Word: seculare
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...necessarily count on the long-term backing of the powerful military. Economists and stock analysts around Asia question Habibie's ability to bring sensible change to Indonesia's choking economy--his big-spending statist policies are anathema to the International Monetary Fund--and politicians forecast continuing turmoil as secular and religious groups compete for influence now that Suharto's strong restraining hand has been lifted...
Though there certainly may be areas of friction in Israel between some ardently observant Jews and some equally ardent secular Jews, as described in your article "The Religious Wars" [WORLD, May 11], most Jewish Israelis feel and act as a single people, a family united by its religious heritage, whether its members choose to observe its rules to a greater or lesser degree. The populace in Israel is not polarized, nor on the brink of a religious civil war. RABBI AVI SHAFRAN New York City
...recent moderation on the part of the B.J.P., coupled with the decline of the secular Congress Party, has helped it rocket to prominence. In 1984 the party held just two seats in India's lower house of Parliament; by 1991 it had 119. Today it holds 179 seats out of 545 and took power by cobbling together a coalition of socialists, nationalists and regional parties with vastly different agendas...
...business legislating when, how, or if we observe the Sabbath. By putting the religious mores of one faith into law, Massachusetts is violating the spirit of the principle of separation of church and state. While laws requiring once-a-week shop closings in general might serve the nominally secular purpose of providing a day of rest (an aim sanctioned by the Supreme Court), the alcohol law imparts a specific religious judgement about drinking on Sundays which the state is in no position to make. Those who wish to observe the Sabbath by not drinking alcohol are free...
...result is an appeal that permeates Christian and secular worlds both. Gomes' sermons compel his audience to capitalise on their talents--even if they are unsure about what those talents are. As Gomes likes to tell his undergraduates, "You all have a future. You just don't know what it is yet." The contagion of his passion is unavoidable; we emerge from his sermons feeling inspired, not just about spirituality, but, remarkably, about who we are. Gomes knows that "words influence. Words are power." In his new books Sermons, he concentrates the power of 40 his most compelling homilies...