Word: secularize
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...explanation, Tutu and others cite various factors, secular and spiritual. Tribal religion lost power as Africans began to cross tribal lines. Islam might have filled this void, but the much anticipated Muslim surge, funded by new Arab oil wealth, has yet to materialize in black Africa. More important, most experts agree, is the record of the Christian missionaries. According to one theory, the past stereotype that missionaries were deeply disliked and distrusted stemmed from colonists, not from Africans. Today missionaries are sometimes seized upon as political scapegoats and expelled by new nationalist leaders. But Africans are still surprised and touched...
...spiritual practices, healing therapies and "consciousness cults" have appeared in the U.S., and simultaneously the charismatic Christian revival has accelerated and spread into new social strata. While often opposed in outlooks, values and interpretations, both the Eastern religious-humanistic psychologies and the Pentecosal movement challenge the prevailing scientific-secular-liberal orthodoxy. Liberalism is founded on the notion of progress, specifically a bigger and tastier economic pie each year, made possible by the ever-expanding industrial machine. But now, according to Rifkin...
...Ayatullah Khomeini is a unique, three-in-one figure: revolutionary, de facto head of state, and spiritual leader. He has made much of his religious role and his rejection of the ways and means of the secular and corrupt Western world. Islam requires the truly dedicated to follow a most detailed ethical system. For Muslims, the present crisis in Iran has raised some perplexing questions. Are good Muslims permitted to indulge in hostage taking? In peacetime, during a jihad (holy war), or not at all? And, depending on the answer, how good a Muslim is the Ayatullah Khomeini...
...Hardly an eyebrow was raised when the national head of Reform Judaism endorsed Senator Kennedy even before the primaries. But Protestant Evangelicals have generally judged politics to be the devil's playground. This year they are plunging in, too, borrowing methods and single-issue zeal that religious and secular liberals have applied to racial equality, women's rights, the environment and the Viet Nam War. Their booming religious TV and radio circuit provides a "bully" pulpit for exploring moral issues. The effect on a close presidential race could be crucial...
There are 31 million Evangelicals of voting age, whose ranks include all political views. Today a quartet of interlocking groups urged on by secular New Right activists is busily at work, interviewing presidential candidates and hoping to register millions of inactive churchgoers, deliver votes on a national and local level and provide chosen candidates with campaign workers and cash. The four...