Outline and evaluate the view that religion is losing its significance in the contemporary UK. [33mk]

That the British society is indeed increasingly getting secularised is evidenced by several cognate social processes including rationalisation, structural differentiation, social differentiation, religious pluralism, a surge in technological world view, industrialisation, democratisation, urbanisation and international immigration.

Max Weber in his pioneering work -The Protestant Ethics & the Spirit of Capitalism (1905), saw ‘desacrilisation’ as the ‘disenchantment of the world’, the religious world view losing its mystery and magic thus replacing it with technological world view. Further, Berger (1973) argued that Protestantism represented crucial elements of secularism within the tradition of western Christianity itself. Reformation and Enlightenment focusing on the ‘this life’, ‘work’ and ‘pursuit of prosperity’ provided the pivotal impetus towards secularisation. Talcott Parsons in his book ‘The Social System’ (1951) posited that with industrialisation and urbanisation societies underwent ‘structural differentiation’ wherein specialised institutions increasingly assumed the functions of hitherto performed by religion. For instance, the exercise of authority, adjudication, education and entertainment came to be performed by State, independent judiciary, universities and theatre independent of Church. Social differentiation, arising out of geographical and social mobility resulting in religious pluralism, Bruce (1995)(1996) argued, made religion a matter of choice rather than something that can be taken for granted. Berger (1969) and Wilson (1966) take this argument forward as they point out that religious diversity creates a plurality of life worlds creating a crisis of credibility for the religion. Diversity undermines religions’ plausibility structure as society is no longer unified a single ‘sacred canopy’ provided by a single church. This is further aggravated, as per Bruce, by an increase in social and cultural diversity spurred by industrialisation.

Sociologists on the other side of the secularisation debate are more discreet and have referred to a rise in New Religious Movements (NRM) and New Age Movements (NAM) as evidence of religions’ continuing role in British social life. Greeley referred to the growth of the NRMs as evidence of resacrilisation (renewed belief in the sacred). Campbell referred to this phenomenon as ‘Easternisation’ of the west as mystical religions stressed the limits of science and rationality in ensuring well-being of individuals. Grace Davie (1994) said the situation is one of ‘believing without belonging’ that is people may admit to private religious beliefs but are less inclined to join formal religious groups and attend Church. Day (2007), however, challenged this view & held that religion is still used as a public marker of identity as an affiliation to a community of people like themselves and not necessarily to a particular faith. In this connection Davie talks about Vicarious religion in the sense that an active minority performs religious rituals and practices on behalf of a much larger community who implicitly understand and approve of what the minority is doing. Bellah (1987) argued that while institutional religion is in decline other aspects of it continue in a variety of form in modern society. Individuation has replaced institutional religion and many have embarked on spiritual journeys in search of themselves.

Any debate on how secular or how religious is British society or for that matter any society would ultimately mean understanding the tense cultural dilemma: whether social institutions should draw their legitimacy from Moral Rationalism or Religious Tradition? While there is little doubt that institutionalised Church plays less of a political role today than it did in earlier centuries our national debates on issues such as age of homosexual consent, abortion, women priest and public policies on poverty continue to be influenced by the Church and its leaders. Measuring religiosity or secularisation of British society would also require understanding of religious beliefs and practices of minorities. In a globalised world it also may mean understanding how societies in Africa, Asia and Latin America respond to institutionalised religion.