A Secular Age
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Narrated by:
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Dennis Holland
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By:
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Charles Taylor
About this listen
What does it mean to say that we live in a secular age? Almost everyone would agree that we - in the West, at least - largely do. And clearly the place of religion in our societies has changed profoundly in the last few centuries. In what will be a defining book for our time, Charles Taylor takes up the question of what these changes mean - of what, precisely, happens when a society in which it is virtually impossible not to believe in God becomes one in which faith, even for the staunchest believer, is only one human possibility among others.
Taylor, long one of our most insightful thinkers on such questions, offers a historical perspective. He examines the development in "Western Christendom" of those aspects of modernity which we call secular. What he describes is in fact not a single, continuous transformation, but a series of new departures, in which earlier forms of religious life have been dissolved or destabilized and new ones have been created.
As we see here, today's secular world is characterized not by an absence of religion - although in some societies religious belief and practice have markedly declined - but rather by the continuing multiplication of new options, religious, spiritual, and anti-religious, which individuals and groups seize on in order to make sense of their lives and give shape to their spiritual aspirations.
What this means for the world - including the new forms of collective religious life it encourages, with their tendency to a mass mobilization that breeds violence - is what Charles Taylor grapples with, in a book as timely as it is timeless.
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- Narrated by: Peter Ganim
- Length: 19 hrs and 2 mins
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This landmark book, first published in 1978, remains one of the most influential books in the Social Sciences, particularly Ethnic Studies and Postcolonialism. Said is best known for describing and critiquing "Orientalism", which he perceived as a constellation of false assumptions underlying Western attitudes toward the East. In Orientalism Said claimed a "subtle and persistent Eurocentric prejudice against Arabo-Islamic peoples and their culture."
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We're lucky to have this on audio
- By Delano on 02-27-13
By: Edward Said
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Irrationality
- A History of the Dark Side of Reason
- By: Justin E. H. Smith
- Narrated by: Jeff Harding
- Length: 13 hrs and 35 mins
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Discovering that reason is the defining feature of our species, we named ourselves the “rational animal”. But is this flattering story itself rational? In this sweeping account of irrationality from antiquity to today - from the fifth-century BC murder of Hippasus for revealing the existence of irrational numbers to the rise of Twitter mobs and the election of Donald Trump - Justin Smith says the evidence suggests the opposite.
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A good brain workout
- By ThomasC on 04-09-19
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The Twilight of the American Enlightenment
- The 1950s and the Crisis of Liberal Belief
- By: George M. Marsden
- Narrated by: William Hughes
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In the aftermath of World War II, the United States stood at a precipice. The forces of modernity unleashed by the war had led to astonishing advances in daily life, but technology and mass culture also threatened to erode the country's traditional moral character. As award-winning historian George M. Marsden explains in The Twilight of the American Enlightenment, postwar Americans looked to the country's secular liberalelites for guidance in this precarious time, but these intellectuals proved unable to articulate a coherent common cause by which America could chart its course.
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Such a relevant book to our current world
- By Adam Shields on 09-14-16
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The God Argument
- The Case Against Religion and for Humanism
- By: A. C. Grayling
- Narrated by: William Roberts
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What are the arguments for and against religion and religious belief - all of them - right across the range of reasons and motives that people have for being religious, and do they stand up to scrutiny? Can there be a clear, full statement of these arguments that once and for all will show what is at stake in this debate? Equally important: what is the alternative to religion as a view of the world and a foundation for morality?
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Fascinating Topic Made Mind Numbingly Dull
- By m.emery on 06-17-15
By: A. C. Grayling
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The Case for God
- By: Karen Armstrong
- Narrated by: Karen Armstrong
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Moving from the Paleolithic age to the present, Karen Armstrong details the great lengths to which humankind has gone in order to experience a sacred reality that it called by many names, such as God, Brahman, Nirvana, Allah, or Dao. Focusing especially on Christianity but including Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Chinese spiritualities, Armstrong examines the diminished impulse toward religion in our own time, when a significant number of people either want nothing to do with God or question the efficacy of faith. Why has God become unbelievable?
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Great recasting of how God should be interpreted
- By John Doyle on 02-18-11
By: Karen Armstrong
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Worshipping the State
- How Liberalism Became Our State Religion
- By: Benjamin Wiker PhD
- Narrated by: Ken Maxon
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Many Christians feel that they are being opposed at every turn by what seems to be a well-orchestrated political and cultural campaign to de-Christianize every aspect of Western culture. They are right, and it goes even further back than the Obama Administration. In Worshipping the State: How Liberalism Became Our State Religion, Benjamin Wiker argues that it is liberals who seek to establish an official state religion: one of unbelief.
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An Excellent Excellent book
- By Rara Sh on 01-22-24
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Reason, Faith, and the Struggle for Western Civilization
- By: Samuel Gregg
- Narrated by: John McLain
- Length: 6 hrs
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This sharp commentary on the rise and current decline of Western Civilization touches on historical moments - including the building of early universities in the Middle Ages and the American Revolution - and figures - including Augustine, Acquinas, Edmund Burke, and Adam Smith - that exemplify the faith-reason synthesis at the heart of Western Civilization, as well as the modern villains that threaten to destroy it.
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Excellent description of the current state of the West
- By Terryn on 10-24-19
By: Samuel Gregg
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The Soul of the World
- By: Roger Scruton
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- Length: 8 hrs and 25 mins
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In The Soul of the World, renowned philosopher Roger Scruton defends the experience of the sacred against today’s fashionable forms of atheism. He argues that our personal relationships, moral intuitions, and aesthetic judgments hint at a transcendent dimension that cannot be understood through the lens of science alone. To be fully alive - and to understand what we are - is to acknowledge the reality of sacred things.
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"Against Reductionism"
- By Edmund Schilvold on 10-08-15
By: Roger Scruton
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Why You Think the Way You Do
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- By: Glenn S. Sunshine
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Why You Think the Way You Do traces the development of the worldviews that underpin the Western world. Professor and historian Glenn S. Sunshine demonstrates the decisive impact that the growth of Christianity had in transforming the outlook of pagan Roman culture into one that—based on biblical concepts of humanity and its relationship with God—established virtually all the positive aspects of Western civilization.
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"Christian's view of the western world"
- By Bradley on 03-21-10
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The Year of Our Lord 1943
- Christian Humanism in an Age of Crisis
- By: Alan Jacobs
- Narrated by: Paul Boehmer
- Length: 8 hrs and 37 mins
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By early 1943, it had become increasingly clear the Allies would win the Second World War. Christian intellectuals on both sides of the Atlantic thought the soon-to-be-victorious nations were not culturally or morally prepared for their success. These Christian intellectuals - Jacques Maritain, T. S. Eliot, C. S. Lewis, W. H. Auden, and Simone Weil, among others - sought both to articulate a sober and reflective critique of their own culture and to outline a plan for the moral and spiritual regeneration of their countries in the post-war world.
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The Audible is a Train Wreck
- By John on 09-04-18
By: Alan Jacobs
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What listeners say about A Secular Age
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- von Orgies
- 06-12-24
The grand granularity, and lucidity of Taylor's thought
Taylor moves through the history of ideas - always bringing each item into illuminating conceptual frameworks - with remarkable clarity. It is an overwhelming topic, of course, but anyone hoping to gain a, at a bare minimum, sufficiently granular understanding of what the grounds of attitude toward the world is, as it is shaping up into the more or less present moment, would do well to find themselves acquainted with this seminal work.
The only very slight qualm I have with this edition is that the French, which is a thoroughly reoccurring aspect to Taylor's text, seems a little stilted. Could be far worse, of course, and, seeing as that is the sole, and principle criticism, there's really very little reason to not pursue this thoroughly enlightening, and edifying (if, granted, a dizzyingly long and complex) grand opus.
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- Kindle Customer
- 09-06-17
Brilliant
A very compelling diagnosis of the modern secular culture. Extremely helpful in understanding the tensions between the modern moral order and modern epistemology, which often seem incompatible. The narrator is a perfect choice for this book. Very clear articulation and enjoyable for listening. Highly recommended.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Luke H.
- 07-30-20
Paradigm Shifting
I cannot unsee the reality that Taylor unveils through this magisterial work. If you have questions/doubts/wonders about how & why the spiritual longings and ethical concerns of our modern day fit with the scientific, “Enlightened” view of the world... there’s no better exposition.
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- Marcus
- 07-28-15
Exclusive Humanism and Religious Beliefs
Charles Taylor master narrative about secularism is full of history context and well founded insights. His exposition of the relevant facts in western civilization path toward humanism and rationalism is clear. His interpretation of these facts and the way in which they were understood in our society gives the readers an enlightened perception of our postmodern condition. This is a work that deserves multiple readings or listenings. I already listened to it three times and each one of them provided me with new insights and reflections.
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10 people found this helpful
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- jacob lewis
- 07-07-19
Clear presentation
Very pleasant voice and pacing although the speaker's French was a bit hard to catch at times (I can't speak for the German though)
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2 people found this helpful
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- Nic
- 09-08-22
Greatest story ever told
It is a comprehensive, philosophically informed historical sociology of Western European Christianity and its fate today. Spectacular
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- Pogo
- 07-29-18
What it means to live in a secular age
The book itself is well written and important, but the narration was problematic. There are many extended quotations in French (followed by English translation), which the narrator relentlessly mangles. A small thing compared to the overall importance of the book, but after several hours it was annoying and distracting.
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- Boss Morgan
- 02-24-23
Wine and wine skin
Worth the effort. A wonderful account of the world’s quest to experience the Wine in ever evolving wine skins. And Taylor describes it wonderfully and invites us to stand with him at the intersection. Of Dust and Spirit. Self as Divine Participant. Man as potential. Steinbeck”s Timshel. “”Thou mayest”
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- Norman
- 06-13-15
Needs Guest Narrators for French and German
It's great to have such a serious academic title available on audio, but the publisher, Audible Studios, need to seriously reconsider using English language narrators for the many long passages in French or German. Audible Studios produces French and German audiobooks for their foreign .fr and .de sites, so this is hardly beyond their resources or competence. Holland makes so many errors with his French, and his German is simply growling, guttural English (not remotely like anything that sounds like German and utterly unintelligible), that the foreign language passages, which frequently come in the space of every couple minutes, make the book an unnecessarily painful experience for the many multilingual listeners who are likely to be among its audience. Passages shouldn't be unintelligible just because they're in a foreign language, especially for listeners fluent in those languages.
Prospective listeners not fluent in French or German needn't be put off from the book in that all such passages are translated after the initial (horrific) reading.
I still give the book 4 stars overall, as any audio production of a 900-page tome from Harvard Press is a considerable service. Holland well captures Taylor's meditative yet embattled tone, though the book lacks structure and I think promises more than it delivers in terms of its thesis.
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28 people found this helpful
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- Daniel L. Scott Jr.
- 11-07-16
secularism as conscious, deliberate choice
Taylor's book, long, often wordy and perhaps needlessly complex, nonetheless is a must read for people of faith living in the the North Atlantic nations. A Secular Age explains why believers are so often like the man in the gospels who cried out to Christ, "Lord, I believe, help Thou mine unbelief. It also explains the difference between Christianity as practiced and explained south of the equator from the same faith north of the equator, a matter Phillip Jenkins has described so well. I am certainly the richer for the hours spent listening and pondering this most important work.
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