Living the Secular Life: New Answers to Old Questions

Living the Secular Life: New Answers to Old Questions

â€œA humane and sensible guide to and for the many kinds of Americans leading secular lives in what remains one of the most religious nations in the developed world.â€ â€”The New York Times Book Review
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Over the last twenty-five years, â€œno religionâ€ has become the fastest-growing religious preference in the United States. Around the world, hundreds of millions of people have turned away from the traditional faiths of the past and embraced a moral yet nonreligiousâ€”or secularâ€”life, generating societies vastly less religious than at any other time in human history. Revealing the inspiring beliefs that empower secular cultureâ€”alongside real stories of nonreligious men and women based on extensive in-depth interviews from across the countryâ€”Living the Secular LifeÂ will be indispensable for millions of secular Americans.

Drawing on innovative sociological research,Â Living the Secular LifeÂ illuminates this demographic shift with the moral convictions that govern secular individuals, offering crucial information for the religious and nonreligious alike.Â Living the Secular LifeÂ reveals that, despite opinions to the contrary, nonreligious Americans possess a unique moral code that allows them to effectively navigate the complexities of modern life. Spiritual self-reliance, clear-eyed pragmatism, and an abiding faith in the Golden Rule to adjudicate moral decisions: these common principles are shared across secular society. Living the Secular LifeÂ demonstrates these principles in action and points to their usage throughout daily life.

Phil Zuckerman is a sociology professor at Pitzer College, where he studied the lives of the nonreligious for years before founding a Department of Secular Studies, the first academic program in the nation dedicated to exclusively studying secular culture and the sociological consequences of Americaâ€™s fastest-growing â€œfaith.â€ Zuckerman discovered that despite the entrenched negative beliefs about nonreligious people, American secular culture is grounded in deep morality and proactive citizenshipâ€”indeed, some of the very best that the country has to offer.

Living the Secular LifeÂ journeys through some of the most essential components of human existenceâ€”child rearing and morality, death and ritual, community and beautyâ€”and offers secular readers inspiration for leading their own lives. Zuckerman shares eye-opening research that reveals the enduring moral strength of children raised without religion, as well as the hardships experienced by secular mothers in the rural South, where church attendance defines the public space. Despite the real sorrows of mortality, Zuckerman conveys the deep psychological health of secular individuals in their attitudes toward illness, death, and dying. Tracking the efforts of nonreligious groups to construct their own communities, Zuckerman shows how Americans are building institutions and cultivating relationships without religious influence. Most of all,Â Living the Secular LifeÂ infuses the sociological data and groundbreaking research with the moral convictions that govern secular individuals and demonstrates how readers can integrate these beliefs into their own lives.

A manifesto for a booming social movementâ€”and a revelatory survey of this overlooked communityâ€”Living the Secular LifeÂ offers essential and long-awaited information for anyone building a life based on his or her own principles.
Country USA
Manufacturer Penguin Books
Binding Kindle Edition
ReleaseDate 2014-12-04
Format Kindle eBook

Country	USA
Manufacturer	Penguin Books
Binding	Kindle Edition
ReleaseDate	2014-12-04
Format	Kindle eBook

Living the Secular Life: New Answers to Old Questions

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