What is actually happening to the secularization thesis?

There is a thesis that can be expressed to the effect that our world is becoming more secularized with each passing day. Its name is the "secularization thesis." This thesis, which came to hold all social science circles under its influence from the 19th century throughout the twentieth century, sees secularization as a part of humanity's evolution. Modernizationist approaches too have identified secularization with modernization and have assigned secularization the bearing of the evolutionary quality attributed to modernity.

The thesis that religion would recede as distance was covered in modernization was at first confirmed in social developments, being in a sense verified in the field. Industrial society left virtually no room for religion in daily life, and references to religion in people's behavior, in their individual and social preferences, in their daily lives, were increasingly on the verge of disappearing. Within the working hours of daily life organized as industrial society, religious rituals and places were increasingly either put out of play or pushed to the margins of time or space. From the point to which they had been pushed, it would have been very easy for them to be put out of play entirely.

Although the position of religion within these early depictions of industrial society was exactly like this, the passing time witnessed religion, instead of passing away entirely, opening new and central spaces for itself again and becoming a part of life. Not only in Turkey of course, but all over the world the return of religion was recorded as an important sociological development. Not only among Muslims, but for all world religions, religion re-established its own prestige in contrast to the position that positivism had deemed fit for it. Today religion in the life of societies is without doubt far more influential than it was in the late 19th century and the first half of the 20th century.

Volkan Ertit, from the Sociology department of Aksaray University, has moved to a wholesale defense of secularization against observations in this direction. In his article titled "Is the Sociology of Religion and Peter Berger Exempt from Scientific Method?" he tries to show that the secularization process has not ended and that the line leading toward it as a final historical outcome has not been deviated from. Truth be told, this article is like a summary of what he has said in many studies he did on this subject earlier. He has evidently seen our objection to the presentation of secularization as an evolutionary development as a result of our negative attitude toward secularization.

Yet saying that religion has become influential, drawing attention to developments in this direction, does not express a state of affairs very much to be celebrated in favor of religion. After all, we are not speaking with enthusiasm about the development of Islam alone, and we also see, and state, that when an awakening occurs in all religions or religious identities at the same time, this makes no greater contribution to world peace and prosperity.

The entry of religions onto the stage at the same time brings with it the conflicts in the world also taking place on a religious basis. Today's rising Islamophobia, or hostility to Islam, is also a result of the development in the West of a more radical Christian or Jewish religiosity against Islam, and in other countries of Hindu or Buddhist religiosity. While the hatred against Muslims that grows with each passing day today is largely fed and developed in the temples, communities and churches of these religions, the sense of identity based on these religions, and religious feelings, also continue to increase.

Even in international relations, which are thought to be the most secularized, contrary to what is supposed, there is a far denser religious motivation. After the 11 September attacks, US President George Bush openly said that they were in a Crusade. Who can ignore that a great many people, if perhaps not everyone, were motivated by religious feelings in this Crusade? Moreover, we know that this Crusade set in motion the deep apocalyptic consciousness in the mental background of the Jewish and Christian world.

Today all of the Middle East policies of the USA and Europe are Israel-centered, and Israel's reason for existence is nothing other than a religious motivation. It is quite clear that the identity consciousness and emotional states of mind that its occupying and massacring policies, which disregard Muslims, have set in motion in the Muslim world strain the secularization thesis considerably. In fact, as long as a state called Israel exists in this world in this form, no one can persuade anyone of the secularity of the world we live in or that the course of events is toward secularization.

The point where Ertit is mistaken is in thinking that the whole critique against the secularization thesis rests only on Peter Berger's observations. It is true that Peter Berger was one of the first sociologists to question the thesis that the world is secularizing.. There may be methodological problems in his work too; Ertit claims that Berger does not rely on a proper empirical sampling when putting forward his theses. In my view this is of no importance. The strength of Berger's thesis lies in its being able to point to a certain reality that everyone is seeing, to such an extent that, although I personally cite him on these matters, I do not base my views on secularization solely on him.

For example, I am not saying that the secularization thesis has collapsed; I am saying that it is wrong to see secularization as a final stage of an evolutionary line of development. Why should the secularization thesis collapse; I think of it as a tendency that constantly comes and goes in world history, in the development of societies. Very different from what Ertit thinks.

Here too Ertit makes a mistake: first he identifies what I say with what Berger says, then he sets about criticizing Berger as if criticizing me.

In fact I had treated my approach on this subject in more detail in my book titled "Islam and the Sources of Secularization" (tezkire yayınları, 2017). I will just make a note aside of the fact that Ertit set about such a critique without referring to that book of mine at all.

Still, since the subject has been opened, let us say may it be a blessed occasion for explaining the matter better, and let us continue.