On Secularism - Part 1

"Secularism" is one of those words in Christian circles that has many different connotations to different people. For some it's like a dark crusading force against everything to do with Christianity. For others it's something that can basically work side-by-side with with it. Still others see it as a self-authenticated and merited worldview. Regardless of how you see it, many of its varying assumptions simply do not square with Christianity, and it's often difficult for Christians to know how to interact with it wisely.

Part of the issue isn't just "secularism" itself, but more generally the culture at large. Secularism is a bit of a nebulous term that represents only a single facet of the greater culture (or cultures) we find ourselves in. In other words, it's not a monolithic movement, so in some ways it's a bit like nailing Jello to a wall. Nevertheless, secularism is increasingly the dominant worldview even if it is competing with others. But what secularism does represent in its most simplest form is to be free from religious belief or influence. With such a wide variety of religious belief, secularism props itself up as the arbiter of truth, bringing enlightenment and progress to all society, with the tools of the sciences at its aid.

Secularism typically isn't explicitly anti-religious, but sees religion as a separate entity that's merely personal and private. So in a secularist government, for example, politicians need to leave any of their religious beliefs at the door and engage in policy making under secularist assumptions. One can easily see why people adopt this approach. In a liberal society desiring to maintain religious freedoms, you wouldn't want your own religious beliefs to encroach upon the beliefs of others through policy making. Therefore, if everyone keeps their religion to themselves you wouldn't have to worry about that.

But being asked to play by rules of secularism doesn't demonstrate its truthfulness or fairness but it's dominance. Studies in the sciences and humanities have taught us enormous amounts of information about ourselves and the world we live in, but the sum of their findings don't add up to secularism. In fact it's quite the opposite. If secularism attempts to be objective by not having faith-based religious assumptions, then it fails by its own standards. That's because rather than removing so-called "faith based" assumptions from its worldview, it's unwittingly replaced them with its own new set of presumptions. It's a bit like saying secularism become its own religion.

Secularism's greatest failing, then, is its own ignorance toward what it deems as mythical and supernatural nonsense. But that doesn't mean that a Christian doing science, by contrast, is going to come upon a mystery and just say "God did it." That "God-of-the-gaps" idea is pathetically unscientific and unfaithful to exploration. The Christian scientist, as much as any other scientist, is genuinely interested in how things work and function in the world. In other words, he is just as interested in truth as the next scientist. That's because the sciences and humanities are not the just tools of secularism, but the genuinely good gifts that God has bestowed upon us.

But besides enabling us to engage in scientific study what does God have to with science anyway? In science your dealing with the material, so what you find is what you find, whether you believe God or not. You certainly don't have to be a Christian to do science well, so it may seem like it makes little difference. As it is, in the sciences and humanities there is a great wealth of information to be gleaned that is not only helpful but truthful as well regardless of who's done it. John Calvin concedes the same thing. Consider this passage from his Institutes (Book 2, Chapter 2, Section 15).

Whenever we come upon these matters in secular writers, let that admirable light of truth shining in them teach us that the mind of man, though fallen and perverted from its wholeness, is nevertheless clothed and ornamented with God's excellent gifts. If we regard the Spirit of God as the sole foundation of truth, we shall neither reject the truth itself, nor despise it wherever it shall appear, unless we wish to dishonour the Spirit of God. For by holding the gifts of the Spirit in slight esteem, we condemn and reproach the Spirit himself. What then? Shall we deny that the truth shone upon the ancient jurists who established civic order and discipline with such great equity? Shall we say that the philosophers were blind in their fine observation and artful description of nature? Shall we say that those men were devoid of understanding who conceived the art of disputation and taught us to speak reasonably? Shall we say that they are insane who developed medicine, devoting their labour to our benefit? What shall we say of all the mathematical sciences? Shall we consider them the ravings of madmen? No, we cannot read the writings of the ancients on these subjects without great admiration. We marvel at them because we are compelled to recognize how preeminant they are. But shall we count anything praiseworthy or noble without recognizing at the same time that it comes from God? Let us be ashamed of such ingratitude, into which no even the pagan poets fell, for they confessed that the gods had invented philosophy, laws, and all useful arts. Those men whom Scripture calls "natural men" [1 Corinthians 2:14] were, indeed, sharp and penetrating in their investigation of inferior things. Let us, accordingly, learn by their example how many gifts the Lord left to human nature even after it was despoiled of its true good.

When Calvin speaks here he makes a distinction between secular callings and those specific to the church. Obviously when it comes to heavenly things, non-Christians will be devoid of understanding, but secular callings are sacred and legitimate for Christians as well. That's because these secular callings were there from the beginning of creation but we have just become corrupted by the curse of the fall like everything else. Therefore you don't have to Christianize your business, your music, or the way you conduct your scientific surveys. As Martin Luther would put it, if you are a shoemake, then make a good shoe and sell it at a fair price.

What secularism does to the sciences is interpret the findings on the assumption that there is only the material. Again, this might seem to make little difference since you’re only dealing with material things anyway. The notoriously atheistic Richard Dawkins of Oxford University may display is ignorance when he writes books like “The God Delusion” but his work on biology can be a great asset to us all. But how does his atheism inform his work where a Christian, or a theist might differ? 

Most simply because all of this work points to something far greater than itself. There’s beauty and order in it. Romans 1:20 says, “For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.” Francis Collins, the man who led the team that cracked Human Genome Project isn’t without reason when he states that human DNA has the “fingerprints” of the creator God. Even if these reflections seem somewhat subjective, it does no use to simply assume it all happened by itself based on infinitesimally impossible random chance. That only creates bigger problems for itself, and the burden of proof is on the secularist to show why its more reasonable to assume God’s not part of the picture.

For the studies in the humanities, on the other hand, since secularism has no time for acknowledging the existence of God, that we do indeed have a relationship with him (albeit broken), and that the world is fallen and corrupted by our own doings it completely removes an important part of the puzzle, which only the Bible has made clear to us. And this is important because the Bible teaches us not only "theological" things such as sin and redemption but it teaches ethics, morality, equality, justice. Secularism takes these things as well, but by denying the existence of a creator and ruler God, it removes any basis for them. 

This is particularly dangerous in the area of human rights. If human rights are not grounded in the God-ordained dignity of human beings, they are only grounded in the whims of the dominant culture. Human rights become nothing more than the will to power, but secularism sees this as progress. 

Take the work of Steven Pinker, for example. Steven Pinker, an avowed atheist, is the Johnstone Family Professor of Psychology at Harvard University and a best-selling author. If you've never heard of him, in 2004 Time Magazine named him one of 100 most influential scientists and thinkers in the world. He posits that as human beings progress in science and technology that our morality also progresses as well. He cites that we no longer have slavery, we have more human rights such as women’s suffrage and equality, and so on. Rather ironic when you consider we've just witnessed the bloodiest century of all human history. And while Steven Pinker really is a smart guy, it's not difficult to see why he would come up with an idea like this.

Consider some of the things your grandparents believed. Today, many of those things are considered outdated and silly. It’s easy to think from our vantage point that we live in a more advanced society, not only in terms of technology, but in ethics and morality too. But don’t forget that in another two generations your grandchildren will consider many of your own beliefs silly too. The secularist might assume that in two generations they’ll have advanced even further than we have, but to what end? And on what basis are we to believe that the morals of today are better than yesterday or tomorrow? None! Without God morals are subject to the tides of the culture, or to the evolutionary process and we have no ability to discern good or evil except that which is useful for survival. Frederich Nietzche who was one of the few atheists to acknowledge this.

And this is the whole point: Secularism attempts to do something which it can only fail to achieve. It has no grounds for believing its foundation other than its own leap of faith. It not only fails by its own standards, but the grounds on which it's based mean that its own assumptions can't be trusted. Everything becomes a whim, an experiment, and it's all utterly, utterly meaningless.