Patterns of Secularization

A century ago and more now, it was a commonplace among many academics that as countries and societies continued to "modernize" they would concomitantly throw off any religious allegiances they may once have had. Modernity, it was assumed, could only follow the way of secularity. Today we know that is bunk--pious superstition concocted by those for whom religion was the bearer of all evils. Religion is back today in a big way.

And yet, for all that, we continue to see societies once strongly identified with Christianity move away from their religious moorings. How does that happen? What are the motives? These and other new questions are tackled in a book that looks as the process of secularization in a once heavily Catholic country--Ireland--and a once heavily Orthodox one, Greece:

Daphne Halikiopoulou, Patterns of Secularization (Ashgate, 2011), 194pp.

About this book the publisher tells us:

Drawing on David Martin’s “Cultural Defense Paradigm,” which expects secularization to be inhibited in cases where religion serves as a carrier of national identity, Patterns of Secularization offers a comparative study
highlighting the limits of existing interpretations and identifies variations within the cultural defense paradigm.

Contents:
Introduction.
PART I: THEORETICAL AND HISTORICAL CONSIDERATIONS:
National identity and the secularization debate;
The origins and consolidation of ‘cultural defence’ in Greece and the Republic of Ireland.
PART II: CHURCH, STATE AND NATION:
Church and state: nationalist legitimisation versus ‘moral monopoly’;
Church and nation: external threat perceptions, national identity and religion.
PART III: EMPIRICAL CONSIDERATIONS:
State discourse and the redefinition of national ientity in the Greek and Irish educational systems; Church discourse and nationalist mobilisation.
Conclusion: Pattern of secularisation.
Bibliography; Appendix; Index.