4.2.5 - Secularisation - Arguments Against and Religious Revival

Contested decline

The secularisation thesis argues that modern societies become less religious as science, rationality, and individual choice expand. However, critics say this picture is too narrow if it treats churchgoing in Western Europe as the whole story. Sociology is interested not just in whether people attend services, but also whether religion still shapes identity, moral expectations, life events, and political culture.

One criticism is that secularisation can be measured too crudely. Attendance records and membership figures are useful for showing institutional decline, but they do not capture private belief very well. Survey evidence can also be messy: some people say they are religious because of family identity, while others rarely attend formal worship but still pray, believe in God, or want religious rituals at key moments.

Grace Davie argues that modern religion can become more private and optional rather than simply disappearing. Her idea of "believing without belonging" suggests that people may retain belief even when they no longer feel committed to weekly participation. This matters because it challenges the assumption that lower attendance automatically equals lower religiosity.

The same broad line of argument appears in the idea of vicarious religion: a relatively small active minority may keep religion going publicly for a much wider population. People who never attend church every week may still expect baptisms, weddings, funerals, remembrance services, or moral leadership in moments of crisis. Religion therefore retains social visibility and symbolic power even when everyday participation has thinned out.

Daniele Hervieu-Leger adds that late modern religion is less about inheriting one fixed tradition and more about choice. As the old "chain of memory" weakens, some people become pilgrims who search across beliefs, while others become converts who commit strongly to a chosen community. This suggests change in the form of religion, not necessarily its extinction.

Critics of secularisation also challenge the "golden age" assumption. If the past was never as deeply religious as nostalgia suggests, then the scale of decline may be exaggerated. Some earlier church attendance may have reflected conformity, respectability, or social pressure rather than deep conviction. That means long-term comparisons need caution.

Markets and counter-examples

Another major challenge comes from Stark and Bainbridge, whose religious market theory rejects the idea that modernity naturally kills religion. They argue that demand for religion is fairly constant because people continue to seek meaning, reassurance, and answers to suffering and death. What changes is the supply. Where there is competition between churches, sects, denominations, and movements, religion may remain lively because organisations have to attract followers.

This helps explain why the USA has often been treated as a counter-example to secularisation. It is highly modern and scientifically advanced, yet religion has remained more visible and publicly influential than in much of Western Europe. From this perspective, pluralism does not always weaken religion. It can energise it by creating consumer choice, innovation, and competition between groups.

Peter Berger is important here because he later retreated from his earlier secularisation argument. Faced with continuing religious vitality across large parts of the world, he accepted that the prediction of an inevitably secular world had been overstated. His change of view is significant because it shows that even leading secularisation theorists had to respond to contrary evidence.

However, sociologists still need to evaluate the evidence carefully. The USA may not disprove secularisation everywhere. Pew’s 2023–24 survey found 62% of US adults identified as Christian, compared with 78% in 2007. Its longer-run affiliation decline qualifies the historical counter-example; public visibility is not proof of unchanged participation. Pew US religious identity. Self-report surveys can overstate attendance, and high belief does not automatically mean religious institutions control everyday life. A society may show strong religious identity while still becoming more secular in law, family life, or moral regulation. This is why sociologists distinguish between institutional power and personal belief.

Global revival and fundamentalism

One of the strongest criticisms of secularisation is that it can be Western-centric or Eurocentric. Western Europe does show clear institutional decline, but many other regions do not follow the same path. Globalisation has sometimes spread religion as much as it has spread secular values.