Taking every thought captive for obedience to Christ (2 Corinthians 10.5)

Vision
Secularism
The institutions of secularization have failed the movement, at least in America. That is the opinion of Sam Haselby, who is a visiting scholar at Columbia University (“American secular,” Aeon, 26 May 2016). Mr. Haselby explains that America was founded under a banner of secularism, its founding documents written to ensure that religion and government would be kept entirely separate, and that all the important powers ordering the affairs of people and the State would be in the hands of government.

While evangelical Protestantism had a role in shaping the worldview of the Founders, they reserved the right to pick and choose from the Christian worldview whatever served their secularizing agenda. Jefferson and Madison in particular were adamant to keep religion out of the public square, reserving to it a kind of private enclave of the soul onto which government promised not to trespass. These men and others like Tom Paine, wrote and worked tirelessly to erect institutions of government and education to ensure that their secular vision would be the dominant worldview of the new republic, all the while using the language of religion to secure the support of their Christian compatriots.

Given the scope of their efforts and their evident success, Mr. Haselby asks, “So, what went wrong? How did the country founded by visionary secularists, and that made historic advances in both religious freedom and the separation of religious and political powers, nonetheless become the world’s most religious political democracy?”

After a lengthy and helpful history of the origins and rise of secularism in America, Mr. Haselby returns to his question. Even though secularists dominate in all the relevant realms of public speech – government, education, the media, and pop culture – still, religion persists. He cites as explanation the fact that secularists have not succeeded in persuading the general public to embrace their vision. He insists, “…the simple problem was unpopularity.” The idea of a secular world was not popular at the time of the Founding, and it has remained a minority vision throughout the course of America’s history unto today. Secularists created institutions which they hoped would replace the churches as the focal point of American life. However, they have not succeeded in this effort. They have “failed at building institutions that rival the special breadth and depth of religion’s involvement in people’s lives.”

Worse, the promise of secularization has not panned out. Rather than coalesce into a single, seamless movement, secularism has become factionalized, with competing interests sapping its inherent strength. Moreover, the vision of secularism, of a society “more enlightened, peaceful and just”, has not been realized. Mr. Haselby concludes, “American secularism has not fulfilled those aspects of its promise. It never even secularised (sic) American political life. Whether it was a mistake in principle, or the problem is that secularists did not go far enough, is open to debate, but it is worth remembering that American secularism was always meant to be a means, not an end.”

It’s important to note that when Mr. Haselby explains secularism is primarily a means, what he means is that the original goal of the secular movement was to clear the forest of the American intellectual landscape of any semblance of religion, that churches should close, people should focus their interests on libraries, teachers, and associations devoted to science and reason, and that a true “new order of the ages” should emerge from the wellspring of pure and widespread secular thinking.

In this sense I suppose we could agree with Mr. Haselby: the secular vision is neither persuasive nor powerful to fulfill its promise of a novus ordo seculorum. Religion continues. Millions profess faith in Christ. Churches abound throughout the land. A Christian subculture of education, publishing, and pop culture flourishes. And other religions, in particular, Islam, seem to be gaining ground in America as well.

On the other hand, I think Mr. Haselby’s assessment is too modest. The effects of the secular worldview on the American Christian community have been extremely powerful. Most Christians live a kind of “niche” faith, where whatever they are and do as believers is limited to certain places and times, but almost never intrudes into their public life. Further, Christians have signed on to the secular insistence that faith is a personal matter and should not be discussed in public; we ought not try to “cram our religion” down the throats of our neighbors – a demand to which most Christians have happily acquiesced. Even the form of Christianity taught in churches, Christian schools, and Christian institutions of higher education, is a mixed bag of Biblical truth, American pragmatism and individualism, and free market capitalism. A full, expansive, and transformative Christian worldview informs none of these venues.

So while we as Christians might breathe a sigh of relief to know that secular leaders consider their own effort a failure thus far, this is no reason to declare victory and settle into our status quo faith. Now, more than ever in this country, the Church of our Lord Jesus needs informed believers who live, relate, work, speak, and make and use culture in ways consistent with their citizenship in the Kingdom of righteousness, peace, and joy in the Spirit.

The secular vision – including its desire to render all religion unnecessary – is not going away any time soon. So if we want to preserve a decidedly Biblical and Christian legacy for our children and grandchildren, we’ll need to repent of the kind of “near Christianity” now in evidence, and invest more effort in learning and living a Christian worldview.

For reflection
1.  What do you understand by “a Christian worldview”? Would you say that you have such a worldview? Explain.

2.  Consider the Christian faith as it is taught in your church. Is it broad and expansive, speaking about every area of life, culture, society, and the future? Or does it focus mainly on the needs of church members, to help them know peace and a sense of wellbeing in tumultuous times? Would you describe the preaching and teaching at your church as “taking every thought captive for obedience to Christ”? Explain.

3.  Secularists believed from the beginning that if they could isolate religion to a particular niche – primarily, whatever folks do in and with their local church – they could create institutions that would attract people away from the church into the more enlightened, broader, and more reasoned views of secularism. Can you see how this agenda is still at work in America? Do you think Christians are in any way complicit in supporting this agenda? Explain.

Next steps: Talk with a pastor about what you can do to begin learning and living a fuller, broader, and more effective Christian worldview.

T. M. Moore

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