On the other hand, when we look at modern Britain the picture we get is very different.
With the growth of political democracy in the 20th century, the role of the Church has changed as the basis of its power has been eroded by the development of political parties. The growth of scientific ideologies has meant that the Church no longer has a monopoly of knowledge, fatally weakened one of their greatest strengths, the ability to control how people see and think about the world. Although its specialist insights into “religious questions” such as the meaning of life; may afford religion some influence in society. However the Church no longer has a judicial function, the ability to judge and punish deviants and politically has been relegated to the role of a pressure group.
This evidence suggests that the Church as an institution has lost many of its former functions it performed in pre-industrial societies. Beforehand, the Church was able to control individuals and society and was actively involved in all political matters. However, in modern Britain the Church has a less significant role, unable to control how people view the world and has been relegated to the role of a pressure group.
Bryan Wilson (1966) argues the “loss of functions” by the Church can be seen as disengagement (a decline in the power involvement of the church in everyday life) from the wider society as evidence of secularization. While David Martin (1969) sees this view as concerned with “decline in the power, wealth, influence and prestige of the Church.
Compared to its role in medieval Europe, the Church in contemporary western society has undergone a process of disengagement. The Church as an institution has lost many of its former functions it performed in pre-industrial societies, such as education and social welfare, making it become a social institution.
This evidence suggests that a reason for the fall in religious membership and Church attendance is that people no longer use the Church to satisfy non-religious needs.
However, many anti-secularization sociologists have claimed that the role of religion has been transformed in modern societies, rather than necessarily diminished. Talcott Parsons argues that evolution of society involves a process of structural differentiation, where various parts of the social system become more specialized and religious values become increasingly generalized, therefore performing fewer functions. Therefore for Parsons, the role of the Church is transformed in modern society; it performs a different role, but one that is no less important. Now the specialised role of religious institutions exerts influence through the norms and values they put forward, rather than through direct involvement in the country.
On the other hand, Steve Bruce (1995) refers to this process as ‘social differentiation’. He argues that the Church used to provide values and morals to individuals but now society is more individualistic and this is no longer the case. Social differentiation means that the Church now has less opportunity to involve itself in non-religious spheres. Therefore religion and religious morals are becoming less important in modern society.
“Modernization sees the freeing of economic activity from religiously sanctioned controls and the development of the world of work as an autonomous sphere driven only by its own values. Gradually, other aspects of life will go the same way. Education, social welfare, health care, and social control have mostly passed out of church control, and where churches still run such activities they do so in ways that differ little from secular provision. Bruce, 1995
This evidence suggests that the role of the Church has changed in modern Britain. Parsons argues that the role of religion has not been diminished, it has transformed. However, Steve Bruce argues that the Church is losing many of its former functions.
From a different perspective, Peter Berger has argued that, in pre-industrial societies, religion forms is the only plausible explanation for social life. However, when scientific and rationalist ideologies was developed like Darwin’s Theory of Evolution, the Church’s role as only prophet of the world will inevitably decline and result in political decline.
In the past, peoples desire for understanding is fed by the only form of plausible explanation that exists – religion. Berger sees this process as not evidence for secularization but merely evidence of a changing role for religious institutions. Therefore the role of religion has shifted from focusing on explaining everyday meaning to explaining deeper meaning such as life and death.
This suggests that secularization is not taking place as religious institutions are merely changing roles. A reason for this is the growth of rationalization, as individuals now look to science rather than religion for answers to their questions.
This essay is now going to look at religious practice.
There are a number of ways in which we can measure the concept of religious practice, such as Church attendance, membership and ceremonies like marriages and baptisms. Some of the strongest evidence for the secularization thesis comes from Church statistics. The earliest available survey statistics on church attendance originate from the 1851 “census of religion”.
Using the English Church Census to monitor Church attendances over the past 150 years there has been a decline in attendance over this period from a high of 50% of the adult population in the 1850's to a low of 10% in 1989. Furthermore, in the past 20 years we can notice that there has been a stable decline in Church attendances in general. In 2000 only 7.5% of British adults attend Sunday Church, a decline of 22% since 1990. However the overall decline in religious practice seems to have been most noticeable amongst the larger Churches (Anglican and Roman Catholic), where attendance seems to have declined consistently. Amongst smaller denominations the picture is patchier, with some showing a decline but others showing an increase. However most denominations are statistical small that any small alterations tend to transform into large percentage increase and also the technique of counting the attendance is unreliable.
This evidence suggests that in modern Britain there has been a consistent decline in religious practice.
Brierley notes that there has been a general increase in religious participation, as measured by raw numbers of those attending services.
However, we shouldn’t assume that this represents an increase in participation for a number of reasons. For example, immigrants coming into Britain have changed the religious climate of modern Britain, increasing the religious diversity. Immigrants have brought their own religious practices. These practices tend to be higher; this could be due to immigrants wanting to maintain some form of common identity and values, rather than it being an indication of religiosity. Also as first generation immigrants settle and start families, their numbers increase. This then increases the numbers of original immigrant groups; therefore there are more people in the religious participation age group, rather than an increase in religious practice.
Apart from non-Christian denominations, there has been a development and increase in participation of sects and cults over the past 25 years. However sects and cults are numerically small that any slight changes tend to translate into large percentage fluctuations. The method of counting participation is difficult to measure, this making it highly unreliable to measure and count.
From a pro-secularisation point of view, the growth in the number of different sects and cults is interpreted as evidence of secularization, because of the fragmentation of religious practice. Sects and cults appear and disappear with great regularity and this type of religious participation is interpreted as a general institutional weakening of the role of religion because people seem to have little overall commitment to these types of religious organizations.
This evidence suggests that there has been a general decline in religious participation in Britain over the past 150 years. Therefore, pro secularization theorists would argue that secularization is indeed taking place.
However, Anti-secularisation theorists would interpret the same statistics differently.
An anti-secularisation viewpoint sees religious participation in the past as being largely overestimated. David Martin (1967), questions the reliability and validity of religious statistics. He views the demographic content as being not valid and questions the accuracy in the method of collections. He believes people religious belief cannot be measured from statistics about religious practice. Similarly, the figures for “total attendance” do not distinguish between those who attend church services over 50 times a year and those who only attend once a year. This is important when looking at society in the past, as some people attended church services more than once a day (mainly for social rather than religious reasons) whereas in modern Britain people are likely to attend church only once.
This evidence suggests that secularization is not taking place. Anti-secularisation theorists argue that we cannot reliably infer the extent of people’s religious belief from statistics about religious practice. People may still be religious, but may practice their religion in different ways.
Finally, this essay is now going to look at Religious Thought/Beliefs
Although there are huge problems involved in the measurement of religious beliefs, in general they are measured simply by asking people about their beliefs. We must also take into account that there is no comparable data for religious belief in the recent past, let alone centuries ago.
Opinion poll evidence is perhaps the simplest type of data relating to religious beliefs.
Figures show that in 2000, 70% of people held some sort of religious belief whereas only 15% rejected the idea of God, spirit or life force. Steven Bruce (2001) argues that the opinion poll data show a strong weakening of religious belief. Belief in a personal God has declined markedly, as has belief in “some sort of spirit or life force”. Bruce argues that this represents a big increase in skepticism towards religious belief. He states “ people are moving away from what they cannot believe without wishing to go so far as to say they do not believe”.
However, data from the 2001 census does suggest religious beliefs of a fairly traditional kind remain common. The British census showed that 72% of the population described themselves as being Christian and 23% of the population have no religion or didn’t state it. However the 390,000 people who responded to the Internet campaign and put their religion as `Jedi Knight’ distorted these figures, showing that they did not take the question seriously.
Grace Davie (1995) has characterized the situation in Britain as “believing without belonging” – that is, people may admit to private religious beliefs but are less inclined to join religious groups or to attend religious services on a regular basis. Davie notes that opinion poll data shows that younger generations are less religious than older ones, she states that “not only have young people left our churches, they are, it seems rejecting even nominal belief”. If the younger generations stay less religious, then this is evidence that secularization is occurring.
Religious belief and participation may be the most obvious areas in which to look for evidence for/against secularization. However, Jose Casanova (1994) argues that these aspects of religion are irrelevant to secularization, for him, the role of religion is the most important.
This evidence suggests that evidence for religious beliefs is hard to find and that it can be interpreted in many different ways. Bruce argues that belief in a personal God has declined markedly, and that people are becoming skeptical about their religious beliefs. However, to test the secularization thesis we need to use historical comparable data, which we do not have. Therefore, comparisons of religious belief are not valid.
Overall, there is no clear conclusive evidence to suggest modern Britain has been or becoming secularised, even after examining the three main indicators – Religious Organisation, Religious Practice and Religious Thought.
The Church as an institution has lost many of its former functions it performed in pre-industrial societies. Brian Wilson sees it as disengagement from the wider society as evidence as secularisation. While Talcott Parsons argues that the role of the Church has transformed in modern society; it performs a different role, but one that is no less important. The 2001 British Census suggests that modern Britain is still fairly religious, however, other statistics show that only a small percentage of individuals actually practice their religion. In regards to religious belief, we cannot make valid comparisons because of the lack of historical comparable data.
Finally, the secularization thesis cannot be tested adequately or accurately tested due sociologists defining the term “secularization” in many different ways. In doing this, there are many different interpretations of whether secularization is actually occurring in modern Britain.
Jessica Pemberton.