As Religion Recedes, America’s Culture Wars Are Apt to Become More Intense

Many Western liberals hold fast to a version of what sociologists call the “secularization thesis,” which goes something like this: as science and knowledge progress, people will shed religion (or, at least, certain forms of religion) along with other prejudices, grow more enlightened, and become increasingly tolerant of racial differences, homosexuality, abortion, and other things. There is plenty of evidence the U.S. is becoming less religious, but the result appears to be that people are deviating further from the ideals of the liberal secularists. Thus, for instance, extreme-right anti-Semites—including self-styled “Christian nationalists”—tend to come from the ranks of the unchurched. Daniel K. Williams comments on the broader phenomenon. (Free registration required.)