Heritage Presbyterian Church Adult Sunday School

1. P e t e r J o n e s
Director of truthXchange
A Worldview & Culture Teaching Series by Ligonier Ministries
Adult Sunday School
Summer 2019

2. Lesson Slide
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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
The Big Question
How can we make sense of the
breakneck spiritual and social changes
happening right now in our culture?
and
How should Christians respond?

3. Lesson Slide
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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
Lesson Introduction
• We live in a society that has seen tremendous
development in science and technology. This development
has been intimately tied to a modern ideology called
secular humanism, which views human reason as the
ultimate authority and rejects the supernatural.
• However, modern culture, as it becomes increasingly
“postmodern,” is very open to the supernatural and
countless forms of spirituality
• In this lecture, Dr. Peter Jones explains the development
of secular humanism, tracing its origin, rise to dominance,
and eventual decline
• By understanding secular humanism as an influential
ideological movement, you will be better prepared to
understand the modern/postmodern culture in which you
live.

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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
Scripture Reading
I, Paul, myself entreat you, by the meekness and
gentleness of Christ—I who am humble when face to
face with you, but bold toward you when I am away!—
I beg of you that when I am present I may not have to
show boldness with such confidence as I count on
showing against some who suspect us of walking
according to the flesh. For though we walk in the
flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh.
For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but
have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy
arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the
knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to
obey Christ,
2 Corinthians 10:1-5

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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
Teaching Objectives
1. To explain the history of secular humanism
and its influence on modern culture
2. To expose how secular humanism has
affected the church in the form of
theological liberalism
3. To show why secular humanism has failed to
provide an alternative religion to
Christianity

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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
Watch Lecture 2

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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
Discussion Questions 1-2
1. Dr. Jones argues that as Western culture has made
great advances through science and technology, it
has become more enamored with the power and
ability of human reason. Can you think of episodes
in Scripture where success leads to pride? Do you
think that there is a direct relationship between a
society’s success and its morality?
2. Read Mark 4:26–34. Compare the secular humanist
view of bringing about the kingdom of man on earth
with Christ’s description of the growth of the
kingdom of God. What are the primary differences
between their respective modes of arrival?

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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
Mark 4:26-34
And he said, "The kingdom of God is as if a man should
scatter seed on the ground. 27 He sleeps and rises night
and day, and the seed sprouts and grows; he knows not how.
28 The earth produces by itself, first the blade, then the
ear, then the full grain in the ear. 29 But when the grain is
ripe, at once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has
come." 30 And he said, "With what can we compare the
kingdom of God, or what parable shall we use for it? 31 It is
like a grain of mustard seed, which, when sown on the
ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth, 32 yet
when it is sown it grows up and becomes larger than all the
garden plants and puts out large branches, so that the birds
of the air can make nests in its shade." 33 With many such
parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to
hear it. 34 He did not speak to them without a parable, but
privately to his own disciples he explained everything.

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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
Discussion Questions 3-4
3. Despite the cry of numerous intellectuals over the
past few centuries, religion shows no sign of going
away. When Christians in particular have their faith
belittled by such intellectuals, how should they
respond? What is their ultimate comfort amid this
type of adversity?
4. What sort of evidence do you see in modern culture
that suggests the waning influence of secular
humanism? In what areas of culture do people still
cling to a secular humanist ideology?

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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
The Postmodern Critique
• Secular humanism (modernism) has been
weakened at its core by the postmodern
critique: all meta-narratives and ultimate
truth claims are only suspicious power grabs
• Postmodernism contributes to the future of
human development its emphases on
pluralism, complexity, and ambiguity
• These emphases are precisely the
characteristics necessary for the potential
emergence of a fundamentally new form of
intellectual vision

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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
The Death of God?
• As the first great challenge to historical Christianity in our time,
modernism proclaimed in the 1960s the “death of God” as a
victory for secular humanism
• But the “death of God” did not become a victory for secular
humanism. It actually led to the return of spiritual paganism.
The “death of God” was not the death of any notion of divinity,
but the “death” of the specific transcendent God of biblical
Twoism.
• “At the death of God we will see the rebirth of the gods and
goddesses of ancient Greece and Rome.” ~ David Miller, The
New Polytheism
• From the writings of Carl Jung, Miller understood the “death of
God” was a demise that would not herald the victory of
secularism but a celebration of the liberating rebirth in the West
of the Oneist pagan gods from faraway places and ancient times

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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
After the “Death of God”
• The “death” of the biblical God in the 1960s signals a
number of seminal events for our own time:
1. The coup de grace of Western Christendom as a significant
social and cultural force—we are now on the defensive,
not for our truth claims but as a force for good within the
culture
2. The demise of secular humanism—most unexpected and
still not widely noticed
3. The rebirth of the old pagan belief in the divinity of
nature and humanity
• Following secular humanism, the rebirth of ancient
paganism is the second great challenge to historical
Christianity in our time. We are just beginning to see
its power.

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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
Changing of the Guard
• The successful transfer of the dominant cultural
worldview from one generation to the next is the
normal historical pattern
• But in the 20th century West, this normal transfer has
been disturbed by a pattern of rejection and
replacement (i.e., “culture war”)
• Rejection and replacement will continue to be the new
pattern until our culture reaches a state of “worldview
equilibrium” (a new normal)
• Note: Historically, only religious cultures have yielded
stable worldview equilibrium. Modernism and
postmodernism (as secular worldviews) are inherently
unstable across multiple generations.

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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
Where the West is Headed
Generation Dominant Culture State of Oneism
• Baby Boomers Secular Humanism  Nascent Oneism
• Generation Xers Early Postmodernism  Emergent Oneism
• Millennials Late Postmodernism  Competing Oneism
• iGens Spiritual Paganism  Aggressive Oneism
• Secular humanism continues (and will continue) to have
devotees and strongholds, but will continue to lose cultural
influence
• By God’s sovereign sustaining grace, Christ’s kingdom
continues (and will continue) to have faithful churches and
strongholds, but Western Christendom is rapidly crumbling
• Aggressive Oneism, in the form of neo-ancient spiritual
paganism, has arrived!

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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
Next Lesson
In order to understand the changing direction of our society,
all Christians (especially millennial and younger Christians,
for whom secular humanism has begun to fade in influence)
need to meet Swiss psychologist, Carl Gustav Jung, the
creator of transpersonal psychology

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The Rise and Fall of Secular Humanism
Resources by Peter Jones
• Only Two Religions (study guide)
• Only Two Religions (evangelism tool)
• truthxchange.com (website)
• heritage-pca.org (website)
• The Other Worldview (book)
• The Pagan Heart of Today’s Culture
(booklet)