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Secularization (or secularisation) is the transformation of a society from close identification with religious values and institutions toward nonreligious (or irreligious) values and secular institutions. The secularization thesis refers to the belief that as societies "progress", particularly through modernization and rationalization, religion loses its authority in all aspects of social life and governance.^[1] The term secularization is also used in the context of the lifting of the monastic restrictions from a member of the clergy.^[2]

Secularization has many levels of meaning, both as a theory and a historical process. Social theorists such as Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud, Max Weber, and Émile Durkheim, postulated that the modernization of society would include a decline in levels of religiosity. Study of this process seeks to determine the manner in which, or extent to which religious creeds, practices and institutions are losing social significance. Some theorists argue that the secularization of modern civilization partly results from our inability to adapt broad ethical and spiritual needs of mankind to the increasingly fast advance of the physical sciences.^[3]

The term also has additional meanings, primarily historical and religious.^[4] Applied to church property, historically it refers to the seizure of monastic lands and buildings by anti-clerical European governments during the 18th and 19th centuries, which resulted in the expulsion and suppression of the religious communities which occupied them (see Kulturkampf). Otherwise, secularization involves the abandonment of goods by the Church where it is sold to purchasers after the government seizes the property, which most commonly happens after reasonable negotiations and arrangements are made. In Catholic canon law, the term can also denote the permission or authorization given for a member of a religious order to live outside his or her religious community or monastery, either for a fixed or permanent period.^[5]

Background[link]

Secularization is sometimes credited both to the cultural shifts in society following the emergence of rationality and the development of science as a substitute for superstition — Max Weber called this process, "the disenchantment of the world" — and to the changes made by religious institutions to compensate. At the most basic stages, this begins with a slow transition from oral traditions to a writing culture that diffuses knowledge. This first reduces the authority of clerics as the custodians of revealed knowledge. As the responsibility for education has moved from the family and community to the state, two consequences have arisen:

• the collective conscience as defined by Durkheim is diminished; and
• through the fragmentation of communal activities, religion becomes more a matter of individual choice rather than an observed social obligation.

A major issue in the study of secularization is the extent to which certain trends such as decreased attendance at places of worship indicate a decrease in religiosity or simply a privatization of religious belief, where religious beliefs no longer play a dominant role in public life or in other aspects of decision-making.

The issue of secularization is discussed in various religious traditions. The government of Turkey is an often cited example, following the abolition of the Ottoman Caliphate and foundation of the Turkish republic in 1923. This established popular sovereignty in a secular republican framework, in opposition to a system whose authority is based on religion. As one of many examples of state modernization, this shows secularization and democratization as mutually re-enforcing processes^{[citation needed]}, relying on a separation of religion and state. In expressly secular states like India, it has been argued that the need was to legislate for toleration and respect between quite different religions, and likewise, the secularization of the West was a response to drastically violent intra-Christian feuds between Catholicism and Protestantism. Some have therefore argued that Western and Indian secularization is radically different in that it deals with autonomy from religious regulation and control. Considerations of both tolerance and autonomy are relevant to any secular state.

Definitions[link]

John Sommerville (1998) outlined six uses of the term secularization in the scientific literature. The first five are more along the lines of 'definitions' while the sixth is more of a 'clarification of use':^[6]

1. When discussing macro social structures, secularization can refer to differentiation: a process in which the various aspects of society, economic, political, legal, and moral, become increasingly specialized and distinct from one another.
2. When discussing individual institutions, secularization can denote the transformation of a religious into a secular institution. Examples would be the evolution of institutions such as Harvard University from a predominantly religious institution into a secular institution (with a divinity school now housing the religious element illustrating differentiation).
3. When discussing activities, secularization refers to the transfer of activities from religious to secular institutions, such as a shift in provision of social services from churches to the government.
4. When discussing mentalities, secularization refers to the transition from ultimate concerns to proximate concerns. E.g., individuals in the West are now more likely to moderate their behavior in response to more immediately applicable consequences rather than out of concern for post-mortem consequences. This is a personal religious decline or movement toward a secular lifestyle.
5. When discussing populations, secularization refers to broad patterns of societal decline in levels of religiosity as opposed to the individual-level secularization of (4) above. This understanding of secularization is also distinct from (1) above in that it refers specifically to religious decline rather than societal differentiation.
6. When discussing religion, secularization can only be used unambiguously to refer to religion in a generic sense. For example, a reference to Christianity is not clear unless one specifies exactly which denominations of Christianity are being discussed.

Opposition[link]

Abdel Wahab Elmessiri (2002) outlined two meanings of the secularization term:

1. Partial Secularization: which is the common meaning of the word, and expresses "The separation between religion and state".
2. Complete Secularization: this definition is not limited to the partial definition, but exceeds it to "The separation between all (religion, moral, and human) values, and (not just the state) but also to (the human nature in its public and private sides), so that the holiness is removed from the world, and this world is transformed into a usable matter that can be employed for the sake of the strong".

Sociological use and differentiation[link]

As studied by sociologists, one of the major themes of secularization is that of "differentiation": the tendency for areas of life to become more distinct and specialized as a society becomes modernized. European sociology, influenced by anthropology, was interested in the process of change from the so-called primitive societies to increasingly advanced societies. In the U.S., the emphasis was initially on change as an aspect of progress, but Talcott Parsons refocused on society as a system immersed in a constant process of increased differentiation, which he saw as a process in which new institutions take over the tasks necessary in a society to guarantee its survival as the original monolithic institutions break up. This is a devolution from single, less differentiated institutions to an increasingly differentiated subset of institutions.^[7]

Following Parsons, this concept of differentiation has been widely applied. As phrased by Jose Casanova, this "core and the central thesis of the theory of secularization is the conceptualization of the process of societal modernization as a process of functional differentiation and emancipation of the secular spheres – primarily the state, the economy, and science – from the religious sphere and the concomitant differentiation and specialization of religion within its own newly found religious sphere." Casanova also describes this as the theory of "privatization" of religion, which he partially criticizes.^[8] While criticizing certain aspects of the traditional sociological theory of secularization, however, David Martin argues that the concept of social differentiation has been its "most useful element."^[9]

Institutional secularization[link]

In most Western countries, government, the not-for-profit sector and the private sector have taken over the provision of social welfare functions, but in Germany, secularization has not occurred to the same degree. There are still about 100,000 Church-based charitable foundations providing services from pre-school education to health care for the elderly, making the two major Churches the second largest employers after government. This is funded partly by the Churches out of their own revenues, with the balance coming from general tax revenue. Critics argue that by allowing the Churches to play such a major role, the State is breaching its duty of neutrality under Article 4 of the Grundgesetz, and they consider it inappropriate for such heavy subsidies to be given to the Churches. For their part, the Churches see this work as a natural part of their Christian mission. (On the extensive secularization in Germany at the beginning of the 19th century, see German Mediatization)

Current issues in the study of secularization[link]

At present, secularization as understood in the West, is being debated in the sociology of religion. Some scholars (e.g. Rodney Stark, Peter Berger) have argued that levels of religiosity are not declining, while other scholars (e.g. Mark Chaves, N. J. Demerath) have countered by introducing the idea of neo-secularization, which broadens the definition of secularization to include the decline of religious authority.

In other words, rather than using the proportion of irreligious apostates as the sole measure of secularity, neo-secularization argues that individuals increasingly look outside of religion for authoritative positions. Neo-secularizationists would argue that religion has diminishing authority on issues such as birth control, and argue that religion's authority is declining and secularization is taking place even if religious affiliation may not be declining in the U.S. (a debate still taking place).^{[citation needed]}

Finally, some claim that demographic forces offset the process of secularization, and may do so to such an extent that individuals can consistently drift away from religion even as society becomes more religious. This is especially the case in societies like Israel (with the ultra-Orthodox and religious zionists) where committed religious groups have several times the birth rate of seculars. The religious fertility effect operates to a greater or lesser extent in all countries, and is amplified in the West by religious immigration. For instance, even as native whites became more secular, London, England has become more religious in the past 25 years as religious immigrants and their descendants have increased their share of the population.^[10]

See also[link]

External links[link]

• Definition of Secularization at Garethjmsaunders.co.uk
• Secularization Theory: The Course of a Concept

Notes[link]

References[link]

• Berger, Peter. The Sacred Canopy. (1967)
• Berger, Peter. The Desecularization of the World. (2000)
• Bruce, Steve. Religion in the Modern World: From Cathedrals to Cults
• Bruce, Steve. God is Dead: Secularization in the West. (2002)
• Casanova, Jose. Public Religions in the Modern World. (1994)
• Chaves, M. Secularization As Declining Religious Authority. Social Forces 72(3):749–74. (1994)
• Ellul, Jacques. The New Demons.
• Gauchet, Marcel. The Disenchantment of the World. (1985/tr. 1997)
• Martin, David. A General Theory of Secularization. New York: Harper & Row. (1979).
• Sommerville, C. J. "Secular Society Religious Population: Our Tacit Rules for Using the Term Secularization. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 37 (2):249–53. (1998)
• Said, E. Orientalism: Western Conceptions of the Orient. London: Penguin. (1978).
• Skolnik, Jonathan and Peter Eli Gordon, eds., New German Critique 94 (2005)Special Issue on Secularization and Disenchantment
• Stark, Rodney, Laurence R. Iannaccone, Monica Turci, and Marco Zecchi. How Much Has Europe Been Secularized? Inchiesta 32(136):99–112. (2002)
• Taylor, Charles. A Secular Age. Harvard University Press. (2007)
• Warrier, Maya. Processes of Secularisation in Contemporary India: Guru Faith in the Mata Amritanandamayi Mission, Modern Asian Studies (2003)
• Abdelwahab Elmessiri, Dar Al-Shorok, "The Partial Secularization and The Complete Secularization", "العلمانية الجزئية و العلمانية الشاملة"

José Casanova (died 8 December 1987) was a Peruvian international footballer who played as a midfielder.

Casanova died in the 1987 Alianza Lima air disaster.

External links[link]

• José Casanova at National-Football-Teams.com

This biographical article related to Peruvian association football is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Very Reverend Adolfo Nicolás Pachón
Born	(1936-04-29) April 29, 1936 (age 76) Villamuriel de Cerrato, Spain
Nationality	Spanish
Occupation	Superior General of the Society of Jesus

Society of Jesus

History of the Jesuits Regimini militantis Suppression Jesuit Hierarchy Superior General Adolfo Nicolás Ignatian Spirituality Spiritual Exercises Ad majorem Dei gloriam Magis Notable Jesuits St. Ignatius of Loyola St. Francis Xavier Blessed Peter Faber St. Aloysius Gonzaga St. Robert Bellarmine St. Peter Canisius St. Edmund Campion

Father Adolfo Nicolás Pachón, S.J., S.T.D. (born April 29, 1936) is a Spanish priest of the Roman Catholic Church. He is the thirtieth and current Superior General of the Society of Jesus, the largest male religious order in the Church.

Biography[link]

Adolfo Nicolás was born in Villamuriel de Cerrato, Palencia, and entered the Society of Jesus, more commonly known as the Jesuits, in the novitiate of Aranjuez in 1953.^[1] He studied at the University of Alcalá, there earning his licentiate in philosophy, until 1960, whence he traveled to Japan to familiarize himself with Japanese language and culture. Nicolás entered Sophia University in Tokyo, where he studied theology, in 1964, and was later ordained to the priesthood on March 17, 1967.

From 1968 to 1971, he studied at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, from where he earned a doctorate in theology. Upon his return to Japan, Nicolás was made professor of systematic theology at his alma mater of Sophia University, teaching there for the next thirty years.

He was Director of the East Asian Pastoral Institute at the Ateneo de Manila University, in Quezon City, Philippines, from 1978 to 1984,^[2] and later served as rector of the theologate in Tokyo from 1991 to 1993, when he was appointed Provincial of the Jesuit Province of Japan. Nicolás remained in this post until 1999, and then spent four years doing pastoral work among poor immigrants in Tokyo.

In 2004 he returned to the Philippines after he was named President of the Jesuit Conference of Provincials for Eastern Asia and Oceania.^[2][3] As Moderator, he was at the service of the Jesuits of several countries, including Australia, China, Japan, Korea, Micronesia, Myanmar, and East Timor.

In addition to his native Spanish, Nicolás can speak Catalan, English, Italian, French, and Japanese.^[4]

Secretary General of the Society of Jesus[link]

On the second ballot of the thirty-fifth General Congregation (GC XXXV) of the Society of Jesus, Nicolás was elected as the Order’s thirtieth^[5] Superior General on January 19, 2008, succeeding the Dutch Fr. Peter Hans Kolvenbach. His election was immediately relayed to Pope Benedict XVI, who confirmed him in the post. Many have marked the similarities between Nicolás and former Superior General Fr. Pedro Arrupe, who, after having suffered a stroke, became the first Jesuit superior general to resign his office- with the urging and acceptance of the Vatican^[5] under Pope John Paul II. Father Arrupe, like his eventual successor, was a Spanish missionary in Japan; Nicolás has described Arrupe, whom he had earlier had as Provincial Superior, as a "great missionary, a national hero, a man on fire".^[6] He leads a congregation which currently numbers 18,500 members.^[7]

General Curia restructuring[link]

In March 2011, Nicolás forwarded a communiqué globally of revisions to the General Curia restructuring the secretariats, including the creation of new positions and a commission.^[8]

Beliefs and values[link]

Missionary work[link]

He once stated, "Asia has a lot yet to offer the Church, to the whole Church, but we haven't done it yet. Maybe we have not been courageous enough, or we haven't taken the risks we should".^[9] In an article on Nicolás, Michael McVeigh said that Nicolás has also expressed his wariness of missionaries who are more concerned with teaching and imposing orthodoxy than in having a cultural experience with the local people, saying, "Those who enter into the lives of the people, they begin to question their own positions very radically."^[9]

In the homily of the Mass celebrated after his election as Superior General, Nicolás emphasized service, based on the scriptural reading for that day, the words of St. Ignatius of Loyola, and Benedict XVI's teaching on God is love. He stated: "The more we become as servants, the more pleased God is." Delving further on the scriptural passage and after relating an anecdote of experiences with the poor in Asia, he related poverty with having God as the only source of strength, pointing out that the Jesuit's strength is not in externals (power, media, etc.) nor in internal fortitude (research). "The poor only have God in whom to find strength. For us only God is our strength."

Nicolas also developed the following ideas: the message of the Jesuits is "a message of salvation" and the challenge of discerning the type of salvation that people today are waiting for.^[10]

Obedience to Rome[link]

After receiving a message from Pope Benedict asking the Society of Jesus to affirm its fidelity to the magisterium and the Holy See, the Congregation presided by Nicolás responded, "The Society of Jesus was born within the Church, we live in the Church, we were approved by the Church and we serve the Church. This is our vocation...[Unity with the pope] is the symbol of our union with Christ. It also is the guarantee that our mission will not be a 'small mission,' a project just of the Jesuits, but that our mission is the mission of the Church."^[11]

Liberation theology[link]

In a November 2008 interview with El Periodico, Nicolás described liberation theology as a "courageous and creative response to an unbearable situation of injustice in Latin America."^[12] These remarks are particularly controversial since some forms of liberation theology have been denounced by Pope John Paul II^[13] and by Pope Benedict XVI, when he was still Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.^[14] However, the Superior General also added, "As with any theology, liberation theology needs years to mature. It's a shame that it has not been given a vote of confidence and that soon its wings will be cut before it learns to fly. It needs more time."^[12]

References[link]

Wikinews has related news: Jesuits choose Adolfo Nicolás as their new Superior General

External links[link]

• Spaniard becomes new Black Pope – New York Times
• Habemus Papam: Jesuits Go Ad Orientem – Whispers in the Loggia
• Spaniard Adolfo Nicolás elected new Superior General of the Jesuits – Catholic News Agency
• What should GC35 do? Adolfo Nicolas:Six hopes for the General Congregation

David Ramsay Steele is the author of From Marx to Mises: Post-Capitalist Society and the Challenge of Economic Calculation (an exposition of the economic calculation problem) and Editorial Director of Open Court Publishing Company. With Michael R. Edelstein, in 1997 he co-wrote Three Minute Therapy: Change Your Thinking, Change Your Life, a psychological self-help book based on Albert Ellis's Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy. In the 1960s, Steele was a member of the Socialist Party of Great Britain [1].

Works[link]

• “Smash Cash” Oz Issue 17 (December 1968) [2] [3] [4]
• “Posing the Problem: The Impossibility of Economic Calculation Under Socialism”, Journal of Libertarian Studies v5 #1 ( Winter 1981) pp 7–22 [5]
• “The Failure of Bolshevism and Its Aftermath”, Journal of Libertarian Studies v5 #1 ( Winter 1981) pp 99–111 [6]
• “Attempted Theft of an Organisation”, The Journal of the Libertarian Alliance v3 #3 (1983) PDF
• “The Irrationality of Planning“, Critical Review v1 #2 (1987)
• “Hayek's Theory of Cultural Group Selection”, Journal of Libertarian Studies v8 #2 (Summer 1987) pp 171–195 PDF
• Great Economic Thinkers: Karl Marx — Das Kapital, from Capitalist Exploitation to Communist Revolution (sound recording, 1988)
• “How We Got Here”, Critical Review v2 #1 (1988)
• From Marx to Mises: Post-Capitalist Society and the Challenge of Economic Calculation (1992)
• “Partial Recall”, Liberty v7 #3 (1994)
• “Why Stop at Term Limits?”, National Review v47 #17 (1995)
• “Nozick on Sunk Costs“, Ethics v106 #3 (1996)
• “Between Immorality and Unfeasibility: The Market Socialist Predicament”, Critical Review v10 #3 (1996)
• Three Minute Therapy: Change Your Thinking, Change Your Life by Michael R. Edelstein (with Steele, 1997)
• “Yes, Gambling Is Productive and Rational”, Liberty (1997) (Reprinted in A Rhetoric of Argument by Jeanne Fahnestock & Marie Secor.)
• “The Strange Life of Murray Rothbard”, Liberty (2000)
• “Alice in Wonderland: A Review of The Passion of Ayn Rand by Barbara Branden”, Free Life (2001) PDF
• “The Mystery of Fascism”, Liberty (2001) PDF
• “Porn, Rape and Justice” (15 April 2001) PDF
• Genius — In their Own Words: The Intellectual Journeys of Seven Great 20th-Century Thinkers (editor, 2002)
• “An Unexpected Discovery”, Liberty v16 #7 (2002)
• “Ayn Rand and the Curse of Kant”, Liberty v16 #8 (2002)
• “The Sacred Element“, Liberty v17 #3 (2003)
• “My Orwell Right or Wrong”, Liberty v17 #5 (2003)
• “Wasn't It a Little Crowded on that Grassy Knoll?”, Liberty v17 #11 (2003)
• “Life, Liberty, and the Treadmill”, Liberty (2005) PDF
• “Why and When Should We Rely on Scientific Experts?” in Heldke et al., The Atkins Diet and Philosophy (2005)
• "Marxism” in Tom Flynn (ed), The New Encyclopedia of Unbelief (2007)
• “Marx, Karl Heinrich” in Tom Flynn (ed), The New Encyclopedia of Unbelief (2007)
• Atheism Explained: From Folly To Philosophy (2008)

Links[link]

• At the bottom of this CNN transcript, he talks about the Open Court Popular Culture and Philosophy series.

This biography of a British economist is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Miroslav Volf, Yale Theological Conversation, Yale Divinity School, February 2006

Miroslav Volf (born September 25, 1956) is an influential Christian theologian and professor, currently at the Yale University. He is widely known for his works on systematic theology, ethics, conflict resolution, and peace-making.

Volf was born in Osijek, PR Croatia, FPR Yugoslavia. He obtained his B.A. at the Evangelical-Theological Faculty in Zagreb. He moved to the United States and obtained his M.A. at the Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California. He has a doctorate (Dr. Theol., Dr. Theol. habil.) from the University of Tübingen where he studied under Jürgen Moltmann.^[1]

His book Exclusion and Embrace was selected as among the 100 Books of the [20th] Century by Christianity Today.^[2] Volf was the 2002 recipient of the Louisville Grawemeyer Award in Religion.

Volf was formerly a professor at Fuller Theological Seminary. He is currently the Henry B. Wright Professor of Theology at Yale University Divinity School and Director of the Yale Center for Faith and Culture, which focuses in part on workplace spirituality.

He has been a member in both the Episcopal Church (USA) and the Evangelical Church in Croatia, but currently attends Christ Chapel in Madison, Connecticut.

Recently^[when?] he contributed the essay, "Forgiveness, Reconciliation and Justice" to a new text on the atonement, Stricken by God? Nonviolent Identification and the Victory of Christ.

Bibliography[link]

• Allah: A Christian Response New York: HarperOne, 2011
• A Public Faith: How Followers of Christ Should Serve the Common Good. Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2011
• Against the Tide: Love in a Time of Petty Dreams and Persisting Enmities Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2009
• The End of Memory: Remembering Rightly in a Violent World Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2006
• Free of Charge: Giving and Forgiving in a Culture Stripped of Grace New York: Zondervan, 2005
• After Our Likeness: The Church As The Image Of The Trinity Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1998
• I znam da sunce ne boji se tame. Teoloske meditacije o Santicevu vjerskom pjesnistvu ("The Sun Is Not Afraid of the Darkness." Theological Meditations on the Poetry of Aleksa Santic) Osijek: Izvori, 1986
• Zukunft der Arbeit -- Arbeit der Zukunft. Der Arbeitsbegriff bei Karl Marx und seine theologische Wertung München/Mainz: Christian Kaiser, 1988
  • Translation into Croatian: Buducnost rada -- rad buducnosti. Pojam rada u Karla Marxa i njegovo teolosko vrednovanje (Biblioteka Filozofska istrazivanja 46) Zagreb: Hrvatsko filozofsko drustvo, 1991
• Work in the Spirit. Toward a Theology of Work New York: Oxford University Press, 1991
• Gerechtigkeit, Geist und Schöpfung. Die Oxford-Erklärung zur Frage von Glaube und Wirtschaft (ed. with Hermann Sautter) Wuppertal: Brockhaus, 1992
• The Future of Theology. Essays in Honor of Jürgen Moltmann (ed. with T. Kucharz and C. Krieg) Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996
  • German edition: Theologie auf dem Weg in das dritte Jahrtausend Gütersloh: Christian Kaiser, 1996
• Exclusion and Embrace. A Theological Exploration of Identity, Otherness, and Reconciliation Nashville: Abingdon, 1996
  • Translation into Croatian: Iskljucenje i zagrljaj. Teolosko promisljanje identiteta, drugosti i pomirenja Zagreb: Step Press, 1998
• Trinität und Gemeinschaft. Eine ökumenische Ekklesiologie Mainz/Neukirchen-Vlyn: Grünewald/Neukirchener, 1996
  • Translation into English: After Our Likeness. The Church as the Image of the Trinity Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998
• A Spacious Heart. Essays on Identity and Belonging (with Judith M. Gundry-Volf) Harrisburg: Trinity Press, 1997
• A Passion for God's Reign. Theology, Christian Learning, and the Christian Self (ed.) Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998

References[link]

External links[link]

• Yale Center for Faith and Culture webpage
• Yale Divinity School faculty webpage
• Interview with Volf on "Allah: A Christian Response" at ReadTheSpirit.com

This Croatian biographical article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e