Philosophy and Sociology of Religion
Taylor’s later work has turned to the philosophy of religion, as evident in several pieces including the lecture “A Catholic Modernity” and the short monograph “Varieties of Religion Today: William James Revisited.”
However, Taylor’s most impressive contribution to date is his book A Secular Age which argues against the secularization thesis of Max Weber, Steve Bruce, and others. In rough form, the secularization thesis holds that as modernity (a bundle of phenomena including science, technology, and rational forms of authority) progresses, religion gradually diminishes in influence.
Taylor begins from the fact that the modern world has not seen the disappearance of religion but rather its diversification and in many places its growth. He then develops a complex alternate notion of what secularization actually means given that the secularization thesis has not been borne out. In the process, Taylor also greatly deepens his account of moral, political, and spiritual modernity that he had begun in Sources of the Self.
Read more about this topic: Charles Taylor (philosopher)
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