Secularism Destigmatized

[cbayer]

http://www.religiondispatches.org/dispatches/sarahposner/6869/secularism_destigmatized/

February 25, 2013 1:26pm
Post by SARAH POSNER

Is secularism on the brink? Of collapse? Of wild success? Or, more modestly, of at least starting an essential conversation?

That was the subject of a conference last week at Georgetown University, Secularism on the Edge, organized by Jacques Berlinerblau, the director of the university's Program for Jewish Civilization and author of the book, How to Be Secular. Berlinerblau's central argument is that secularism has a robust history in the United States, but that it needs to "check into rehab." As Berlinerblau told me when we discussed his book on Bloggingheads, secularism, as a social movement and political worldview, has been in a downward trajectory over recent decades in the United States. In his book, Berlinerblau offers a "12-step program" for a secularist movement to revitalize itself.

A crucial aspect of any secular renaissance, he argues in his book and argued last week, is correcting secularism's sullied reputation. Last week's conference was intended, Berlinerblau said, to "destigmatize secularism." Berlinerblau is a critic of the influence of the New Atheists; he thinks secularism gets a bad rap because of the wide misperception that secularism is anti-religion. He's an advocate of an accommodationist approach to church-state separation, as opposed to a strict separationist approach. That's not his ideal, but his concession to the erosion of church-state separation over the past several decades and what he thinks is achievable in the current climate.

One of the most heated moments took place when Phil Zuckerman, a sociologist at Pitzer College and a founder of the school's new major in Secular Studies, took issue with Berlinerblau's criticism of Michael Newdow, the activist best known for his unsuccessful attempts to have "under God" in the pledge of allegiance declared unconstitutional. One person's annoying and counterproductive gadfly is another person's hero.

more at link

[trotsky]

1. It's sad that we have to "destigmatize" one of the USA's central founding principles. n/t