Secularization & Virtue
On Misunderstanding Christian Formation
Headlines regularly tell of some new study declaring the continued decline of Christianity in America. Such headlines are striking because they seem to confirm what many experience on a regular basis: that religion just doesn’t seem to be as important as it once was. Many Christians, especially those who are older, lament Christianity’s diminishing role in people’s public and private lives. Public opinion surveys are a concise and scientific means of confirming what many already experience as happening in America, while also offering interesting talking points for pastors and religious leaders as they mobilize support and raise funds to further their work.
The problem is that public opinion surveys are generally created for the purposes of social science—and not the needs of the Church—and therefore are unable to describe fully the features of modern secularity. What does it mean to understand the challenge of secularization on Christian terms—beyond the perspectives afforded by national surveys?
Models of Secularization
THIS ARTICLE ONLY AVAILABLE TO SUBSCRIBERS.
FOR QUICK ACCESS:
Phil Davignon is Chair and Associate Professor of Sociology at Union University in Jackson, Tennessee. He is the author of Practicing Christians, Practical Atheists: How Cultural Liturgies and Everyday Social Practices Shape the Christian Life (Cascade Books, 2023).
subscription options
Order
Print/Online Subscription
Get six issues (one year) of Touchstone PLUS full online access including pdf downloads for only $39.95. That's only $3.34 per month!
Order
Online Only
Subscription
Get a one-year full-access subscription to the Touchstone online archives for only $19.95. That's only $1.66 per month!
bulk subscriptions
Order Touchstone subscriptions in bulk and save $10 per sub! Each subscription includes 6 issues of Touchstone plus full online access to touchstonemag.com—including archives, videos, and pdf downloads of recent issues for only $29.95 each! Great for churches or study groups.
Transactions will be processed on a secure server.
more on Christianity from the online archives
8.4—Fall 1995
The Demise of Biblical Preaching
Distortions of the Gospel and its Recovery by Donald G. Bloesch
more from the online archives
22.3—April 2009
Neil Postman's Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business by J. Daryl Charles
19.1—January/February 2006
on Death & Seven of the Last Words of Socrates by Graeme Hunter
33.2—March/April 2020
An Architectural Sign of Mere Christianity by Michael Ward
calling all readers
Please Donate
"There are magazines worth reading but few worth saving . . . Touchstone is just such a magazine."
—Alice von Hildebrand
"Here we do not concede one square millimeter of territory to falsehood, folly, contemporary sentimentality, or fashion. We speak the truth, and let God be our judge. . . . Touchstone is the one committedly Christian conservative journal."
—Anthony Esolen, Touchstone senior editor
