<p>I was writing my essay and wanted to confirm the meaning of Secularism.
What does the word Secular means in the west? Does it means Non-religious?</p>
<p>yes 10 chars</p>
<p>i was first introduced to the term in art class, when we were learning art history.
a secular object, like a gold plate, would have no religious purpose and mostly for decorative purposes.</p>
<p>the opposite of sacred</p>
<p><em>commits seppuku at this thread</em></p>
<p>Catholic priests who are not members of a religious order – who are “diocesan” priests – are also called secular priests. They live and work out in the world, and not in a closed-off monastery or religious community. </p>
<p>But in its wider general usage, secular means non-religious. Not anti-religious (like some people seem to think), just non-religious.</p>
<p>I always though that secularism meant religionless government (i.e that the judicial laws, etc were separated from religious ones).</p>
<p>In my country Secularism means equality of all religions(or rather equal treatment to Hinduism, Islam and Christianity).
When i saw Fides post about ‘Secularism destroying Society’ i was like ‘Is this guy mad, how the hell could equality of religion destroy Society?’
It took me time to figure out this difference.</p>
<p>I think secularism falls into two categories: healthy and unhealthy. Healthy secularism means things like the separation of church and state (namely, that governments cannot persecute people over their religious beliefs) and the equal treatment of all religious peoples. This is good. Unhealthy secularism, on the other hand, is when people lose their religious faith in droves, when a society harbors a largely anti-religious attitude, and when governments persecute people for being committed to their religion (breaking the separation of church and state). This is bad.</p>
<p>It seems that the more “liberal” or left-wing a society becomes, the closer its secularism moves to the unhealthy.</p>