On 27
August 2013, the Jesuit think-tank UCSIA inside Antwerp University (Universitair
Centrum Sint-Ignatius Antwerpen) hosted, as part of its series on
“Religion, Culture and Society”, a lecture by the sociologist of religion, José
Casanova of Georgetown University. He spoke with a heavy Spanish accent about
“Types of Secular States and Regimes of Religious Pluralism: USA, India,
China”.
Casanova
noted a veritable paradigm shift among his colleagues. We live in an era of globalization
of both the religions and secularism, and under an increasing familiarity with
an Increasing diversity of religions. The scholars are now admitting that their
secularization thesis (that modernization would lead to a decrease in
religiosity everywhere) is not correct. Religion has adapted and made many gains
even in formerly secularized circles and societies. We live in a postsecular
world. He also saw a shift in methodology: religious scholarship is
increasingly interdisciplinary and studies religion and the secular in their
mutual relation.
There are
two types of secular state: assertive or aggressive secularism in order to free
politics from religion, as in France and now in China; and secularism as the
dis- or non-establishing of a state religion, striving for neutrality between
the different denominations, as in the US and to a large extent in India.
In Europe,
there were since ca. four centuries mostly confessional states under the
principle “Cuius region,
illius et religio”, i.e. “to whom the region belongs, his is also the
religion”. In a certain sense, this
arrangement has continued after the population has largely secularized. This
means that while all West-European countries have a large “unchurching”, no
country has crossed the line from having Catholicism as the state religion to being
in majority Protestant; or vice versa. Many Europeans associate modernization
with secularization. So, there has been an unchurching but no conversion. In
America, by contrast, many unchurched people joined a religion (or as they call
it in the US, a religious “denomination”) after finding a place in American
society, and associated it with the progress that America would bring.
On China
and India, he introduced himself as a dilettante,
a mere sociologist. Let us reassure him: nothing to worry about, with his
sociological glasses on he would not
stand out in a typical South-Asian Studies department. There, Sanskrit and
classical studies are neglected and shunned (because deemed fostering “Hindu
fundamentalism”) while the focus has shifted to studying social groups
oppressing or oppressed by caste and other so-called evils of Hindu society. He
proposed to concentrate on religion.
In mainland
China, the official policy has been a rejection of religion (“smash
temples and build schools”). In the
Marxist scheme of things, religion is part of the childhood of mankind, which
we have outgrown in this age of science. Even before China became Communist,
the modernizing processes were deemed to be hampered by traditions and
religion. These were considered “feudal” vices. Zongjiao, “religion”, is a 19th-century neologism, and
strictly denotes a sectarian group. With the reforms of Deng Xiaoping and
since, the toleration of religion has gradually increased. Now religion is used
to some extent for harmonious social development. Half the Chinese books on
religion are less than ten years old. Chinese folk religion or minxin (short for minjian xinyang) , “people’s faith” is the most popular religion in
China, in which most people participate to some extent, e.g. by celebrating
Chinese New Year. However, the five religions recognized by the state are
Daoism, Buddhism, Islam, Catholicism and Protestantism; others, including
native sects such as the “evil sect” of Falungong,
are illegal. However, these five are not really equal, for Daoism and Buddhism
have a weaker sense of membership (and hence exclusivity and militancy) than
the other three. Only 10% of the population is member of a religion. Members of
the ruling Communist Party are required to be atheist.
India, by
contrast, chose for a mobilization of the religions, as the annihilation of
religion was deemed impossible. Religion permeates the whole society and, like
in Northern Ireland, religious identity proves very resilient: even a declared
atheist, depending on his provenance, is deemed a “Hindu atheist” or a “Muslim
atheist”. According to Rajeev Bhargava, India’s secularism is no copy of
Western secularism, based on keeping or creating a distance in the relation between
religion and the state. Instead, it embraces religion, but tries to keep
neutrality between the different religions. Except that it makes a distinction
between the majority and the minorities, which get privileged in the
Constitution, the laws and political practice, in order to protect them from
the majority. Thus, a parliamentary majority involving non-Hindus imposed
reforms on Hinduism but does not touch Muslim law. Even Casanova, unlike most
Westerners, was aware that India discriminates against the majority.
In fact,
India is not a secular state at all. Casanova is a well-meaning but unforewarned
Westerner swallowing and reproducing what he is spoon-fed by Bhargava. The
latter is a cunning representative of India’s rulers, who has an interest in
pretending that India practices “secularism”, and that anything that might seem
unsecular to Westerners is due not to a defect in India’s secularism but to the
observers being Westerners who don’t understand India’s unique approach to
secularism. Well, he would, wouldn’t he?
India does
not satisfy a minimum definition of a secular state (which means Bhargava and
all the other self-described secularists are wrong). This does not follow from Indian
secularism being Indian as against Western, but from it being secularism. First
of all, a minimum condition of a secular state is that all citizens have to
abide by the same laws. In India, by contrast, Hindus, Muslims, Christians and
Parsis have separate law codes, at least
for marriage, family matters and inheritance. Most parties allow this
constitutional non-secularism. The only major party that promises real
secularism, i.e. a Common Civil Code, is the Hindu nationalist BJP, which is
(paradoxically and counterfactually) accused of being “a threat to Indian
secularism”. Secondly, the anti-majority discrimination is not “secular”, and
by definition it is not secular in the sense of “neutral” between different
worldviews. It is inconceivable that the American Constitution would prohibit a
Protestant citizen from becoming President, or any other office. To apply an
example really on the statute books in India, it is inconceivable that the
American Constitution would allow the religious minorities to set up state-subsidized
faith schools but withhold this right from Protestants, forcing Protestants to
redefine themselves as a non-Protestant religious minority, the way the Arya
Samaj and the Ramakrishna Mission have gone to court to get themselves recognized
as non-Hindu minorities.
It may also
interest some people that Casanova reaffirmed the observation that conversion is
the most revolutionary event, and not only demographic. Among those who are
left behind as loyal members of their parental religion, it triggers a crisis
as if their central beliefs were overturned. Well, Mahatma Gandhi would have
approved, for in Indian society such as it is, conversion cuts families or
communities down the middle. For this reason, he was dead against conversion.
His opinion that it should be outlawed, however, was overruled by the
secularists who took power upon decolonization, for in the Constitution they gave
a guarantee of “freedom of religion”, including “propagation” (i.e. missionary
activity). This too was a serious discrimination, for implying “propagation” in
the free practice of religion accords with the historical experience of
Christians and Muslims but not of Hindus or Parsis. Eventhough in Western
circles some travelling Gurus have advertised their “path”, Hindus traditionally
don’t really propagate, and many communities don’t accept converts. For Parsis,
any form of conversion into their religion is excluded. So the freedom to
propagate does not count for them. It was only given a place in the
Constitution to satisfy Christians and Muslims, the groups served by the
secularists.
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