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The last two centuries have been a
conspicuously unique era in the history of the human race.
For, unlike any other epoch in our history, the last 200 years have
witnessed the systematic and seemingly unstoppable deconstruction of religion as
an important element of Western society and human culture.
So seemingly successful has the exorcism of religion from public life
been since the modern Enlightenment era, that many 20th century
American scholars even went so far as to prematurely pronounce the imminent
death of religion in our age. As
events and trends in recent world history have shown us, however, this was an
exceedingly mistaken pronouncement to say the least.
As is becoming increasingly apparent in the
early years of the 21st century, religion’s obituary may have been
written somewhat prematurely. Our
current era is witnessing one of the greatest world wide religious resurgences
ever recorded in the annals of human history.
In America alone, for example, we have seen the importance of religiously
based human values ushered center stage in the elections of 2004. And the rest of the world has not been immune to this trend.
The centrality of religion in human life and culture has been
aggressively reasserted in India, Israel, throughout the Islamic world, and
throughout the Third World especially. Only
the modern secular states of Western Europe seem, so far, to have remained
relatively untouched by the global revival of spirituality.
Rather than ushering in a new secular age, an age free from the influence
of religion, spirituality and contemplation, the evidence seems to indicate that
we are actually entering a Post Secular Age:
an age wherein religion will necessarily fill up the vacuum created by
the ruinous failure of 20th century secular materialism.
 The notion that religion would meet its
eventual demise (and, according to some of the more rabidly atheistic thinkers,
that it should meet its demise) had
been espoused by a large number of Western intellectuals in the last two
centuries. Perhaps the most famous
of these individuals were, what Christian theologian Martin Marty termed, “The
Bearded God-Killers” (National Public Radio, 1996). These primarily 19th century figures included:
Karl Marx, Charles Darwin, Friedrich Nietzsche and Sigmund Freud.
Mistakenly equating all human religious expression with an enslaving
opiate designed to keep the proletariat bound by psychic chains, Karl Marx
predicted both the inevitable death of religion and the subsequent emergence of
a new atheistic world order: the Dictatorship of the Proletariat; leading to a
state of Communism. He was woefully
wrong on both counts. Similarly,
Freud saw in religion the greatest threat to humanity’s social and psychic
development. Indeed, to Freud
religion and philosophy represented no more than a “...black tide of mud...”
designed solely to keep humanity enslaved in the chains of superstition (Ernest
Becker, “Denial of Death”, p. 94).
Overt atheists were not the only individuals to pronounce the imminent
end of religion.
Surrendering to the en vogue
secularism of their day, even quite a few Judeo-Christian theologians also felt
that secularism would ultimately triumph over the human religious impulse.
Among these religious leaders were several who felt that the inevitable
secularization of the world merely represented a coming of age for homo
religiosus (religious man). Included
among these were theologian Harvey Cox (author of “The
Secular City”) of Harvard, and Anglican Bishop John Robinson (who wrote
“Honest to God”). Succumbing
wholesale to the seemingly unstoppable secular tide seen in 20th
century history, some shortsighted Christian theologians went so far as to
declare the death of God in the early 1960’s.
If God Himself were indeed “dead”, however, such ongoing phenomena as
the belief in the importance of the spiritual dimension of human life,
religiously inspired values and ethics, and the active search for God on the
part of multiple millions today seem to be very far from it.
As we enter the beginning years of the 21st
Century, it appears that religion has made an undeniably powerful comeback onto
the world stage. Throughout the
Third-World, nation upon nation is rejecting the current Western materialistic
paradigm. Nations that were
traditionally Hindu (Sanatana Dharma), Islamic, Buddhist and Jewish are
rediscovering their ancient religious heritage and turning to these time-tested
spiritual world-views for meaningful and practical answers to many of today’s
social, political, economic and ethical dilemmas - dilemmas, many of which were themselves created directly as a result of
the failures of secular materialism. The
world’s many Indigenous peoples and tribes - peoples ranging from the
Aborigines of Australia to the many hundreds of Native American tribes in North
and South America – are also reconnecting with their own, long oppressed,
spiritually-based cultures: cultures
that have proven themselves to be gentler, saner, and more Earth-centered
paradigms than anything secular materialism ever had to offer.
Moreover, with the dramatic failure and consequent collapse of Marxist
regimes in Eastern Europe, the former Soviet Union, and the Third World, the
peoples of these former Communist regimes have expressed an unprecedented
resurgence of interest in more religious ways of life.
Indeed, in today’s Russia, and throughout much of Eastern Europe, two
of the fastest growing religions are Hinduism (Sanatana Dharma) and Buddhism.
This world-wide rediscovery of the
importance of religion has also had a dramatic impact on the American scene. There are several recent trends in American culture that
readily reveal this fact. One of
these trends has been the explosive popularity of the trendy New Age movement in
recent years. As a movement deeply
grounded in the belief that personal spiritual development is essential to any
real social and political change, New Age thought has had a deeply penetrating
influence on the American public. With
an emphasis in such beliefs as karma,
reincarnation, meditation, natural foods, chakras,
and Yoga, much of New Age thought is directly derived from much older and more
orthodox forms of Hindu philosophy; though this clear dependence on Hinduism (Sanatana
Dharma) is sadly often not acknowledged by many New Age thinkers and leaders.
As a result of this disconnect from its religious roots, the actual
understanding of many of these New Age leaders tends to be rather shallow and
faddish. The rebirth of interest in religion is also seen on the
popular stage by the amazing number of books with spiritual themes that have
become run-away best sellers. These
include the works of such popular writers as Deepak Chopra, Bernie Siegal,
Thomas Moore and Marianne Williamson. While
the New Age movement is not deeply rooted in the philosophical profundity and
guiding discipline of traditional religious thought, the popular impact of this
movement is still a clear testament to the resurgence of interest in
spirituality in modern America.
Coupled with the more recent success of New
Age spirituality has been the growing popularity of Asian religions on the
previously solely Judeo-Christian American religious landscape - specifically
Hinduism (Sanatana Dharma) and Buddhism. Over
the past three decades, hundreds of thousands of Americans have joined various
Asian religious traditions. Legions
of famous celebrities, such as the actors Richard Gere, and musical performers
like Madonna and Sting, among many others, now consider themselves to be
practicing Hindus, Buddhists or Taoists. In
addition, to throngs of college students and youth across America, nothing is
considered “cooler” today than studying and practicing Hindu and Buddhist
philosophy and spirituality. Every
major American city has at least several dozen Hindu temples and Buddhist
meditation centers. Yoga, Tai Chi
and meditation are spiritual techniques that are now practiced by millions of
average, middle class Americans. The
estimate is that there are currently 15 – 18 million Americans practicing Yoga
regularly, with an even greater number enjoying the benefits of meditation.
In Gallup polls conducted on the basic religious beliefs of everyday
Americans for the last twenty years, a consistent 23% - 25% of Americans say
they believe that the principle of reincarnation offers the best possible
explanation for the afterlife. The
number of Hindus in America today is roughly 3 million.
Half of these are non-Indian Americans who have adopted Hinduism (Sanatana
Dharma) as their religious practice. In
many ways, it has become easily arguable that 20th century Americans
are witnessing nothing less than the slow but steady “Hinduization” of
North-American culture and society.
The recent religious resurgence in America
is affecting society not only on a more popular level, but within the realm of
academia as well. The latter
phenomenon is evidenced by the recent successes of overtly religious scholars in
philosophy departments across the land. For
much of the last 40 years, philosophy departments at almost every major
university were uninviting intellectual vacuums, in which only materialist and
empiricist philosophy was allowed to flourish.
Religious philosophers were made to feel like outsiders.
This is beginning to change quite significantly today as more and more
departments open their doors to theistic thinkers.
Such philosophers of religion as Alvin Plantinga (famous for his bold
defense of the Ontological Argument for God’s existence) and Keith Yandell
(author of “The Epistemology of Religious Experience”) have begun to make
tremendous inroads into an area that, until recently, was almost the exclusive
domain of atheistic Humean skeptics.
On a more ominous note, the new religious
resurgence in America has also included a marked rise in Evangelical Christian
fundamentalism. This new
evangelical revival has taken on increasingly political tones in recent years.
Beginning with such individuals as Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell in the
late 1970’s, fundamentalist Christian activists began to take their
theological opinions into the partisan political realm.
Through supporting politicians and ballot initiatives viewed as being
pro-family values, and pro-Christian, Evangelicals have made their views
forcefully known and implemented throughout the nation.
The success and acceptability of Pat Robertson’s Christian Coalition in
the Republican Party in the late 1990s, and the more recent overt confessions of
Christian faith on the part of President Bush, reveals to us that this is a
movement that is both immensely powerful and that is here to stay.
In addition to the rise of Christian
fundamentalism, the world has also witnessed the violent specter of Islamic
fundamentalism and Islamist inspired terrorism in recent years.
The most prominent example of the destructive force of fundamentalist
terror was, without question, the terrorist attacks on innocent American
civilians perpetrated on 9/11. In
an attempt to enforce their highly reactionary version of Islam upon the world,
Islamic terrorists have declared open war against both modernity, as well as the
followers of all non-Islamic religions. From
the southern Philippines, Indonesia, Southern Thailand and Northwest China, to
the Chechen Republic in Russia, Afghanistan, Kashmir, Sudan and Israel, the
ravages of Islamic fundamentalism have led to untold deaths, destruction and
suffering on the part of many hundreds of thousands of innocent people globally.
Thus, the current global resurgence in religious consciousness also has
its extremely ominous side, as well as its decidedly positive value.
The fact that religion, both in America and
throughout the world, is again becoming an increasingly important factor in
human culture is well-established knowledge.
Let us now explore some of the possible reasons for why this is the case.
One reason for the ascension of religion is certainly the dramatic
failure of the most powerful anti-religious ideology in human history:
Marxism. First presented to
the public as a rational, scientific and humanistic alternative to religion, the
fall of Communism in Europe in 1989 revealed Marxism to be a more repressive,
inhumane and destructive system than any religion had ever been. As only one of a large multitude of examples showing the
failure of Marxism, we have the vivid example of Cambodia. Cambodia was a peaceful and beautiful Buddhist nation
previous to the Marxist Khmer Rouge shooting their way to power in 1975.
Marxist rule led to the systematic genocide of at least 1.5 million of
Cambodia’s inhabitants - over an eighth of the population! - over a three year
period. This was an instance, not
of a foreign nation invading and committing acts genocide, but of Communist
Cambodians committing acts of mass genocide against their very own Cambodian
people! And all was done in the
name of a humane and rational ideal of Marxist atheism.
Interestingly, Marxists and secularists throughout the last hundred years
had repeatedly attempted to accuse religion of being responsible for all of
humanity’s many historic sufferings and injustices.
As we now know, however, more human beings have been persecuted,
murdered, tortured and dehumanized as a direct result of atheistic Marxism in
the 20th century alone than have been harmed in all of the world’s
religious wars combined since the very beginning of human history.
Indeed, it could be argued that the complete
and unmitigated failure of secularism, as a whole, is directly responsible for
the new religious renaissance now being experienced globally.
The omnipresent human need for meaning simply could not be adequately
addressed by the cold, impersonal institutions and ideologies of secular
materialism. The human heart
desires love, meaning, beauty and compassion.
Secular materialism could only offer conflict, meaninglessness,
mediocrity and fear instead. Consequently,
we are now witnessing an increasing worldwide reaction against all forms of
Western materialism - both Marxist and capitalist.
America, as we have seen, has been far from immune from this rather
dramatic global shift.
Some might argue that it is still somewhat
premature to proclaim the advent of a new religious era for humanity.
However, the data reveals that there is currently a definite and dramatic
global shift away from institutions and philosophies that have urged the
abandonment of the human spirit and the Transcendent.
Additionally, the currently ongoing rediscovery of humankind’s many
unique spiritual traditions reveal to all impartial observers that we are at
present experiencing nothing less than the beginning of a Post Secular Age. It is quite apparent that those scholars who earlier in
the 19th and 20th century had predicted - and in some
cases, even looked forward to - the death of religion were exceedingly mistaken.
Rather than being on the verge of extinction, as we begin the second
Millennium, the natural, positive and healthy phenomenon of human religious
expression seems to have been rekindled anew.
About the Author
 Dr. Frank Gaetano Morales,
Ph.D. (Sri Dharma Pravartaka Acharya) earned both a doctorate and a Masters degree in Languages
and Cultures of Asia from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Previously, Dr. Morales earned a B.A. in Philosophy and Theology
from Loyola University Chicago. His fields of expertise
include Philosophy of Religion, Hindu Studies, Sanskrit, History
of Religion, Comparative Theology, Contemporary South Asian
Politics, and the interface between Hinduism and modernity.
Dr. Morales is currently recognized as one of the nation’s
leading authorities on Hindu philosophy and religion, as well as
South Asian studies. In addition to directing his own
institute (The Center for the Study of Religion and Civilization),
Dr. Morales works in conjunction with several educational
institutes and think tanks globally. Dr. Morales maintains a
very demanding schedule consisting of lecturing, consulting and
writing. Dr. Morales has been a guest lecturer at over two
dozen major universities throughout the USA, including Cornell,
Northwestern, Illinois Institute of Technology, and University of
Virginia. In addition, Dr. Morales has served as a South
Asian affairs consultant for such corporations as Ford Motor
Company, Lucent Technologies, Goodwin Procter Law Firm, and the
Global Health Corporation. His first book, “Experiencing
Truth: The Vedic Way of Knowing God”, is scheduled for
publication in 2006. In addition to his academic duties, Dr.
Morales has been a practicing orthodox Hindu for 30 years, and is
an ordained Hindu priest. The practice of Yoga and
meditation are of central importance in his life. His
website is www.dharmacentral.com.
"Dr.
Frank Morales represents the Sankalpa [the will] of the Hindu
people and the cause of Sanatana Dharma. I urge all Hindus
everywhere to give him your full support, assistance, and
encouragement in his crucial work. He needs and deserves our help."
- Dr. David Frawley (Oct. 14, 2007)
Copyright 2007, Frank Morales. You may print, duplicate or copy this article
only if you credit the author and not alter or add to the author's work in any
way.
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