political or secular movements is ultimately misguided; to understand the age we must accept and engage with its unremitting secularity.
The Secular City: Pattern, Meaning, and Morality
The secular metropolis is the pattern of life and the symbol of the world view in contemporary society.
The world looks less to religious rules and rituals for morality or meaning; religion may be a hobby, a national/ethnic marker, or an aesthetic delight for many.
For fewer people does religion provide an inclusive and commanding system of personal and cosmic values.
While some argue that Nazism or communism function as religions, this is misleading: Nazism is a tribal throwback, and everyday communism becomes more secularized and less religious.
For lasting understanding, we must avoid forcing secular/political movements to appear religious; secularization will continue regardless.
Bonhoeffer urged speaking of God in secular fashion and finding a non-religious interpretation of biblical concepts as a way to engage with the modern world.
Currents, Countercurrents, and a Path Forward
Public events (self-immolation, Soka Gakkai, Black Muslims, renewed Catholic vigor) might seem to challenge secularization, but they align with broader secular currents or provoke adaptations in religious systems.
Secular currents often express themselves in quasi-religious forms or prompt changes in religion that lessen perceived threats to secularization.
The revival of ancient Oriental religions often voices nationalist political aspirations while repurposing old symbols for new ends.
Pluralism and tolerance arise as products of secularization: societies resist enforcing a single worldview.
Vatican II represents Catholic openness to truth from all sides, signaling pluralism within religious life itself.
Global spread of secular urban life is accelerated by supersonic travel and instantaneous communication.
Religion in the modern age is increasingly seen as a hobby, a marker of identity, or a set of personal/deep aesthetic values, rather than a comprehensive public moral order.
The central task is to understand and communicate with the secular age by embracing its secularity: love it, speak of God in secular terms, and seek non-religious interpretations of biblical concepts.
The gods of traditional religions persist as private fetishes but not as public, governing forces in the secular metropolis.