Berkley Center

In a series of three Berkley Center lectures on the topic "Narratives of Secularity," world-renowned philosopher Charles Taylor surveyed the master narratives which have underpinned secularization, explored more adequate ones, and hazarded a picture of the present predicament of religion and spirituality in the West. In the first lecture he explored the master narratives of modernity—sound in some respects, but questionable in others—that provide the matrix within which secularization theories have been advanced. The second lecture examined the complex relation between disenchantment and secularity in the West, including the different meanings of "disenchantment," and the implicit meanings behind notions of "re-enchantment." In his final lecture Taylor examined the picture that the narrative of Western secularity yields of our present situation, with particular attention to the phenomena of politico-religious mobilization in our time.