The Importance Of Secularization

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Without faith, societies will fall apart. Religious conservatives argue that without theism societies will not function and cannot maintain a moral order. But, if religion plays a key role to maintain a society, why is world turning to secularity? Secularization has become a trend among Third World Countries to achieve modernization. A legal wall between state and religion impedes enables development of a state. At some point in history religion has limited the state’s authority; hence religion does not contribute to development. Religion has become an obstacle success, so an essential step to build a state is to modernize the political system. The argument that public sphere requires secularization is based on two assumptions: empirical…show more content…
This multivariate analysis was based on three indicators: life expectancy, education and standard of living. Surprisingly or not, states with the best quality of life tend to be among the most secular states, while those with the worst quality of life were the least secular of the most religious countries (Zuckerman, 2015). Scandinavian countries like Denmark, Sweden and Netherlands with a HDI of 0.8 (from 1 being the highest) tend to score best in crime rates, democracy, equality, freedom, and women’s rights. While Egypt, Nigeria, Uganda, Brazil and a long going list of religious countries face violent crime rates problems, high poverty rates, high infant mortality rates and of course high corruption. Problems with religious states do not end here. In line with United Nation’s study on Homicide nations with the highest homicide rates are among most theistic nations – such as Brazil, Colombia and Mexico (Zuckerman, 2015). Still, it is impossible to make a final conclusion on the well-being secularism cause or social illness religiosity causes. Prosperity of the public sphere is caused by multiple factors – cultural, economic, political and historical. With that said, it is crystal clear that secularism is not a threat to society as it is claimed to be. In contrary, it leads to…show more content…
The leader of Republic of Turkey in 1923, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, eradicated the Ottoman dogma and introduced a series of secular reforms. Women were empowered followed by a westernized alphabet, legal code and clothing. In contrast with most of the Arab states like Iran or Saudi Arabia which banded women from school, Turkey presented new education opportunities and banned headscarves in public institutes. Such changes were designed to reach modernization with the support of the urban middle class and guaranteed by military (Handelman, 2015). But, on the other hand, rural population and the urban poor opposed the secular ideas. With time Turkey became less tyrannical, so they relaxed the control over religion; as a result, the first political parties (mainly Islamic) start to be formed. The modernized economy bought millions of religious rural individuals into urban areas, predictably, the growth of Islamic movements affected secularism in Turkey causing political instability. Current president of Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, as a Major of Istanbul in 2002 made the world believe that Islam and democracy can be compatible. With the city funds he managed to renovate Catholic churches and Jewish synagogues. He indicated his respect to other religions by declaring that “a person who is genuine believer would not harm the community no matter what his religion is”
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