Secularism

Secular thinking takes it as obvious that we see things more clearly and analyze things more accurately if we keep religion out of it. That real truth is obscured by religion. This is why we keep religion out of the schools, out of the media, out of politics and out of scholarly research. It is OK for religion to impact people's lives in other, less important areas but during the times when real thinking needs to be done religion should be put on hold.

What is interesting to note is that this idea about religion is itself a religious statement. People don't get that. The idea that religion makes people's thinking worse has become so dominate that people think it has been scientifically proven or something. It hasn't. You either believe it or disbelieve it based on your religion. If you say you are not religious it just means you have no coherent way of thinking about how your religion impacts your thinking. It does not mean your thinking is somehow unrelated to how you answer questions of faith and morals. Just because you have no systematic way of addressing those questions does not mean the answers don't impact the rest of your views.

The difference is that the secular person thinks he is being fair by leaving religion out of his analysis. He does not see that his secular world view made him leave religion out. His analysis is only valid if his world view is correct. When a Catholic does an analysis that is only valid if Catholicism is correct that is seen as not fit for the mainstream media. It can only be considered by Catholic media. But an analysis assuming secular thinking is correct is considered fit for the public square. So we end up with a de facto state religion. It is so deeply ingrained it is not even seen as a religion.

People are so unaware that secularism is religious that they think they can be Christians or even Catholic and secular at the same time. They buy into the idea that religion should be set aside when doing science, education, or politics. That even true religion will somehow make their reasoning less reliable. Perhaps they don't really believe their own religion is true. They confess it as true but would rather set it aside when society makes big decisions. Part of it might be just wanting the respect and admiration of secular people. It is hard to know. But they don't seem to understand that they are thinking in contradictory terms. Supposing they are less likely to arrive at error by starting with something they believe is false.

It is easy to see why secularism leads to atheism. Secularism really is just living and thinking like an atheist even while maintaining that you have faith. Like most contradictions it lasts one generation. People can reject something in practice but not reject it in their creed. They just can't convince their kids to do the same. The children will notice it does not make sense and either return to the faith or reject it entirely. So atheism would be expected to grow as an honest form of secularism.

The interesting thing is that atheism does not last. Many atheists eventually embrace some faith. The ones that don't tend to really believe in faith as something irrational. That is the one dogma of secularism that they can't seem to get beyond.