Religion in Secular Society
Fifty Years On
Bryan R Wilson author Steve Bruce editor
Format:Hardback
Publisher:Oxford University Press
Published:6th Oct '16
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
Fifty years after its publication, Bryan Wilson's Religion in Secular Society (1966) remains a seminal work. It is one of the clearest articulations of the secularization thesis: the claim that modernizations brings with it fundamental changes in the nature and status of religion. For Wilson, secularization refers to the fact that religion has lost influence at the societal, the institutional, and the individual level. Individual secularization is about the loss of authority of the Churches to define what people should believe, practise and accept as moral principles guiding their lives. In other words, individual piety may still persist, however, if it develops independently of religious authorities, then it is an indication of individual secularization. Wilson stresses that the consequences of the process of societalization in modern societies and on this basis he formulated his thesis that secularization is linked to the decline of community and is a concomitant of societalization. Revised and updated, Steve Bruce builds on Wilson's work by noting the changes in religious culture of the UK and US, in an appendix on major changes since the 1960s. Bruce also provides a critical response to the core ideas of Religion in Secular Society.
Bruce's editing and updating of Wilson's work proves helpful in increasing readability and better conveying the utility of Wilson's text for a younger audience. This new edition and its relevance for the US's current religious landscape couldn't be more timely. In Appendix 2 Bruce provides updates to what has changed since 1966, when Wilson's text was original published, in terms of politics, policy, modes of identification, economic factors, and societal changes. Overall, I have to commend Bruce for clarifying Wilson's position and providing much needed updates to this text. This new edition is one that should be kept in conversation as future religious landscape data becomes available. * Sean Dixon, Reading Religion *
I welcome this re-edition of Bryan Wilson's work as an important marker in the sociology of religion * Grace Davie, Sociology of Religion *
Religion in Secular Society outlined in detail some of the empirical evidence emerging in the 1960s that the Church of England was facing very serious decline, even though few senior figures in the Church at the time were prepared to acknowledge this publicly. * Theology *
Bruce's efforts to bring Wilson's sociological descriptions to a new audience are to be commended and fully considered. * Clement Yung Wen, Expository Times *
ISBN: 9780198788379
Dimensions: 202mm x 138mm x 21mm
Weight: 394g
288 pages