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[[File:Alister McGrath.jpg|right|thumb|200px|[[Alister McGrath]] points out that many [[atheism|atheists]]/agnostics were angry that the secularization thesis failed because religion was "supposed to" disappear.<ref>[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=creNs9-Ui6A 'Why God Won't Go Away'] by Alister McGrath</ref> ]]
[[File:Alister McGrath.jpg|right|thumb|170px|[[Alister McGrath]] points out that many [[atheism|atheists]]/agnostics were angry that the secularization thesis failed because religion was "supposed to" disappear.<ref>[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=creNs9-Ui6A 'Why God Won't Go Away'] by Alister McGrath</ref> ]]
A 2003 paper published by the John F. Kennedy School of Government at [[Harvard University]] entitled ''The Secularization Debate'' indicates:
A 2003 paper published by the John F. Kennedy School of Government at [[Harvard University]] entitled ''The Secularization Debate'' indicates:
{{cquote|The seminal social thinkers of the nineteenth century -- [[Auguste Comte]], [[Herbert Spencer]], Emile Durkheim, [[Max Weber]], [[Karl Marx]], and [[Sigmund Freud]] -- all believed that religion would gradually fade in importance and cease to be significant with the advent of industrial society. They were far from alone; ever since the [[Enlightenment|Age of the Enlightenment]], leading figures in philosophy, anthropology, and psychology have postulated that theological superstitions, symbolic liturgical rituals, and sacred practices are the product of the past that will be outgrown in the modern era. The death of religion was the conventional wisdom in the social sciences during most of the twentieth century; indeed it has been regarded as the master model of sociological inquiry, where secularization was ranked with bureaucratization, rationalization, and urbanization as the key historical revolutions transforming medieval agrarian societies into modern industrial nations. As C. Wright Mills summarized this process: “Once the world was filled with the sacred – in thought, practice, and institutional form. After the [[Reformation]] and the [[Renaissance]], the forces of modernization swept across the globe and secularization, a corollary historical process, loosened the dominance of the sacred. In due course, the sacred shall disappear altogether except, possibly, in the private realm.”
{{cquote|The seminal social thinkers of the nineteenth century -- [[Auguste Comte]], [[Herbert Spencer]], Emile Durkheim, [[Max Weber]], [[Karl Marx]], and [[Sigmund Freud]] -- all believed that religion would gradually fade in importance and cease to be significant with the advent of industrial society. They were far from alone; ever since the [[Enlightenment|Age of the Enlightenment]], leading figures in philosophy, anthropology, and psychology have postulated that theological superstitions, symbolic liturgical rituals, and sacred practices are the product of the past that will be outgrown in the modern era. The death of religion was the conventional wisdom in the social sciences during most of the twentieth century; indeed it has been regarded as the master model of sociological inquiry, where secularization was ranked with bureaucratization, rationalization, and urbanization as the key historical revolutions transforming medieval agrarian societies into modern industrial nations. As C. Wright Mills summarized this process: “Once the world was filled with the sacred – in thought, practice, and institutional form. After the [[Reformation]] and the [[Renaissance]], the forces of modernization swept across the globe and secularization, a corollary historical process, loosened the dominance of the sacred. In due course, the sacred shall disappear altogether except, possibly, in the private realm.”
== New Atheism as a reaction to the failure of the secularization thesis ==
== New Atheism as a reaction to the failure of the secularization thesis ==
[[File:Richard Dawkins at QED conference.jpg|alt=Richard Dawkins|thumbnail|260px|right|The atheist philosopher Dr. [[Michael Ruse]] declared concerning [[New Atheism|new atheist]] [[Richard Dawkins]]' book ''The God Delusion'': "''The God Delusion'' makes me embarrassed to be an atheist."<ref>http://www.alternet.org/media/47052?page=entire</ref> ]]
[[File:Richard Dawkins at QED conference.jpg|alt=Richard Dawkins|thumbnail|200px|right|The atheist philosopher Dr. [[Michael Ruse]] declared concerning [[New Atheism|new atheist]] [[Richard Dawkins]]' book ''The God Delusion'': "''The God Delusion'' makes me embarrassed to be an atheist."<ref>http://www.alternet.org/media/47052?page=entire</ref> ]]
Richard Osling wrote about the book ''The Evolution of Atheism: The Politics of a Modern Movement'' published by the [[Oxford University]] Press:
Richard Osling wrote about the book ''The Evolution of Atheism: The Politics of a Modern Movement'' published by the [[Oxford University]] Press:
{{cquote|The tables are turned in a new book, “''The Evolution of Atheism: The Politics of a Modern Movement''” (Oxford University Press). Journalists: It’s heady stuff to be a hook for news treatment, but worth the effort.
{{cquote|The tables are turned in a new book, “''The Evolution of Atheism: The Politics of a Modern Movement''” (Oxford University Press). Journalists: It’s heady stuff to be a hook for news treatment, but worth the effort.
"Secularists have been predicting the imminent demise of religion for centuries. They have always been wrong—and their claims today are no different. It is their unshakable faith in secularization that may be the most "irrational" of all beliefs." (p. 212).<ref>http://www.christianpost.com/news/world-more-religious-than-ever-rodney-starks-triumph-faith-secularism-atheism-154641/ Despite What You've Heard, World Is More Religious Than Ever], Christian Post</ref>}}
"Secularists have been predicting the imminent demise of religion for centuries. They have always been wrong—and their claims today are no different. It is their unshakable faith in secularization that may be the most "irrational" of all beliefs." (p. 212).<ref>http://www.christianpost.com/news/world-more-religious-than-ever-rodney-starks-triumph-faith-secularism-atheism-154641/ Despite What You've Heard, World Is More Religious Than Ever], Christian Post</ref>}}
== Atheist John Grey on New Atheism and the secularization thesis ==
== Atheist philosopher John Gray on what scares the New Atheists ==
''See also:'' [[Desecularization]] and [[Secularization thesis]] and [[Global atheism]]
[[File:John Gray.JPG|thumbnail|right|200px|The [[economist]] Tomáš Sedláček (left) and the [[atheism|atheist]] [[philosophy|philosopher]] John Gray (right) at ZURICH.MINDS 2012]]
[[John Gray (philosopher)|John Gray]] in his Guardian article entitled ''What scares the new atheists?'' wrote:
{{cquote|The rise of violent [[jihad]]ism is only the most obvious example of a rejection of secular life. Jihadist thinking comes in numerous varieties, mixing strands from 20th century ideologies, such as [[Nazism]] and [[Vladimir Lenin|Leninism]], with elements deriving from the 18th century Wahhabist Islamic fundamentalist movement. What all Islamist movements have in common is a categorical rejection of any secular realm. But the ongoing reversal in secularisation is not a peculiarly Islamic phenomenon.
The [[Desecularization|resurgence of religion]] is a worldwide development. Russian Orthodoxy is stronger than it has been for over a century, while China is the scene of a reawakening of its indigenous faiths and of underground movements that could [[Growth of Christianity in China|make it the largest Christian country]] in the world by the end of this century. Despite tentative shifts in opinion that have been hailed as evidence it is becoming less pious, the US remains massively and [[American atheism#American atheist activists exaggerating the number of atheists in the United States|pervasively religious]] – it’s inconceivable that a professed unbeliever could become president, for example. It’s inconceivable that a professed unbeliever could become president of the United States
For secular thinkers, the continuing vitality of religion calls into question the belief that history underpins their values. To be sure, there is disagreement as to the nature of these values. But pretty well all secular thinkers now take for granted that modern societies must in the end converge on some version of liberalism. Never well founded, this assumption is today clearly unreasonable.<ref>[http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/03/what-scares-the-new-atheists What scares the new atheists] by [[John Gray (philosopher)|John Gray]], ''The Guardian''</ref>}}
== See also ==
== See also ==