Affirming Secularization, Opposing Secularism

One of the most influential theological books published in 1965 was Harvey Cox’s The Secular City. Through the years I have thought much about that immensely popular book, which sold over one million copies.

Secularization vs. Secularism 

Cox’s first chapter is “Biblical Sources of Secularization” and the first subsection is “Secularization vs. Secularism”—and that distinction is one that I have considered highly important from the time I first read it while still in graduate school.

According to Cox, secularization is the historical process by which one dominant religion no longer has control over a particular society or culture. But secularization is much different from secularism. 

So, what is secularism? Secularism, Cox contends, is “an ideology, a new closed worldview.... It menaces the openness and freedom secularization has produced.” Among other things, it especially menaces religious faith (and this is my contention, not explicitly expressed by Cox).

Cox wrote in the introduction to the 1983 edition of his book that the “sharp difference” between secularization and secularism was central to the entire argument of his book.

Why Affirm Secularization?

“Secularization,” according to Cox, “represents an authentic consequence of biblical faith.” Thus, “Rather than oppose it, the task of Christians should be to support and nourish it” (2013 ed., p. 22).

For those of us who place a high priority on religious freedom—and Cox (b. 1929) is an ordained Baptist minister, and true Baptists have always been advocates of religious freedom—secularization is good partly because as Cox says early in the Introduction of his book,

Pluralism and tolerance are the children of secularization. They represent a society’s unwillingness to enforce any particular world-view on its citizens (p. 3).

Thus, secularization is consistent with the principle of the separation of church and state, which I have often written about. (For example, see here.) As Brian Zahnd points out in his book Postcards from Babylon (2019),

in the American experiment the United States deliberately broke with the Christendom practice of claiming to be a Christian nation with a state church. It was America that pioneered the experiment of secular governance (p. 46).

In February 2010 I mentioned Cox in my blog article (see here) about Lesslie Newbigin, the outstanding British missionary who spent nearly forty years in India. In 1966 he wrote Honest Religion for Secular Man—and that was the most influential book (for me) that I read in 1967, my first full year in Japan.

As I wrote in that blog posting, Newbigin averred that Indian society changed, largely for the better, through the process of secularization. He gave these examples: “the abolition of untouchability of the dowry system, of temple prostitution, the spread of education and medical service, and so on” (p. 17).

And like Cox, he contended that secularization, which must be clearly distinguished from secularism, has roots in the Judeo-Christian faith.

Why Oppose Secularism?

The distinction between secularization and secularism, such as made by Cox and Newbigin (and me), is not widely recognized now. “Secularism” is the general term used for both—and Andrew Copson’s informative little book Secularism: A Very Short Introduction (2019) describes secularism in words very similar to how Cox explains secularization.

As an ideology, though, secularism is confined to “temporal” or “this-worldly” things, with emphasis on nature, reason, and science. For the most part, there is rejection of transcendence or anything that is not obviously a part of the visible world.

When secularism is truly an ism, it is a worldview that has no room for God, by whatever name God might be understood—or for Truth, Beauty, and Goodness.

While, certainly, I affirm the right of people to be secularists, if that is their free choice, still, I firmly, and sadly, believe that true secularists are missing much of great significance.

Recognizing the difference between secularization in the public square and secularism in one’s personal worldview, I staunchly affirm the former and oppose the latter—as I generally oppose all isms, including Christianism, which I plan to write about next month.

“On Not Leaving It to the Snake”

Thinking Friend Charles Kiker referred to Harvey Cox in commenting on a recent blog article. I responded (see here) by acknowledging my appreciation of Cox’s thinking and by mentioning his book On Not Leaving It to the Snake (1967).

Even though I have long been an admirer of his, up to this point I have not written about Cox, now professor emeritus of Harvard Divinity School, in any of my blog articles. I am filling that lacuna now.

Cox's Books

Harvey Cox (b. 1929) became widely known in theological circles—and beyond—with the publication of his book The Secular City (1965). Remarkably, it has sold over a million copies, a rarity for a theological book.

Cox’s book titled God’s Revolution and Man’s Responsibility was also published in 1965. Unlike the former book, which I read soon after it came out (and again later with even more appreciation), I didn’t read this latter book until in the 1970s. I found it, too, to be a good and important book.

Through the years, Cox has written many other books—including one I have not seen yet: The Market as God (2016), introduced in a Jan. 5, 2017, article in The Nation.

It is specifically Cox’s On Not Leaving It to the Snake, though, that I am writing about in this article. More particularly, I am focusing on the part of that book most relevant to us now: “Introduction: Faith and Decision” (pp. vii-xviii).

Cox's Point 

Cox explains that in the long history of Christian theology, “original sin” has generally been interpreted in such a way that pride is seen to be “the most dangerous of all human sins.” 

In contrast, using the “sexist” language usual for the 1960s, Cox avers that “man’s most debilitating proclivity is not his pride. It is not his attempt to be more than man. Rather it is his sloth, his unwillingness to be everything man was intended to be.”

Accordingly, in the Genesis story of Eve, she was guilty of the sin of sloth, letting the snake tell her what to do.

The ongoing significance of that mythical story is simply this: “Adam and Eve are the biblical Everyman and Everywoman. Their sin is our sin.”

Cox's Relevance

It might be argued that part of the political problem we have in the U.S. today is because many voters committed the sin of sloth. And here I am thinking of the (literally) millions of people who voted for Obama in 2012 but who--because of apathy, or whatever—did not vote at all in 2016.

Further, and perhaps even worse, is the fact that probably millions of voters left it up not to the snake but to the fox (Fox News) to tell them (implicitly, if not explicitly) who to vote for.

In looking ahead, the sin of sloth/apathy may well do the country in—or vigilant resistance/action may keep the country from going down the tubes.

The March 2017 issue of The Atlantic has a long and significant article titled "How to Build an Autocracy" (which you can read here). In that article, David Frum, the author, “argues that if Congress is quiescent and the public apathetic, President Trump can set the country down a path toward illiberalism, institutional subversion, and endemic graft.”

So far, there has been considerable resistance to DJT. Let’s pray that peaceful actions for justice will continue and that a large majority of the population will not succumb to the sin of apathy and will not leave it to the snake (or the fox) to tell them what to do.