The re-emergence of the religious in secular domains has led prominent scholars such as Jürgen Habermas and Charles Taylor to speculate about a new ‘postsecular’ age. The alleged shift from the secular to the postsecular is most visible in the spheres of urban public space, governance and civil society. This volume addresses contemporary relations between religion, politics and urban societies primarily from a theoretical perspective, while also paying attention to empirical manifestations of the central conceptual ideas. The primary focus is the relations between public religion, deprivatization of religion and theorizations of modernity and modernities, with the secondary and closely related focus on theorizing postsecular urbanism including the role of faith based organizations (FBOs) in cities. Contributors include: Justin Beaumont, James A. Beckford, Luke Bretherton, Paul Cloke, Candice Dias, Wilhelm Gräb, Maaike de Haardt, Jason Hackworth, Christoph Jedan, Kim Knott, Michiel Leezenberg, Bernice Martin, David Martin, Gregor McLennan, Arie L. Molendijk, Nihan Özdemir Sönmez, Martijn Oosterbaan, Andy F. Sanders, Anke Schuster, and Hetty Zock.

Exploring the viability of new perspectives on secularisation and the idea of postsecularism, this book reflects on their relevance when considered in the context of different societies within and outside the West. The topic of secularisation has been recently reconsidered by prominent theorists, such as Jürgen Habermas, Talal Asad, Charles Taylor, and José Casanova. Offering a comparative critique of postsecularism, the contributors extend the discourse on postsecularism to include non-Western experiences, providing comprehensive perspectives on the role of religion in the public sphere and considering the validity of the concept of postsecularism. Drawn from a variety of disciplines, the contributors articulate a coherent analysis of the role of religion in the public sphere from a perspective that engages in the envisaged dialogue. This insightful book will be important for those researching secularism and postsecularism, especially from a non-Western perspective, and it will also be of interest to scholars working on politics and religion in general, political philosophy, and African studies.

Continental philosophy of religion has been dominated for two decades by 'postsecular' and 'postmodern' thought. This title questions what comes after the postsecular and the postmodern. It argues that philosophy of religion must either liberate itself from theological norms or mutate into a different practice of thinking.

This book reflects the wide-spread belief that the twenty-first century is evolving in a significantly different way to the twentieth, which witnessed the advance of human rationality and technological progress, including urbanisation, and called into question the public and cultural significance of religion. In this century, by contrast, religion, faith communities and spiritual values have returned to the centre of public life, especially public policy, governance, and social identity. Rapidly diversifying urban locations are the best places to witness the emergence of new spaces in which religions and spiritual traditions are creating both new alliances but also bifurcations with secular sectors. Postsecular Cities examines how the built environment reflects these trends. Recognizing that the 'turn to the postsecular' is a contested and multifaceted trend, the authors offer a vigorous, open but structured dialogue between theory and practice, but even more excitingly, between the disciplines of human geography and theology. Both disciplines reflect on this powerful but enigmatic force shaping our urban humanity. This unique volume offers the first insight into these interdisciplinary and challenging debates.

"This collection of original essays by leading academics represents an interdisciplinary intervention in the continuing and ever-transforming discussion of the role of religion and secularism in today's world. Foregrounding the most urgent and compelling questions raised by the place of religion in the social sciences, past and present, The Post-Secular in Question restores religion to a more central place in social scientific thinking about the world, helping to move scholarship 'beyond unbelief.'"--book jacket.

In The Postsecular Sacred: Jung, Soul and Meaning in an Age of Change, David Tacey presents a unique psychological study of the postsecular, adding a Jungian perspective to a debate shaped by sociology, philosophy and religious studies. In this interdisciplinary exploration, Tacey looks at the unexpected return of the sacred in Western societies, and how the sacred is changing our understanding of humanity and culture. Beginning with Jung’s belief that the psyche has never been secular, Tacey examines the new desire for spiritual experience and presents a logic of the unconscious to explain it. Tacey argues that what has fuelled the postsecular momentum is the awareness that something is missing, and the idea that this could be buried in the unconscious is dawning on sociologists and philosophers. While the instinct to connect to something greater is returning, Tacey shows that this need not imply that we are regressing to superstitions that science has rejected. The book explores indigenous spirituality in the context of the need to reanimate the world, not by going back to the past but by being inspired by it. There are chapters on ecopsychology and quantum physics, and, using Australia as a case study, the book also examines the resistance of secular societies to becoming postsecular. Approaching postsecularism through a Jungian perspective, Tacey argues that we should understand God in a manner that accords with the time, not go back to archaic, rejected images of divinity. The sacred is returning in an age of terrorism, and this is not without significance in terms of the ‘explosive’ impact of spirituality in our time. Innovative and relevant to the world we live in, this will be of great interest to academics and scholars of Jungian studies, anthropology, indigenous studies, philosophy, religious studies and sociology due to its transdisciplinary scope. It would also be a useful resource for analytical psychologists, Jungian analysts and psychotherapists.

The book argues that religion is a system of significant meanings that have an impact on other systems and spheres of social life, including cultural memory. The editors call for a postsecular turn in memory studies which would provide a more reflective and meaningful approach to the constant interplay between the religious and the secular. This opens up new perspectives on the intersection of memory and religion and helps memory scholars become more aware of the religious roots of the language they are using in their studies of memory. By drawing on examples from different parts of the world, the contributors to this volume explain how the interactions between the religious and the secular produce new memory forms and content in the heterogenous societies of the present-day world. These analyzed cases demonstrate that religion has a significant impact on cultural memory, family memory and the contemporary politics of history in secularized societies. At the same time, politics, grassroots movements and different secular agents and processes have so much influence on the formation of memory by religious actors that even religious, ecclesiastic and confessional memories are affected by the secular. This volume is ideal for students and scholars of memory studies, religious studies and history.