Concept in Definition ABC

The term secular is used as a qualifying adjective to designate all those phenomena or elements of a society in which the religion it is no longer present, either because it was eliminated from that area or because it never was. The process of secularization of different areas of social life begins especially after the French Revolution in 1789, at which time the Catholic religion loses its power in the political and social sphere.

The notion of secularization or secular is always linked to a modernization process through which a society passes since it supposes a transformation from religious structures (that is, from a certain level abstract or magical) towards scientific and rational structures, based on the experience, in the real thing. Secularization as a process can be found in different areas of society: for example, when the form of government it is no longer determined or guided by religion, as can also be the case with education or even with more everyday issues such as how to dress or act in certain situations.

The idea of ​​secular always gives preeminence not only to an intangible divinity but to the individual, to the person as a determining and determining element of the various social and historical. This process became especially clear when Western nation states ceased to be led by religion or by the church. From the end of the 18th century until the present Western or Westernized countries have developed secular social systems in which, for example, education no longer depends on the Church but on the State itself. The culture is not centrally religious but secular and public for all, regardless of the religious beliefs that each individual may have. Administrative or civil elements also pass to the power of the State, especially with regard to marriages, divorces, births, deaths, etc.