The Resurgence of Religion—A Challenge for a Secular Self-Interpretation of Modernity?

Abstract

The paper begins with a revision of the secularization thesis that linked modernization with secularization in the light of the recent worldwide expansion of religions. It asks whether and how the later phenomena requires a reconfiguration of the conceptual framework of modernization theory. While secularization has taken place effectively in the expansion of functional systems across state boundaries, religion has not become irrelevant as a “community of interpretation” on many social and moral issues. A new understanding of the secularization thesis is no longer linked to the concept of social evolution, and this implies a changed perspective on the sources of modern philosophy: post-metaphysical thought has critically appropriated contents from the Judeo-Christian tradition that are no less important than those of Greek metaphysics. But the persisting pluralism of worldviews is also a stimulus for the development of international law and shared secular principles of justice for a multicultural world society.