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Secularism
Secularism is the principle of seeking to conduct human affairs based on secular, naturalistic considerations. Secularism is most commonly defined as the separation of religion from civil affairs and the state, and may be broadened to a similar position seeking to remove or to minimize the role of religion in any public sphere. The term "secularism" has a broad range of meanings, and in the most schematic, may encapsulate any stance that promotes the secular in any given context. It may connote anti-clericalism, atheism, naturalism, non-sectarianism, neutrality on topics of religion, or the complete removal of religious symbols from public institutions. As a philosophy, secularism seeks to interpret life based on principles derived solely from the material world, without recourse to religion. It shifts the focus from religion towards "temporal" and material concerns. There are distinct traditions of secularism in the West, like the French, Turkish and Anglo-American m ...
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Islam And Secularism
Secularism—i.e. the separation of religion from civic affairs and the state—has been a controversial concept in Islamic political thought, owing in part to historical factors and in part to the ambiguity of the concept itself. In the Muslim world, the notion has acquired strong negative connotations due to its association with removal of Islamic influences from the legal and political spheres under foreign colonial domination, as well as attempts to restrict public religious expression by some secularist nation states. Thus, secularism has often been perceived as a foreign ideology imposed by invaders and perpetuated by post-colonial ruling elites, and is frequently understood to be equivalent to irreligion or anti-religion. Especially in the late 19th to mid-20th century, some Muslim thinkers advocated secularism as a way to strengthen the Islamic world in the face of Russian, British and French colonialism. Some have advocated secularism in the sense of political order tha ...
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Secularism In India
With the Forty-second Amendment of the Constitution of India enacted in 1976, the Preamble to the Constitution asserted that India is a secular nation. However, the Supreme Court of India in the 1994 case ''S. R. Bommai v. Union of India'' established the fact that India was secular since the formation of the republic.https://indiankanoon.org/doc/60799/?__cf_chl_jschl_tk__=238573f48275b685fc4286d86fb7f8d791b95b89-1605159943-0-AUH3bFyciTLUFhD1SxBDxmdiWyx30gRbc9sKNMEp2AVFRikpp9Yj04upKlxDKg_g67cgonAuoofwtbmSbe7LiFvmdvh1UpVsGEiqmE8NRpW9IZOEaFfi0nC_hORolA9ehgyy8bJ19HFLaV5jtvnCBm9aDQBTp_-rkgKXSxmi5tSu9XKBw1fOvLunDzLkIS1P5Hnoz1yZ6hRi3oBb7brYxYqdXJe-3q0-BNsLFbEaLkO_yaPSbwXcAdvByLdw3yqOivpiMoL6XXvbtnp3IQBCNCtUP6oABTxAbcofz2vMJei_V6_RBiFUFq0DniR6cd7PxtJ-IdP6T6u5yk3b1T-owvbOVfS74wnCJe-ke8RIQXBt The judgement established that there is separation of state and religion. It stated "In matters of State, religion has no place. And if the Constitution requires the State to be secular in thought ...
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Separation Of Church And State
The separation of church and state is a philosophical and jurisprudential concept for defining political distance in the relationship between religious organizations and the state. Conceptually, the term refers to the creation of a secular state (with or without legally explicit church-state separation) and to disestablishment, the changing of an existing, formal relationship between the church and the state. Although the concept is older, the exact phrase "separation of church and state" is derived from "wall of separation between church and state", a term coined by Thomas Jefferson. The concept was promoted by Enlightenment philosophers such as John Locke. In a society, the degree of political separation between the church and the civil state is determined by the legal structures and prevalent legal views that define the proper relationship between organized religion and the state. The arm's length principle proposes a relationship wherein the two political entities inter ...
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Atheism
Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no deities. Atheism is contrasted with theism, which in its most general form is the belief that at least one deity exists. The first individuals to identify themselves as atheists lived in the 18th century during the Age of Enlightenment. The French Revolution, noted for its "unprecedented atheism", witnessed the first significant political movement in history to advocate for the supremacy of human reason.Extract of page 22
In 1967, Albania declared itself the first official atheist coun ...
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Secular Humanism
Secular humanism is a philosophy, belief system or life stance that embraces human reason, secular ethics, and philosophical naturalism while specifically rejecting religious dogma, supernaturalism, and superstition as the basis of morality and decision making. Secular humanism posits that human beings are capable of being ethical and moral without religion or belief in a deity. It does not, however, assume that humans are either inherently good or evil, nor does it present humans as being superior to nature. Rather, the humanist life stance emphasizes the unique responsibility facing humanity and the ethical consequences of human decisions. Fundamental to the concept of secular humanism is the strongly held viewpoint that ideology—be it religious or political—must be thoroughly examined by each individual and not simply accepted or rejected on faith. Along with this, an essential part of secular humanism is a continually adapting search for truth, primarily through sc ...
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Secularity
Secularity, also the secular or secularness (from Latin ''saeculum'', "worldly" or "of a generation"), is the state of being unrelated or neutral in regards to religion. Anything that does not have an explicit reference to religion, either negatively or positively, may be considered secular. Linguistically, a process by which anything becomes secular is named ''secularization'', though the term is mainly reserved for the secularization of society; and any concept or ideology promoting the secular may be termed ''secularism'', a term generally applied to the ideology dictating no religious influence on the public sphere. Definitions Historically, the word ''secular'' was not related or linked to religion, but was a freestanding term in Latin which would relate to any mundane endeavour. However, the term, saecula saeculorumsaeculōrumbeing the genitive plural of saeculum) as found in the New Testament in the Vulgate translation (circa 410) of the original Koine Greek phrase ('' ...
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Pseudo-secularism
In the Indian context, the term pseudo-secularism is used to pejoratively describe policies considered to involve minority appeasement. The Hindus form the majority religious community in India; the term "pseudo-secular" implies that those who claim to be secular are actually not so, but are anti-Hindu or pro-minority. The Hindu nationalist politicians accused of being " communal" use it as a counter-accusation against their critics claiming that the Secularism followed by Congress is faulty or "perverted". Background The first recorded use of the term "pseudo-secularism" was in the 1951 book ''Philosophy and Action of the R.S.S. for the Hind Swaraj'', by Anthony Elenjimittam. In his book Elenjimittam accused leaders of the Indian National Congress of pretending to uphold secularism. After the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was accused of representing the Hindu communalism in Indian politics it started using the counter-charge of "pseudo-secularism" against the Congress and ...
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Anti-clericalism
Anti-clericalism is opposition to religious authority, typically in social or political matters. Historical anti-clericalism has mainly been opposed to the influence of Roman Catholicism. Anti-clericalism is related to secularism, which seeks to separate the church from public and political life. Some have opposed clergy on the basis of moral corruption, institutional issues and/or disagreements in religious interpretation, such as during the Protestant Reformation. Anti-clericalism became extremely violent during the French Revolution because revolutionaries claimed the church played a pivotal role in the systems of oppression which led to it. Many clerics were killed, and French revolutionary governments tried to put priests under the control of the state by making them employees. Anti-clericalism appeared in Catholic Europe throughout the 19th century, in various forms, and later in Canada, Cuba, and Latin America. According to the Pew Research Center several post-communi ...
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Agnosticism
Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, of the divine or the supernatural is unknown or unknowable. (page 56 in 1967 edition) Another definition provided is the view that "human reason is incapable of providing sufficient rational grounds to justify either the belief that God exists or the belief that God does not exist." The English biologist Thomas Henry Huxley coined the word ''agnostic'' in 1869, and said "It simply means that a man shall not say he knows or believes that which he has no scientific grounds for professing to know or believe." Earlier thinkers, however, had written works that promoted agnostic points of view, such as Sanjaya Belatthaputta, a 5th-century BCE Indian philosopher who expressed agnosticism about any afterlife;Bhaskar (1972). and Protagoras, a 5th-century BCE Greek philosopher who expressed agnosticism about the existence of "the gods". Defining agnosticism Being a scientist, above all else, Huxley presented agn ...
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Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a prominent role in the history and development of Western civilization.Gerald O'Collins, O'Collins, p. v (preface). The church consists of 24 Catholic particular churches and liturgical rites#Churches, ''sui iuris'' churches, including the Latin Church and 23 Eastern Catholic Churches, which comprise almost 3,500 dioceses and Eparchy, eparchies located List of Catholic dioceses (structured view), around the world. The pope, who is the bishop of Rome, is the Papal supremacy, chief pastor of the church. The bishopric of Rome, known as the Holy See, is the central governing authority of the church. The administrative body of the Holy See, the Roman Curia, has its pr ...
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Nonsectarian
Nonsectarian institutions are secular institutions or other organizations not affiliated with or restricted to a particular religious group. Academic sphere Examples of US universities that identify themselves as being nonsectarian include Adelphi University, Berea College, Boston University, Bradley University, Brandeis University, Columbia College in Missouri, Concordia University in Montréal, Canada, Cornell University, Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, Denison University, Duke University, Elon University, Fairleigh Dickinson University, Franklin & Marshall College, George Washington University, Hawaii Pacific University, Hillsdale College, Hofstra University, Howard University, Ithaca College, Long Island University, National University, New York University, Northwestern University, Ohio Wesleyan University, Pratt Institute, Quinnipiac University in Connecticut, Reed College in Oregon, Whitman College in Washington, Rice University, the ...
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Gallicanism
Gallicanism is the belief that popular civil authority—often represented by the monarch's or the state's authority—over the Catholic Church is comparable to that of the Pope. Gallicanism is a rejection of ultramontanism; it has something in common with Anglicanism, but is nuanced, in that it plays down the authority of the Pope in church without denying that there are some authoritative elements to the office associated with being ''primus inter pares'' (first among equals). Other terms for the same or similar doctrines include Erastianism, Febronianism, and Josephinism. University of Notre Dame professor John McGreevy defines it as "the notion that national customs might trump Roman (Catholic Church) regulations."''Catholicism and American Freedom,'' John McGreevy Norton and Co., New York 2003, p. 26. The doctrine originated in France (the term derives from ''Gallia'', Gaul). In the 18th century it spread to the Low Countries, especially the Netherlands. It is ...
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