Secularization as a Property of action

Assuming that religion is socially relevant to the extent that it has influence on action, the article invites reconsideration of secularization not as a long-term historical process, but as a property of action: any action, or a whole domain of action (economy, warfare, art, nutrition, sex, etc.), is therefore secularized if in carrying it out people are not influenced by religious doctrines or feelings about the way it should be done, and if it is not justified on this same basis. This definition, rooted in Weber’s work, is intended to be operative for qualitative research and attentive to differences and interactions between groups and individuals, even within a single nation. Traditional accounts of secularization as overall decline of religion are not discussed. Nonetheless it is stressed that these theories are employed as resources in the activity of religious groups, or, in other words, that the perceived decline of religion has implications for social change.