Secularisation

Secularisation in Britain

Crockett estimates that in that in the year 1851 there has been 40% more of the adult population of Britain attended church on Sundays which is a much higher figure then today.

There has been major changes to religion in the UK since then:

-          Decline in the proportion of the population going to church or belonging to one

-          Increasing in the average age of churchgoers

-          Fewer baptisms and church weddings

-          Decline in the numbers holding traditional Christian beliefs

-          Greater diversity, more non-Christian religions

Different sociologist have given different explanations for why this has happened

Wilson – 1966

-          Western societies had been undergoing a long-term process of secularisation.

-          He defined secularisation as ‘the process whereby religious beliefs, practices and institutions lose social significance’.

-          Church attendance in England and Wales fallen from 40% to 10/15%

-          As well as this church weddings, baptisms and Sunday school attendance had also declined

-          Wilson concluded that Britain had become a secular society

Church attendance today

By 2020 4% of adults attended church on Sunday. This means churchgoing has more than halved since original research in 1960s

Attendance at large organisations such as the Church of England and the Catholic Church have decline more than small organisations some of which remain stable or have grown – however this has not made up for the massive declines

1971 – 59% of weddings in church

2018 – 20% of weddings in church

However weddings in church is still more popular then attending church on a Sunday

Since many Catholic schools will only take children with baptism they have become an entry ticket to a good school rather than a sign of Christian commitment “Bogus Baptisms”

Religious affiliation today

A persons religious affiliation refers to their membership of or identification with a religion. Evidence indicates a continuing decline in the number of people who are affiliated to a religion. Between 1983 and 2018 the proportion of adults with no religion rose from under a third to just over half

In the same period those identifying as Christian fell by 40%

The number of Catholics increased slightly due to immigration as well as to other religions partly due to immigration and higher birth rates

Religious belief today

Surveys show a significant decline in belief in a personal god

Religious institutions today

Not only have religious beliefs and practices declined so has the influence of religion as a social institution

Although the church has some influence on the public this has declined significantly since the 19^th century

The state has taken over many functions of the church

Therefor whereas religion once pervaded every aspect of life it has increasingly been confined to the private sphere of the individual and the family

Churches used to provide education but since then it has been provided mainly through the state

Even ‘faith-schools’ now must conform to the states regulations

Bruce agrees with Wilson that all the evidence on secularisation has now been pointing in the same direction for many years.

Bruce predicts that if current trends continue the method church will fold around 2030 and by then the church of England will be a merely small voluntary organisation with a large amount of heritage in britain.

Explanations of secularisation

Wilson defined secularisation as the process where religious beliefs, practices and institutions lose social significance

Religious belief – believing in a God

Religious practice – the extent to which people involve themselves in Church membership, attendance at religious services

Institutions – ability to exert influence and control over the running of society

Why is secularisation occurring?

Weber believed secularisation was being caused by rationalisation – the process by which rational ways of thinking come to dominate

-          He argued scientific explanations of the world had come to replace religious ones

-          This had begun with the protestant reformation in the 16^th centenary where protestants split from the church. The reformation encouraged individuals to think for themselves about their faith and the world

In the middle ages the world was an enchanted garden populated with angels and demons, spirits and ghost

Max Weber: Rationalisation

Rational ways of thinking and acting have replaced religious ones

Weber: the medieval catholic view saw the world as an ‘enchanted garden’ with God and other spiritual forces believed to be present and active in this world

However the Protestant Reformation brough a new worldview

Disenchantment: events no longer explained as the work of unpredictable supernatural beings, but as the predictable workings of natural forces

Technological world view

Bruce argues the growth of a technological worldview has replaced religious or supernatural explanations of why things happen – plane crashes we are unlikely to look at in terms of why God did that but rather in terms of scientific and technological

Structural differentiation

Parson defines structural differentiation as process of specialisation that occurs with development of industrial society.

Specialised institutions develop to carry out function which used to be performed by single institution

Religion dominated in pre-industrial society but industrialisation has become a smaller and more specialised institution

Disengagement

Structural differentiation leads to disengagement of religion – functions transferred to other institutions such as state and it becomes disconnected from wider society. Church loses influence it once had

Privatisation

Religion has become more privatised – confined to the private sphere of the home and family

Social and cultural diversity

-          Decline in community – when religion lost its basis in stable local communities it lost it vitality and its hold over individuals

-          Industrialisation – social and geographical mobility not only breaks up communities but brings people together from many different backgrounds, creating even more diversity

-          Diversity of occupations, cultures and lifestyles undermines religion – people cannot avoid knowing that many people around them hold different beliefs. Bruce argue the plausibility of beliefs is undermined by individualism because the plausibility of religion depends on practice within community

Criticisms

Aldridge points out community does not have to be in a particular area:

-          Religion can be source of identify on a worldwide scale

-          Some religious communities are imagined communities that interact through the use of global media

-          Pentecostal and other religious groups often flourish in supposedly ‘impersonal’ urban areas

Religious diversity

Berger says another cause of secularisation is the trend towards religious diversity where instead of these being only one religious organisation and only one interpretation of the faith there are many:

-          The sacred canopy

Everyone lived under a single sacred canopy or set of beliefs this gave the beliefs grater plausibility because there was no one to challenge them.

Since the grow in number of religions society is thus no longer unified under the single sacred canopy provided by one church

-          Plausibility structure

This is the reasons why people find it believable. When there are alternative versions of religion people are likely to question all of them. Therefore what is true and what is false simply becomes a personal opinion.

Criticisms

Berger changed his views and now argued that diversity and choice actually stimulate interest and participation in religion

Beckford agrees with the idea that religious diversity will lead some to question or even abandon their religious beliefs but this is not inevitable – some say it may lead to strengthen of religious beliefs

Cultural defence and transition

Bruce identified two counter-trends that see to go against secularisation they

Both associated with higher than average levels of religious participation:

1.      Cultural defence

Religion provides a focal point for the defence of national, ethnic, local or group identify in a struggle against an external force such as a hostile foreign power

2.      Cultural transition

Religion provides support and a sense of community for ethnic groups such as migrants to a different country and culture

Bruce argues that religion only survives in such situations because it is a focus for group identity. Therefore these examples do not disprove secularisation but show that religion is most likely to survive where it performs functions other than relating individuals to the supernatural.

Secularisation in America

Wilson found that 45% of Americans attended church on Sundays

However he argued that churchgoing in America was more an expression of the ‘American way of life’ than of deeply religious beliefs.

Wilson claimed America was a secular society not because people had abandoned the church’s but because religion there had become superficial

Bruce uses three sources of evidence to support his claim:

-          Declining church attendance

-          Secularisation from within

-          Religious diversity

Declining church attendance

It was found that even though 40% of people said they went to church this did not make sense because if it was true the church’s would be full.

They carried out head counts at services.

They then carried out interviews and found that the levels of attendance claimed at interviews was 83% higher.

Bruce found that this may be because it is still seen as socially desirable or normative to go to church so people have stopped going will still say they attended if asked in a survey

Secularisation from within

Bruce argues the way American religion has adjusted to the modern world amounts to secularisation from within.

Religion in America has been ‘psychologised’ or turned into a form of therapy. Change has enabled it to fit in with a secular society

America has remained popular by becoming less religious

Religious diversity

Growth of religious diversity has contributed to secularisation from within

Churchgoers are becoming less dogmatic in their views

Bruce identifies trend towards practical relativism – acceptance of the view that others are entitled to hold beliefs that are different to one’s own

Criticisms of secularisation theory

-          Religion is not declining but rather it is simply changing its forms

-          Secularisation theory is one-sided it focuses on decline and ignores religious revivals and the growth of new religions

-          Evidence of falling church attendance ignore people who believe but don’t go to church

-          Religion may have decline in Europe but not globally secularisation is not universal

-          The past was not a ‘golden age’ of faith from which we have declined and the future will not be an age of atheism 

-          Far from causing decline religious diversity increase participation because it offers choice. There is no overall downward trend. Religious trends point in different directions and people make use of religion in all different ways