After having described the historical basis of the process of pillarization in Belgium,
the author explains the emergence of the Catholic pillar as a defence mechanism of
the Catholic Church and the ...Catholic leadership to protect the Catholic flock from sec-
ularization. He describes the different services the Catholic pillar was offering for its
members and the development of Belgium as a state based on three pillars: the catho-
lic, the socialist and the liberal one that were all three institutionalized. This structure
meant that Belgium was rather a segregated country that was vertically integrated. In
the sixties of last century, the pillar was confronted with a growing secularization of
the population, which forced the leadership of the pillar to adapt the collective con-
sciousness: the Catholic credo, values and norms were replaced by so-called typical
values of the Gospel integrated in what is called a Socio-Cultural Christianity. Under
the impact of the changing economic situation, the politicization of the Flemish ques-
tion and the emergence of Ecologist parties, the Christian pillar had to adapt its serv-
ices and is now based on clienteles rather than members. Only in the Flemish part of
Belgium is it still an institutionalized pillar.
In the last half century new religious movements or cults of one sort and another have mushroomed throughout the US and Europe. Increasingly these groups have been met with attempts to monitor and ...control them on the part of the state, and concerns about the protection of religious 'consumers' have been set against the democratic right to religious freedom. In this collection, leading sociologists of religion from the UK, US, Western and Eastern Europe debate the political, practical and ethical issues which arise from these changes in the religious landscape.
De la sécularisation DOBBELAERE, Karel
Revue théologique de Louvain,
2008, Letnik:
39, Številka:
2
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
Secularization, which is the autonomization of the so-called secular sub-systems with regard to institutionalized religions, has different forms. One of them is «laïcisation», which is a form of ...manifest secularization, i.e. one that is intended and recognized by those producing it. Besides this form, secularization occurs also latently, since it is not explicitly intended. These two forms may be produced on the societal and the organizational level. The author gives examples of them. He also analyzes the existent reciprocal relationships between these collective processes and individual secularization.
La sécularisation, qui est un processus de distanciation à l'égard des religions institutionnelles, peut revêtir diverses formes. L'une d'elles est la laïcisation, qui correspond à une sécularisation intentionnelle et explicite. A côté de celle-ci, la sécularisation s'exprime de façon latente, c'est-à-dire qu'elle n'est pas explicitement voulue. L'une et l'autre peuvent se développer aux niveaux de la société et des organisations, ce qui est illustré par divers exemples. La question des relations réciproques existant entre ces processus collectifs et la sécularisation individuelle est également abordée.
Dobbelaere Karel. De la sécularisation. In: Revue théologique de Louvain, 39ᵉ année, fasc. 2, 2008. pp. 177-196.
Internationally recognized scholars from many parts of the world provide a critical survey of recent developments and achievements in the global field of religious studies. The work follows in the ...footsteps of two former publications: Classical Approaches to the Study of Religion, edited by Jacques Waardenburg (1973), and Contemporary Approaches to the Study of Religion, edited by Frank Whaling (1984/85). New Approaches to the Study of Religion completes the survey of the comparative study of religion in the twentieth century by focussing on the past two decades. Many of the chapters, however, are also pathbreaking and point the way to future approaches.
English
For Bryan Wilson, secularization refers to the fact that religion has lost influence at the societal, the institutional and the individual level. For him, individual secularization is about ...the loss of authority of the Churches to define what people should believe, practise and accept as moral principles guiding their lives. In other words, individual piety may still persist, however, if it develops independently of religious authorities, then it is an indication of individual secularization. Wilson has furthermore stressed the consequences of the process of societalization in modern societies and on this basis he formulated his thesis that secularization is linked to the decline of community and is a concomitant of societalization. It is also typical of Wilson that he uses the Catholic Church as his reference to evaluate institutional secularization. Finally, in Wilson ’s work a moral evaluation is present: since a society, even a modern one, cannot survive on procedural values alone, it needs substantive values as well. Consequently, he asked: which institution will socialize the new generations in such values now that religion has lost its impact and the educational system has taken on the characteristics of modern society itself?
French
Pour Bryan Wilson, la sécularisation se réfère au fait que la religion a perdu son influence aux niveaux sociétal, institutionnel et individuel. Selon lui, la sécularisation individuelle résulte de la perte d'autorité des Eglises qui ne peuvent plus définir ce que les personnes doivent croire, pratiquer et accepter comme principes moraux pour guider leur vie. En d'autres termes, la piété individuelle peut encore persister. Mais si elle se développe indépendamment des autorités religieuses, il s'agit alors d'un indicateur de la sécularisation individuelle. Par ailleurs, Wilson a insisté sur les conséquences du processus de sociétalisation dans les sociétés modernes et, sur cette base, il a développé la thèse selon laquelle la sécularisation est liée au déclin de la communauté et coïncide avec la sociétalisation. De manière caractéristique, Wilson a pris pour exemple l'Eglise catholique afin d'évaluer la sécularisation institutionnelle. Pour finir, les travaux de Wilson contiennent une évaluation d'ordre moral: une société, même moderne, ne peut survivre uniquement grâce à des valeurs pratiques et bureaucratiques, elle a également besoin de valeurs substantives. En conséquence, quelle institution, se demandait-il, va socialiser les nouvelles générations à ces valeurs, à présent que la religion a perdu son impact et que le système éducatif a lui-même épousé les caractéristiques de la société moderne?
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