What is Secularism?
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- Опубліковано 4 жов 2024
- Dr. Michael F. Bird (Ridley College) interviews Prof. Jacques Berlinerblau (Georgetown University) about his book Secularism: The Basics.
They discuss:
Why did Prof. Berlinerblau write the book?
Is "Secularism" out to get me?
How is Secularism rooted in the Bible?
What are some of the different types of secularism?
Examples of Bad and Good secularism.
What do you wish American evangelicals knew about secularism?
What do you wish American atheists knew about secularism?
Please leave a question or comment.
If you enjoyoyed the interview then please like, share, and subscribe to the channel.
Books mentioned are:
Jacques Berlinerblau, Secularism: The Basics (New York: Routledge, 2022).
www.routledge....
Michael F. Bird, Religious Freedom in a Secular Age (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2022).
www.amazon.com...
Otherwise, follow Mike on
@mbird12
michaelfbird.substack.com
#Secularism #Religion #Atheism
Your guest’s command of the English language is spectacular. France, I would not have guessed. Good questions posed by the host,
Good day/night Dr Bird. I've enjoyed reading your book responding to Dr Erhman and i've recently subscribed to this
channel. To start off i'll say that I really enjoyed this video, I admit though that I pretty much disagree with the
premise that Prof Jacques laid out and i'm just weary of secularism in general. I would have really liked a chance
to ask Prof Jacques some questions. I don't buy the 'evangelical theocratic bogeyman' that Prof Jacques and those
who agree with him are selling and I don't believe that there are 'acceptable Christian targets' as a lot of establishment Christians have tended to believe and secularism has many forms and the most dangerous of these are specifically antiChristian in nature. With regards to activism, it's not Christianity's fault that adherents are driven to action over it and it's not as though nonChristians don't agitate and act in accordance to their beliefs, i'm thinking LGBT activism and abortion. With regards to the claim that evangelicals(which i'm not by the way but acknowledge as my spiritual brethren) are 'scared' of losing their majority status, this is such a double standard that I wished you'd pushed back on because if we were to ask Prof Jacques if he had a problem with the Jewish population of Israel losing their majority or the Muslim population of Indonesia, the
Hindu population of India,the secularists of Sweden, the Shinto of Japan or the Confucians Of China if they were 'scared' of losing their majorities. He would claim that that would be discriminatory, which leads me to think that it might be that Prof Jacques and those who think like him believe that Christians should be in a lesser position in society, their customs and dreams and aspirations should be no more while everybody else should be in a better position than them.
Prof Jacques certainly sold a glowing view secularism and praised it's imposition on Christian spirituality and only had criticism when it overreached on Muslim spirituality in France for example but had nothing to say about the recent acts of secular overreach in Finland where a Christian has had to stand trial to answer for her religious beliefs.
I recall in 2017, secularists were protesting the fact that some states prioritized Christian and Yazidi refugees
over Muslims considering it as bigotry while conveniently 'forgeting' the fact that these peoples were
actively being persecuted by Daesh at the time at a much greater level than the general Muslim population.
I also recall the same secularists like Ariel Ricker guided Muslims to lie about being Christians so as to game the
system.
Those same secularists pinned the culpability of the Christchurch massacre on to Christianity even though the attacker
was an ecofascist non christian which incidentally inspired the Sri Lankan reprisal attacks on innocent Christians.
Those same secularists tried to portray Devon Patrick Kelley as a Christian in the wake of the Sutherland springs
massacre only for it to be revealed that he was a rabid antitheist.
At the start of the recent pandemic, a secularist activist named Katherine Stewart who is an antiChristian who is known to infiltrate churches placed culpability for the pandemic onto Christians, a slanderous lie that had it been foisted onto any other community would have had her face consequences.
I could literally go on but I could be here all day. Secularists are no friends of Christians and I believe we should be wary of this ideology.
The issue remains that given that we live in a multireligious society, how is the government to interact with the different religions? If we agree that people of different religions are to be treated as equals in our society, then some sort of secular framework for government is going to be necessary. That of course does not mean that we Christians can't bring our religious beliefs into the public square, but that also means that Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, and Hindus will have that same right.
As an aside, very few Chinese people self-consciencely hold to Confucianism as a belief system. It is more like the air we breath regardless of our religion (and that includes Chinese Christians).
@@ivanlau374 I acknowledge that we live in a multi religious society and that the governments at least of the secular west are
gonna have to interact with different religious communities, protecting them and their right to freely practice
whatever they want to. Speaking on a governmental level, all individuals should definitely be afforded the same rights
and protections as everyone else in a free state. I'm not really arguing against secularism the concept,secular
governments or multireligous societies per say. I'm simply against the double standards, selective Antichristian
alarm-ism and hypocrisy of the secularists that has gone unchallenged for such a long time.
We do agree that people of different religions are to be treated as equals in our society, we disagree however in he
method because I don't think a secular framework for government is necessarily the best way to reach that goal
because I think secularism is specifically anti Christian in nature.
You say that secularism does not mean that Christians can't bring their religious beliefs into the public square but
from my experience that's exactly the case however I'd be open to hearing which Christian belief is in the public
square in secular societies in your opinion. To be clear I'm not against all the other groups bringing their
religious beliefs into the public square, I enjoy learning from other people and their views, particularly if these
people are proud and uphold their views because I can empathize with them because I don't put my belief in
Christianity in my pocket to please nonbelievers, I'm proud of it, uphold it and love it and as an example in my
country all food is halal to accommodate the Muslim minority, traditional faiths are free to practice and we even
have ministers in parliament designated to handle customary law. It is commonplace for religious festivals like
Ramadan, Diwali,Yom Kippur and Navaratri to be specifically mentioned when they occur and I believe that's a great
thing that these communities are regarded so highly even though they are minorities however I am also not blind to
the fact that these communities where they are the majority don't necessarily reciprocate the same sentiment to
their minorities particular the Christian minorities and that's my problem, secularists want me to minimize my religion
to accommodate nonbelievers and when I ask whether secularists will ask nonbelievers to accommodate my brethren in their
states, the secularists have nothing to say. No, my criticism of secularism doesn't lie with trivialities, I could
care less about mundane issues like middle class Christians in the west whining about coffee mugs and whats drawn on
them, what I'm working against is the secular state actively working towards the mistreatment and demonization of
Christians globally whether inadvertently or not. I'll turn to the case I previously mentioned, that is the
Christchurch massacre where in it's wake Australian secular university professors like Douglas Pratt gave the
impression that the offender was a Christian even though he was a non Christian who committed an attack costing the
lives of dozens of Muslims after which Daesh responded by attacking churches and hotels in Sri Lanka resulting in a
fatality in the hundreds. The secularists here were careless in their reporting because of an antiChristian bias
embedded within their ideology. Some have told me that this was mere carelessness from the secularists but I
attribute it to malice because I've noticed the same pattern repeated. They did the same thing when omar marteen
attacked pulse nightclub, attributing it to a Christian and when they found out he wasn't one, they buried the
story. This is an extreme example of secularism and it's consequences for Christians and on the other end which is
demonization, I could show a plethora of depictions of Christians or Christian figures demonized in the secular
media, mind you I'm certainly not for censorship of any kind, I just detest double standards and hypocrisy because other
religious groups aren't given the same treatment. I recall last year an episode depicting a Hasidic man was removed
off air because it offended the sentiments of that community and years ago the jerry springer opera mocking
Christianity was played on the bbc which promoted it as free speech whereas the same bbc adamantly refused to show
the charlie hebdo cartoons vilifying them as islamophobic whereas in the christian case it somehow wasn't christophobic.
As an aside and as a comparison i'm so proud that despite all secular efforts wherever Christians are the majority,
minority groups are thriving and can live their lives to their full potential knowing their governmental
representatives see them as equals. I live in this multireligous society but I know it is not a friend to my
religious community and does not have benevolent intentions towards me and my own.
I admit that I couldn't tell you statistically speaking just how many people hold to Confucianism consciously as you
put it, i'm mainly speaking based on the stats I have on hand and what I've been told by Chinese folks I know. I'll
amend my statement to say the vast majority of the Chinese people hold mainly to an atheistic model with a high view
of Confucianism, certainly as recently as 2019 its been mandatory for Chinese parliamentarians to affirm state atheism in
order to hold political office. This is probably reflected in the general population. Either way all i'm saying is
just as Prof Jacques believes that Christians in the US would be uniquely afraid to lose their majority status, I'm
sure the same sentiment is shared with the atheist/Confucians in China and all other groups worldwide but the
professor and those who think like him seem to think ONLY Christians should be excluded from the public area to
various degrees and only on the basis of their religion, the double standard annoys me because its
deChristianisation that is being exalted but it's hidden under the guise of multireligionism and equality.
@@gazelle6027 I think we're working with differing understandings of secularism. I'm working with an understanding that the government doesn't promote or favor one religion over another but instead treats all religions equally. The interviewee himself stated that secularism exists on a spectrum. I'm still interested in what alternative framework you would propose.
Also, regarding Christians being uniquely afraid of losing their majority status, I think he's speaking to his American context. As an American and an Evangelical myself, I can attest that many Christians are afraid of losing their minority status and that many want to reclaim Christian dominion over the public square.
@@ivanlau374 "I think we're working with differing understandings of secularism."
Probably, look I understand the term secularism in what its proponents mean definitionally speaking but in terms of experience I personally think that it means deChristianisation, I’m open to having my mind changed on the matter though.
"I'm working with an understanding that the government doesn't promote or favor one religion over another but instead treats all religions equally."
But the examples I’ve given show that that isn’t the case, you’ve really not dealt with what I’ve presented you, indicative of the dismissal of Christian perspectives rife today. Judaism and Islam aren’t treated the same way as Christianity is in secular societies, there are terms for example to describe the mistreatment of the adherents of certain religious communities, islamophobia and antisemitism exists as crimes whereas there is no corresponding term with regards to antichristian discrimination.
"The interviewee himself stated that secularism exists on a spectrum."
Which I believe to be antiChristian in nature, all other views and ideas are sacred and must be upheld by the secular state whereas Christianity must be minimized for the state to be secular.
"I'm still interested in what alternative framework you would propose."
Recently I’ve been reading up on the Benedict option, I believe that Christians should create communities where they live together away from those hostile to them, creating their own infrastructure and pulling their resources to improve their lives. The church ought to stop acting as a charity for outsiders and look towards introspection and in-group preference. An immediate halting of proselytism must be initiated, excommunication of the bad faith actors in the church must take place. Wealthy American Christians should support only poorer African Christians, wealthy Europeans Christians should support the Middle Eastern and Asian Christians populations, stopping all Christian activity with regards to the Israel-Palestine issue as long as Christians in the region are not directly affected in any way. The global Christian population should act to purchase if it must a region in the Middle East for the Middle Easter Christian population and in Africa the global Christian community must ensure that the African Christian population can thrive unharmed. I’m not looking to alter the lives of the nonbelieving populations of societies where Christians may live, I’m wary of these populations and think it wise for Christians to just avoid them as much as possible, it would seem that would be the best framework whereby everyone would be satisfied. Christians would not be imposing themselves on anyone and outsiders would stay out of Christian affairs.
I’d want to hear your answer to my initial question, which Christian belief would you say is in the public square in secular societies in your opinion?
"Also, regarding Christians being uniquely afraid of losing their majority status, I think he's speaking to his American context." I disagree with this view because I don’t buy the theocratic bogeyman that secularists have been trying to sell folks for years particularly because this bogeyman is always in the form of a Christian and I propose that even if Christian in the US were afraid of losing their status this wouldn’t be a uniquely American Christian phenomenon, wouldn’t Israeli Jews, Pakistani Muslims, Indian Hindus, Swedish atheists and Yazidis also be afraid of losing their statuses too?
Shouldn’t secularism on principle zero in on all these communities fears then?
As an aside, do you truly believe that if we asked prof Jacques if he’d be happy for Israeli Jews to be significant minorities and have their beliefs be subject to the state, he’d be all for it or will we find out that this animus is reserved only for Christian.
"As an American and an Evangelical myself, I can attest that many Christians are afraid of losing their minority status and that many want to reclaim Christian dominion over the public square."
You’re acting as though secularists who constantly bray about the 'evils of Christian ' aren’t themselves dominionist in that for their empire, they spread their beliefs systems. Where secularists see Christian dominion, Christian see secular late liberal democracy and globalist capitalism and the secularist thrill of pulverizing countless villages in the middle east so they can also have secular governments. I’m not an American, neither am I an Evangelical. I’m a Christian who has lived in places and talked with other Christian who’ve had the yoke of hostile nonbelievers choke them which is why I stand with all Christian regardless of denomination against those who want to do the church harm in any way and secularist do want to do harm to the church. Evangelicals are not acceptable targets as a lot of secularists and their 'good' Christian friends may think. A lot of Evangelicals are afflicted by a sort of masochism that is deeply rewarding for them as a narcissist with a saviour complex. Some silently wear a cilice; David French for example regularly writes articles about how awful Evangelicals are.
Evangelical supporters of secularism are confused because their ideas of "just" and the "ideals of a Christian majority nation" are just liberalism and because they confuse liberalism for Christianity, according to them, the country becomes more Christian as it becomes more secular and liberal.
And, some people really need to understand that there are plenty of "non-religious theists" who do exist, because most of the time people will always conflate non-religious with atheism.
So i really have no idea where do some people get this weird idea that non-religious has anything to do with atheism. It really doesn't.
Thank you Dr. Bird for the interview. In reference to the interaction, it causes me to think of the words spoken by our Lord in Matthew 28 when he says that all authority is given to him over heaven and earth. Any thoughts?
Hi James, well, authority can be mediated or delegated. God appoints government to do certain things (see Rom 13). Jesus does not want Christians running the water treatment plant or DMV.