On Charles Taylor’s Secularization Thought

Charles Taylor is a well-known philosopher,sociologist,and political activist.He is a liberal Catholic in Canada and a student of Isaiah Berlin;his most representative discourse on religious issues is A secular age.In this book,Charles Taylor,through his discussion of the development of the social history and the history of ideas in the Western world,combined with the previous academic research results of the secularization theory,answered "Why in Western society,in 1500,did not believe in the existence of God is impossible;and by the year 2000,it is inevitable to do not believe in God? " He thinks that the secular society is a result of exclusive humanism,which is a transformation of understanding context.The exclusive humanism was born in European society in the late Middle Ages.The author believes that although modern society is a secular society,people still need religion,which is caused by human’s pursuit of transcendence and meaning.This conversion comes from within the religion(Catholicism),and this transcendence is based on religion for Taylor.Is there a transcendence in daily life? Is sense of meaninglessness in everyday life an inevitable product of the secular age? Taylor made his own answers to these questions,and left room for discussion by later scholars.The first chapter of this article discusses the development of secularization thought at the social level,and it is synchronized with the progress of society;the second chapter discusses the history of the secularization thought from the internal logic of the thought itself;The third chapter introduces the expression and characteristics of secularization thought in history and present;the fourth chapter discusses the relationship between faith and anti-secularization.