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Secularism

Secularism is humanism's first-born.

Worldly Winds (2)

But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them.
2 Corinthians 4.3, 4

Humanism’s children
The various ill winds that confront us in the course of our journey in Christ are the children of humanism, that is, of the belief that human beings are the highest reality and human reason is the most reliable means to truth.

Paul suggests as much in his epistle to the Romans. In Romans 1.18-32, Paul identified two categories of people. All people, because they are made in the image of God, have a sense of God, and even, to a certain extent, true knowledge of Him. Those who acknowledge God and give Him thanks, receiving the gift of grace through Jesus Christ, constitute His true family and children (Rom. 1.16, 17; Jn. 1.12; Matt. 12.50).

But most people do not identify with this family. Most people, Paul tells us, refuse to acknowledge God or give Him thanks. But, since they are His image-bearers, they will identify with and even worship something beyond themselves, even if that something is merely a projection of their own best hopes and ideas. So they create idols and bend their lives entirely to the pursuit of those idols, whether they are imagined deities or longed-for material success of one kind or another.

Humanism encourages the view that people are their own and only reliable god. As William Ernest Henley insisted in his poem, “Invictus,” “I am the master of my fate,/I am the captain of my soul.” From that initial contrary wind, all other ill winds spin out and follow their chosen course. The “god of this age” to which Paul refers in 2 Corinthians 4.3 can be understood as meaning “the god which consists of this age,” that is, of the spirit of the age, the dominant worldviews of the age, and as the case is in our age, humanism and all its children.

Secularism defined
Humanism makes all religious belief subservient to human reason. For Diderot and the other encyclopedists, religion is simply a sub-category of philosophy, and a way of knowing that was, in the 18th century, in the process of being eclipsed. The great success of the French philosophes in creating their Encyclopedia project was that they were able to redefine God and truth in humanist terms. By subjecting God to the mind of man, they effectively rendered Him as merely one option among many as a guiding light for life.

And this view of God as optional birthed the child of secularism from its humanist womb.

In his book, A Secular Age, Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor explained that “The shift to secularity…consists, among other things, of a move from a society where belief in God is unchallenged and indeed unproblematic, to one in which it is believed to be one option among others, and frequently not the easiest to embrace.”

A secular society holds that faith in God is optional. Instead of trusting God, Taylor explained, secularists look within, depending on their own best judgment and their strongest and most persistent feelings to determine what’s best for them. In our society, we have changed from belief in God as “the default option”, “to a condition in which for more and more people unbelieving construals seem at first blush the only plausible ones.”

Indeed, “the presumption of unbelief has become dominant” in Western societies everywhere “and has achieved hegemony in certain crucial ones, in the academic and intellectual life, for instance, whence it can more easily extend itself to others.” In other words, secularism is that wind of doctrine that insists we must make our way in life apart from any god or gods, to follow instead whatever ideas the mind of man might construe, which suit his purposes and ends, and have only as much reality and permanence as he who makes them intends they should have.

The secularist explains religion as earlier mankind’s best attempt to make sense out of his experience, and the gods of those religions as the product of naïve rational consideration. The secularist will say that such gods are fine, if you need that sort of thing. But most secularists do not, having determined that they have achieved a higher and more reliable measure of rational maturity. Instead of worshiping the unseen God of Scripture – Who speaks to them continuously throughout His creation – secularists create other ultimate and more desirable realities – wealth, success, fame, self-indulgence, and more – which they pursue with the same fervor and faith as any sincere believer in Jesus Christ. They have their gods, even though they do not acknowledge them as such.

We tend to think of secularism as prescribing no God, but in reality, secularism prescribes as many gods as you need to satisfy your desires and dreams. Because all secularists are made in the image of God, and are at all times the beneficiaries of God’s common grace, it is inevitable that they will accomplish many good things, and that secularism itself will promote objectives and practices which are not inimical to seeking the Kingdom of God. Secularism has provided an impetus for many good works, such as concern for the poor and the environment, universal education, and the future of the planet. Secular institutions, governments, and projects of various kinds aim at accomplishing results that promote improved lives and living conditions, and for this, believers can give thanks to God, and even participate to some extent in such secularist projects and institutions.

Problems with secularism
At the same time, we must be on guard against this ill wind child of humanism, which wends its way into the sails of our soul, where it must be recognized and controlled before it can begin to blow us off course in our journey of faith.

Thus, a believer who has a pick-and-choose attitude toward the Word of God – someone who accepts only those things in Scripture which are “easiest to embrace” – is probably under the influence of the secular wind that says we can option God according to our needs, likes, and interests. Or if our view of Christian faith is that it’s supposed to make us always happy, and never to inconvenience us in any way, then we’ve made God into our servant, just as secularists make gods of their own devising.

God insists on being all the Wind in our sails; but if we find ourselves accommodating any ideas, views, or practices that set God aside – make His way optional – so as to satisfy our own selfish desires – thus making ourselves the final arbiter of goodness, beauty, and truth – then we’re sailing more under the influence of secular thinking than that of the Holy Spirit of God.

Or if we reserve the right to make even the God of Scripture into something other than what He reveals Himself to be – making our minds the creator of God rather than God the Creator of our minds (Ps. 50.21) – we’re once again being influenced by secular thinking more than by the true Wind of God.

Whenever we find ourselves thinking or acting this way, we can know that secular winds are blowing through our thoughts, desires, and values, and that drift from our great salvation will ensue unless we take steps to recognize, resist, and reject the secularism of our day, and are renewed in the Spirt of God and His Word.

For reflection
1. What are some ways that believers sometimes make God “optional”?

2. How can we keep from making God after our own image, that is, making Him always easy to embrace?

3. What should you do if you find that the ill wind of secularism is blowing through the sails of your soul?

Next steps – Preparation: Make sure that, whenever you are reading or studying God’s Word, your mindset is: “God said it. I believe it. That settles it.” Commit your time in the Word to Him and His glory.

T. M. Moore

All the studies in this Winds of Doctrine series are available by clicking here.

At the website
You can also now listen to a weekly summary of our daily Scriptorium study. Click here for Jeremiah 43-45. You can also download for free all the weekly studies in this series on the book of Jeremiah by clicking here.

Three new resources are available at our website to help you grow in the Lord and His work. Our new Personal Mission Field Workshop offers weekly training to help you shepherd the people to whom God sends you. The Ailbe Podcast will introduce you to The Fellowship and how its resources and Brothers can be of help to you in your walk with and work for the Lord. And the InVerse Theology Project can help you in your daily pursuit of the knowledge of God.

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Except as indicated, Scripture taken from the New King James Version. © Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

T.M. Moore

T. M. Moore is principal of The Fellowship of Ailbe, a spiritual fellowship in the Celtic Christian tradition. He and his wife, Susie, make their home in the Champlain Valley of Vermont.
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