Religion and Modernity Reflections on a Modern Debate

Waines, D. (2003)

Article / Letter to editor

The relationship between the phenomena of modernity and religion has exercised scholars in many fields over recent decades. For example, one of the original exponents of the secularization paradigm in the late 1950s and 1960s, sociologist Peter Berger, had, by the end of the millennium, recanted his earlier position saying: 'The big mistake, which I shared with everyone who worked in this area... was to believe that modernity necessarily leads to a decline in religion.' Steve Bruce, sociologist and firm adherent of the secularization thesis, quotes this statement in an article in which he attempts to rescue Berger from the folly of his recantation.1 While Bruce's view may now be regarded as 'unfashionable' in sociology of religion circles, echoes of the 'modernity-religion' dichotomy are very much present in studies related to modernity, contemporary Islam, and fundamentalism.

• Modernity

• All authors: Waines, D.
• Date: 2003
• Journal: ISIM Newsletter
• Volume: 12
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 28 - 29
• Publisher: ISIM, Leiden