All theory of modernity in sociology suggests that the more modernity there is, the less religion. In my theory we can realize that this is wrong: atheism is only one belief system among many.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
The great myth that many social scientists want to encourage is that there is an incompatibility between modern technology and traditional religion. This is absolute nonsense. If anything, it's the reverse.
The basic assumption of the secular society is that modernity overcomes religion.
Religion and modernity are not necessarily mutually exclusive.
Religion cannot and should not be replaced by atheism. Religion needs to go away and not be replaced by anything. Atheism is not a religion. It's the absence of religion, and that's a wonderful thing.
Atheism is a religion itself complete with fanatics and bigots.
The equation of religion with belief is rather recent.
If you look within the United States, religion seems to make you a better person. Yet atheist societies do very well - better, in many ways, than devout ones.
Atheism is a moral position - a rather rigid one, if you've ever read the opinions of its highest-profile espousers, Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins.
I accept that there are multitudes seeking God, seeking meaning, and so on, but if they reject atheism, I would rather they became modern-day Catholics or Jews than that they became Muslims.
I think what I and most other sociologists of religion wrote in the 1960s about secularization was a mistake. Our underlying argument was that secularization and modernity go hand in hand. With more modernization comes more secularization.