What is "secularization"

Secularization \Sec`u*lar*i*za"tion\, n. [Cf. F. s['e]cularisation.] The act of rendering secular, or the state of being rendered secular; conversion from regular or monastic to secular; conversion from religious to lay or secular possession and uses; as, the secularization of church property.

1706, "conversion to secular purposes," in reference to Church property; see secularize + -ation. General use by 1863.

alt. The transformation of a society from close identification with religious values and institutions toward non-religious (or "irreligious") values and secular institutions. n. The transformation of a society from close identification with religious values and institutions toward non-religious (or "irreligious") values and secular institutions.

1. n. the activity of changing something (art or education or society or morality etc.) so it is no longer under the control or influence of religion [syn: secularisation]

2. transfer of property from ecclesiastical to civil possession [syn: secularisation]

Secularization is the transformation of a society from close identification with religious values and institutions toward nonreligious 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. The term secularization is also used in the context of the lifting of the monastic restrictions from a member of the clergy.

Secularization refers to the historical process in which religion loses social and cultural significance. As a result of secularization the role of religion in modern societies becomes restricted. In secularized societies faith lacks cultural authority, and religious organizations have little social power.

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.

The term also has additional meanings, primarily historical and religious. Applied to church property, historically it refers to the seizure of monastic lands and buildings, such as Henry VIII's Dissolution of the Monasteries in England and the later acts during the French Revolution as well as by various anti-clerical European governments during the 18th and 19th centuries, which resulted in the expulsion and suppression of the religious communities which occupied them. The 19th-century Kulturkampf in Germany and similar events in many other countries also were expressions of secularization.

Still another form of Secularization refers to the act of Prince-Bishops or holders of a position in a Monastic or Military Order - holding a combined religious and secular authority under the Catholic Church - who broke away and made themselves into completely secular (typically, Protestant) hereditary rulers. For example, Gotthard von Kettler, the last Master of the Livonian Order, converted to Lutheranism, secularised (and took to himself) the lands of Semigallia and Courland which he had held on behalf of the order - which enabled him to marry and leave to his descendants the Duchy of Courland and Semigallia.

In the 1960s there was a dramatic shift toward secularization in Western Europe, North America (especially Québec), Australia, and New Zealand. This transformation was intertwined with major social factors: economic prosperity, youth rebelling against the rules and conventions of society, women's liberation, radical theology, and radical politics.