Religion and Pluralism

1: Religion and Pluralism

1. Pluralism and Secularization

Many religious thinkers of very different persuasions, such as Huston Smith and Hans Kung, have noted that one of the greatest challenges for religious believers in the 20th and 21st cen­turies is coming to grips with the diver­sity of the world’s religions, whose presence in the global community can no longer be ignored or lightly dismissed. Smith, Kung and others also cite a second major modern challenge to religious belief, the growing “secularization” of life, an indiffer­ence to the sacred, brought on by the forces that characterize modern civilizations—s­cience, technology, commercialization, modern media, mass society, and others.[1]

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