Religious humanism
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Template:Humanism Religious humanism, is an integration of religious rituals with humanistic philosophy that centers on human needs, interests, and abilities. The two basic approaches to religious humanism are from a humanist viewpoint that incorporates religious ritual, and from a revealed religious tradition with a humanist influence.
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Humanist traditions
As originally conceived in the early 20th century, humanism rejected revealed knowledge, theism-based morality and the supernatural. Yet many of the founders of the humanist philosophical movement envisioned it as a religion, with all of the functions, rituals, and moral guidance that revealed religions traditionally provided. In the late 20th century the humanist movement came into conflict with conservative Christian groups in the United States and "Secular Humanism" became the most visible element of organized humanism.
Ethical Culture
The Ethical Culture movement actually predates modern humanism, having been founded in 1876. However, its philosophy is broadly humanistic.
The movement's founder, Felix Adler, conceived of Ethical Culture as a new religion that would strip away the accumulated unscientific dogmas of traditional religions while retaining and elevating the ethical message at the heart of all religions. Adler believed that traditional religions would ultimately prove to be incompatible with a scientific worldview. He felt that the vital aspects of religion should not be allowed to fall by the wayside. Religions provided vital functions in encouraging good works. And religions taught important truths about the world, albeit these truths were expressed through metaphors that were not always suited to modern understandings of the world. For example, monotheistic religions were based on a metaphor of an authoritarian monarchy, whereas a democratic relationships were now understood to be the ideal.
Initially, Ethical Culture involved little in the way of ceremony and ritual. Rather, Ethical Culture was religious in the sense of playing a defining role in people's lives and addressing issues of ultimate concern. Some Ethical Societies have subsequently added a degree of ritual as a means of marking special times or providing a tangible reminder of humanistic ideals.
Unitarian Universalist Humanism
Unitarian Universalists, while not all humanists, have a long tradition of religious humanism.
Spiritual Humanism
Spiritual Humanism claims to be a return to the original concept of humanism as fulfilling all of the functions of revealed religion. The Spiritual Humanism movement is a response to the perceived failure of the original humanist organizations to recruit new membership and address these spiritual needs. Many people feel the need for a religion to help guide them through life's challenges and difficult moral decisions. Recognizing how religious rituals, methods, and communication can impact human behavior, Spiritual Humanism is an attempt to fuse traditional religious behaviors onto the foundation of scientific humanist inquiry.
Revealed religious traditions
In the past, humanist versions of major religions, such as Christian humanism and Humanistic Judaism played an important role in world history. In addition, many Dharmic religions like Hinduism, Buddhism and other Asian religions and belief systems like Confucianism, that focus of human nature and action more than theology, were always primarily humanistic. Currently, however, humanism is dominated almost exclusively by secular humanism. This has given rise to a newer version of humanist religions which are similar in philosophy to secular humanism. Secular humanists and revealed religious humanists primarily differ in their definition of religion and their positions on supernatural beliefs. They can also diverge in practice since religious humanists endorse religious ceremonies, rituals, and rites.
Another approach, Christian Existential Humanism, related to the work of the Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, features a humanist perspective grounded in Christian religious belief; where humanity is something to be celebrated, but not as a replacement for the divine.
See also
External links
- Religious Humanism: The Past We Inherit; The Future We Create
- What on Earth is religious humanism?
- Theism and Religious Humanism: The Chasm Narrows
- Religious Humanism: The Journal of the HUUmanists
- HUUmanists
- American Ethical Union
- Church of Spiritual Humanism
- Christian Existential Humanist Web
- The Temple of Earthnl:Religieus humanisme