{"id":7418,"date":"2017-11-14T18:40:42","date_gmt":"2017-11-15T00:40:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.twocities.org\/?p=7418"},"modified":"2017-11-16T18:55:54","modified_gmt":"2017-11-17T00:55:54","slug":"our-secular-age","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.twocities.org\/?p=7418","title":{"rendered":"OUR SECULAR AGE…"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Collin Hansen is the author and editor of several books, the most noteworthy being Young, Restless, Reformed: A Journalist\u2019s Journey with the New Calvinists<\/em>. Hansen is editorial director for The Gospel Coalition.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hansen\u2019s latest book is Our Secular Age: Ten Years of Reading and Applying Charles Taylor<\/em>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Moore: For those who are not familiar, tell us why an entire book is devoted to the work of Charles Taylor?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hansen: Charles Taylor\u2019s 2007 book A Secular Age<\/em> might be the most ambitious work published in the last 10 years. He aims to account for nothing less than the decline of religion and rise of secularism in the industrialized West. The way he pulls together philosophy, history, sociology, and theology in order to tell the story makes him a fruitful conversation partner, even when we disagree about the conclusions. Nobody has been more helpful to me personally as I look behind and beyond the headlines to understand larger trends and factors that make evangelism and discipleship so exciting but also difficult today.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Moore: The philosopher, James K.A. Smith, has also written a book on Taylor. How is yours different than Smith\u2019s?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hansen: I\u2019m thankful for Smith, who has helped me and many other of this book\u2019s contributors understand the significance of Taylor\u2019s project. Smith does a lot to translate Taylor, who\u2019s not the easiest writer to understand. It can feel like you\u2019re joining a conversation already in progress, and you don\u2019t know if you\u2019re welcome. Several of the contributors to our book, most notably Michael Horton, engage Taylor in more critical ways, especially as it relates to the legacy of the Protestant Reformation. And throughout the book we give more attention to applying Taylor\u2019s work to a wide array of ministry scenarios, from preaching to discipling millennials to forming worship liturgies and more.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Moore: In your introduction you wrote, \u201cWe don\u2019t yet know, then, whether the children of the \u201cyoung, restless, Reformed\u201d will imbibe more of the restless <\/em>or the Reformed<\/em>. (Emphasis yours) Would you unpack that a bit for us?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hansen: I talked with a friend in ministry who instinctively understood one of my motivations for this book. He described his undergraduate years in a Reformed college. Everyone there had grown up Baptist but as a teenager shifted more Reformed in contrast to their parents and home churches. But then they got to this school, and they no longer stood out. Everyone else had the same story! So they searched for new ways to express their individualism: they dropped John Piper for N. T. Wright or converted to Eastern Orthodoxy or Roman Catholicism. Taylor would recognize elements of the secular \u201csubtraction story\u201d in this narrative. In an age of \u201cexpressive individualism,\u201d just about anything can be co-opted for stylistic projection, even if for a time it looks like settled conviction. If the Reformed don\u2019t dig into and catechize the riches of this biblical theology, then they\u2019ll set up their children for another reaction in some unknown new direction.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Moore: Several of the contributors have important points of criticism with Taylor\u2019s work. In that regard, I am thinking of Carl Trueman\u2019s observation that the automobile may have more impact than Taylor appreciates: \u201cPerhaps it is not so much Luther who created religious choice at a practical level but Henry Ford.\u201d Carl says he is exaggerating there, but his general point remains. What do you think about Carl\u2019s comment about the car?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hansen: That\u2019s one of the standout observations from the book. And as an appreciative reader of Wendell Berry, I couldn\u2019t help but agree with Trueman. How can you practice church discipline if anyone can just leave your church and join another one down the road? And that\u2019s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to technology. What\u2019s so special about your pastor\u2019s preaching when you can watch someone better on television or listen to someone who tickles your earbuds via podcast? Why worry about sexual ethics if the pill and abortion separate intercourse from childbirth? Taylor has an unparalleled grasp on the philosophical factors, but he undersells the technological dimension to cultural change.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Moore: Let me ask this next question by invoking Yuval Levin\u2019s masterful book, The Great Debate: Edmund Burke, Thomas Paine, and the Birth of Left and Right<\/em>. Levin makes the point that radicals like Paine are not going to be moved to reconsider why tradition is worth keeping unless they see its beauty. I would give us \u201cEvangelicals\u201d high marks on defending the Bible\u2019s truthfulness, but very low marks on showcasing its beauty. Do you think Taylor has much to offer in this regard?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hansen: Taylor doesn\u2019t so much show us how to do it, but he at least reminds us of the opportunity before us, to showcase the beauty of Jesus Christ and his gospel. Let\u2019s keep preaching and writing books like this one. But let\u2019s also take up the challenge issued by Alan Noble in his chapter on the \u201cdisruptive witness of art,\u201d and let\u2019s appreciate what Mike Cosper captures about the longing for transcendence despite the \u201cimmanent frame.\u201d We do not live in a secular age in the sense that our neighbors reject anything extra-sensory. We\u2019re secular in the sense that we look to the self, not to outside authorities, for meaning. When we can stir the self to appreciate the beauty of the gospel, the sacrifice of Jesus Christ for sinners drawn from every tribe and tongue for everlasting praise, we see that our secular age still longs for hope and eternity.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Moore: What are a few things you would like your readers to gain from your book?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hansen: First, I want them to see that secularism isn\u2019t just a problem outside the church but our primary challenge for discipleship inside every Christian home. If we don\u2019t catechize ourselves and our children in the ancient gospel of Jesus Christ as revealed in God\u2019s Word, the culture will catechize us in ways that undermine our faith. Second, I want them to know they can learn from Taylor without agreeing with him on everything. Certainly I would disagree strongly with his relatively positive assessment of Roman Catholicism before the Protestant Reformation. And third, I want them to see there is hope in our secular age. Even if we could turn back the clock, we wouldn\u2019t want to. There are challenges to faith at the dawn of the information age, no doubt. But God is at work, if we will only look for him.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Collin Hansen is the author and editor of several books, the most noteworthy being Young, Restless, Reformed: A Journalist\u2019s Journey with the New Calvinists. Hansen is editorial director for The Gospel Coalition. Hansen\u2019s latest book is Our Secular Age: Ten Years of Reading and Applying Charles Taylor. Moore: For those who are not familiar, tell […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,43,88,109,26,81,60],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7418","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-apologetics","category-christianity","category-culture","category-discernmentwisdom","category-doubt","category-historiography","category-worldview"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.twocities.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7418","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.twocities.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.twocities.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.twocities.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.twocities.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7418"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.twocities.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7418\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7427,"href":"https:\/\/www.twocities.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7418\/revisions\/7427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.twocities.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7418"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.twocities.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7418"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.twocities.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7418"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}