[(The Way of the (Modern) World, or, Why it's Tempting to Live as If God Doesn't Exist)] [Author: Craig Gay] published on

by Craig M. Gay

This telling critique of the modern world not only exposes the foundational worldview of contemporary secular society and the ideas that undergird modern culture; it also shows how, for Christians, one of the most insidious temptations fostered by these ideas is the enticement toward practical atheism. Craig Gay describes the powerful ideas that have built today's modern complex, exposes the deeper assumptions that lie beneath modern values like "freedom" and "progress, " and shows how these ideas can easily lead us to live as though God does not matter. Arguing for the eviction of certain modern ideas from our churches, Gay's work demonstrates a biblically sound way to live in but not of the world.

Genres: Theology, Philosophy, Cultural, Religion, Nonfiction, Christianity, Christian Living

Paperback

First published June 26, 1998

About the author

Craig M. Gay (PhD, Boston University) is professor of interdisciplinary studies at Regent College in Vancouver, Canada. He is the author of a variety of books, including Dialogue, Catalogue and Monologue: Personal, Impersonal and Depersonalizing Ways to Use Words; Cash Values: The Value of Money and the Nature of Worth; The Way of the (Modern) World: Or, Why It's Tempting to Live as If God Doesn't Exist; and With Liberty and Justice for Whom? The Recent Evangelical Debate Over Capitalism.

Gay has contributed chapters to a number of collections on the subjects of modernity, secularization, economic ethics, and technology, and his articles and reviews have appeared in Christian Scholar's Review, American Journal of Sociology, Crux, and Markets & Morality.

Reviews

[Alex Strohschein · Rating 5 out of 5]

Modernity encourages “practical atheism” because institutions support such skeptical assumptions (1, 4, 12). Practical atheism asserts that what matters is the temporal and observable “world” and seeks to control a (socially constructed) reality but this constricts reality, allowing humans both greater freedom but also the burden of responsibility because of our rejection of God (7-8, 11). Intellectuals and the media especially encourage secularism (45-48). Protestantism spurned medieval Catholic mystery but it “enfranchised the individual” and sought to “resacralize” the whole world while placing too much emphasis on this world, which led to the political state’s ascendancy (63-9). In place of God humans invest faith in politics and comprehensive ideologies that offer meaning, promise control and lessen our sense of responsibility but they also exert power over us, increase impersonality and foster secularism (31-37, 45, 49, 54). These political ideologies appropriate historic Christian values and “desupernaturalize” them (60-1). Christians reject ideology’s messianism because of belief in inadequacy of man and the vital need for God (54-5).

The new “scientific” paradigm displaced medieval Christianity’s cosmology (80). This widely-embraced scientific-technological paradigm renders God “irrelevant” and may prove destructive to humans (81-2, 99). Science and technology allow us to conquer nature, altering our consciousness and making us “anthropocentric,” yet we no longer know “why” or for “what” we use technology (88-90, 94). Society becomes organized along scientific lines for progress’ sake (104). Modern science’s roots lie in Christianity, which pursues science to reveal God’s grandeur and order and to improve people’s “material conditions,” although this required Protestantism, particularly Puritanism, to reject medieval Catholicism’s Aristotelianism and “deductive reasoning” (108-12). Modern science excludes God’s lordship from reality and dismisses the Fall’s effects (114). Western theology has severed Creation “from the…economy of salvation” 118). Protestantism lacks an adequate grasp of science yet eattempts to make Christianity palpable to scientific verification or reinterprets it as personal experience “exempt from…scientific scrutiny” (117-8). We must emphasize the cosmos’ dependence upon God for its creation and sustainment (126-7).

The modern Western economy, freed from religious and political subservience, supports practical atheism and worldliness’ plausibility (135, 174). The market encourages material affluence, leading to increased production and consumption, culminating in “cultural decadence and secularity” (132-33). Major institutions, including the market, operate through rationalization’s techniques, making them anonymous, efficient, utilitarian and this-worldly, but hostile to traditional customs (136-7, 143). Modern consciousness is altered by rationalization, which renders our relationships (reduced to mere “exchange” relations) “practical and pragmatic” (144). Rationality’s four perspectives are practical, theoretical, formal and substantive (139-142). Economic rationalization dismisses holistic nature of mankind (151, 159). Money is used as the sole means of engagement, yet money is unable to compensate virtues; instead, money rewards functional effectiveness (151-154). Rationalization emerged out of Christianity, particularly Calvinism’s “worldly asceticism,” pragmatism and work ethic (144, 162-66). Christians honoured God through “secular” work but eventually overemphasized this-worldliness (170-1). Christians must recover “doctrine of calling” and act substantially (i.e. holistically, ethically) while repudiating practical rationality (140, 142, 175).

The main problem in post(modernity) is that humans want to master reality, bestow their own meanings and create their own fates while spurning God’s authority (238, 242). In doing so, we lose true selfhood and become dehumanized cogs in modernity’s institutions (243). Protestants have haphazardly accommodated modernity’s “pagan” values and tenets into Christianity while at the same time modernity retains “Christian” values in a secularized form (245-250, 259-60). Christians must reject the temptation to separate themselves from culture because this gives secularism a “worldview monopoly”; instead, Christians must respond to culture and resist it theologically (255, 262-64). Christians must recover the “relational telos” of their faith, which allows for “genuine individuality and truly personal existence” (272, 280-83). Modern secularism has no basis for valuing the individual and instead privileges the “collective” (281, 285-88). The Church must patiently proclaim God’s relational reality to unbelievers while avoiding modernity’s demands for “objective proof” of God lest this become an attempt for believers to master or control God (304-5).

(This review being comprised of summaries I was assigned while taking a class with Craig in Fall 2015).

[Sophie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Craig is the coolest, and this book is clearly just as insightful now as it was when he first wrote it. While it can be a bit repetitive at times, I really think every Christian in the West should read this - it’s a very clear description of where we are now and how we got here. And, more importantly, it offers some hope for the future!

[Dan Glover · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would give this book 4.5 stars. Read it for a class I just took with Craig (the author). I'd love to give this a full review - perhaps sometime in the future, just don't have time. For now, I will say that it ought to be read by every pastor and Christian educator, as well as Christians who work in the "secular" world. Actually, this book ought to be read by any and every thinking Christian who really wants to understand the (post)modern society and culture and why the Church's mission and identity within it is so often confused and lacking conviction and potency.

One small suggestion: this book (either in the form of an updated version or a follow-up volume) would benefit from a serious interaction with the work of James K.A. Smith on Cultural Liturgies. Craig's and Smith's work would mesh very well.

[Jared · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was one of the most thought-provoking books I've read in quite some time. Two things that I think the book does exceptionally well: 1) It broadens the definition of "secularism" in a way that makes many contemporary phenomena make a new kind of sense; 2) It explains Protestantism's culpability in that secular shift.

But. This book seems to take FOREVER to make those points. And once they've been made, it almost feels as if Gay proceeds to make them again! Honestly, this book felt about twice as a long as it actually is. Now, to be fair, a good part of that is probably the result of the amazing breadth and depth of Gay's background reading (I've lost count of how many titles ended up on my wishlist after reading Gay's summary/analysis of them), but, still and especially in the last third of the book, I found myself reading impatiently to "get to the point."

However, I would still call this book a "must-read" for anyone who is interested in understanding the state of contemporary culture; you will find no better analysis.

[Emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

We didn't read chapter 4 or 5 for honors colloquium, so I haven't read the full book--but there is so much repetition I doubt I am missing that much from skipping those two chapters.
It's a good book, with a lot of really good points, but it's very dense, wordy, and redundant.

[Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

We all know that there is a battle in the world between something called secularism and traditional Christianity, but what exactly IS secularism? Where did it come from and who is responsible? These questions and more are answered in this book in a very accessible way.

After defining what we mean by secularism, where it comes from, and who is ultimately responsible for it, we come to the latter section that looks at possible remedies, the most important of which is the recovery of the Christian idea of personhood.

I would recommend this book to any Western Christian especially, but also to any Orthodox Christian. While the solution to the problems described here is Orthodox Christianity, unchanged for 2000 years, inevitably as we in the West embrace Orthodoxy we will bring to the table some of the secular thinking that can be so destructive to us all. In addition, even if we haven't been 'simmered' in secularism all of our lives, as the disease spreads we will all eventually come in contact with and potentially be influenced by it.

We must know what it is we mean by secularism and know how and why this mindset works in the modern world if we are to stand our ground. Only this knowledge, faithful adherence to the teachings of the Church and above all the love and grace of our God will save us.

[Sebastian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very insightful. Too much repetition though. Patience and time is needed when reading this book. However, it will be worth it. At least right now. I do not know of another book that deals with the topic in a more effective way.

[Jason Leonard · Rating 4 out of 5]

This may deserve an even higher rating... It's just so darn thick and thoughtful that I will have to (at least) peruse it again to reflect on the meat of Gay's arguments. This is an outstanding critique of the contemporary world of thought, desire, and progress. The last chapter is masterful.

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent! His thesis is that modern culture has rendered God pretty much irrelevant, which is reflected in the modern view of technology, economics, government, the individual, etc.

[Paul Medler]

finished reading

[Dai Li · Rating 5 out of 5]

A breathtaking book. It offers many relevant and accurate criticisms of the ideological dangers of the modern western society.