Seek and You Shall Find

We’re back today with our next installment on the book A Secular Age by Charles Taylor.

Our hope in this series is to break down some of the concepts in this massive, complex work to offer food-for-thought, helpful lenses, and interesting questions that you can bring back to your own community. Perhaps you’ve been encouraged to pick up the book yourself, but if not, we hope you’ve been given a look at some helpful language and ideas.

Thanks again to our colleague and friend from Englewood Christian Church, Jim Aldrich, for writing this series for us. (And hey—yesterday was Jim’s birthday! Wish him a happy birthday in the comments, will you?)

“The fractured culture of the nova, which was originally that of the elites only, becomes generalized to whole societies. This reaches its culmination in the latter half of the twentieth century. And along with this, and integral to it, there arises in Western societies a generalized culture of ‘authenticity’, or expressive individualism, in which people are encouraged to find their own way, discover their own fulfillment, ‘do their own thing’. The ethic of authenticity originates in the Romantic period, but it has utterly penetrated popular culture only in recent decades, in the time since the Second World War, if not even closer to the present…We are now living in a spiritual supernova, a kind of galloping pluralism on the spiritual plane.” (299, 300)

The most important thing about how we moderns imagine the moral/spiritual significance of the universe we inhabit is that a space has opened up “in which people can wander between and around all (the) options without having to land clearly and definitively in any one. In the wars between belief and unbelief this can be seen as a kind of no-mans-land; except that it has got wide enough to take on the character rather of a neutral zone, where one can escape the war altogether.” (351)

“I believe, along with many others, that our north Atlantic civilization has been undergoing a cultural revolution in recent decades. The 60’s provided perhaps the hinge moment, at least symbolically… As well as moral/spiritual and instrumental individualism, we now have a widespread ‘expressive; individualism. This is, of course, not totally new. Expressivism was the invention of the Romantic period in the late eighteenth century. Intellectual and artistic elites have been searching for the authentic way of living or expressing themselves throughout the nineteenth century. What is new is that this kind of self-orientation seems to have become a mass phenomenon.” (473)

We, now twenty-first century people, have widespread perceptions that things have changed. No doubt you feel it (and express it) too. Generally, comments about change are to the effect that something has been lost: community, trust, neighborhoods, extended family, civility. Along with such criticisms, a variety of causes for the loss are expressed: our consumer lifestyles, geographic mobility, corporate practices of profit maximization, family structure, and so on…

All this perceiving and critiquing and attempting to explain come during a time of an almost obsessive pursuit of good and the good. What has clearly changed in our post World War II era is our general understanding of what human life, agency, and good is. This has led us to value and pursue unprecedented individuation, and to experience a collective moral unease about it.

A significant manifestation of this individuation is the consumer revolution—the creation of our consumer culture. The supply of goods and services continues to expand, at a seemingly exponential rate. Being a tool person myself, I am continually amazed at the proliferation of tools available—how any single tool can be “improved” upon to make it more attractive and more necessary. The same is true for every single item we possess. No longer a single option for anything (“You can have it any color you want as long as it’s black,” was the option for early Fords), now everything comes accompanied by an endless list of variations. We have access to what was previously unavailable, even to the highest ranks of society. Much that we have wasn’t even imaginable.

This comes at a cost. Taylor notes that, “Older modes of mutual help dropped off, perhaps because of the receding of dire necessity. People concentrated more on their own lives, and that of their nuclear families. They moved to new towns or suburbs, lived more on their own, tried to make a life out of the ever-growing gamut of new goods and services on offer…” The pursuit of happiness took on a new, more immediate, and more individual sense than before, as each person now became the curator of his or her own life and space, free to express their tastes, desires, and needs in their choices.

One track of this new consumer culture was the creation of a special youth market, for a newly generated stage of life between childhood and adulthood. In some segments of society, young people had long been able to prolong the time before adult responsibilities, butfor most working class or peasant young, a life of labor came early and without interlude. But with the new post-war affluence, and under the tender influences of the advertising industry, youth became a thing. A big thing, one many are reluctant to leave behind. “This youth culture… is defined as expressivist,” Taylor says. He is referring to the self-understandings of life that come from the Romantic expressivism of the late eighteenth century:

“...each one of us has his/her own way of realizing our humanity, and that it is important to find and live out one’s own, as against surrendering to conformity with a model imposed on us from outside, by society, or the previous generation, or religious or political authority.”

Do your own thing; be yourself! “A simplified expressivism infiltrates everywhere. Therapies multiply which promise to help you find yourself, realize yourself, release your true self, and so on.”

Taylor uses the term “Age of Authenticity” to describe this era. The ethic of authenticity, of finding one’s own way, has its roots in older critiques of the buffered, disciplined self concerned with instrumental, rational control. Many of the intellectual and artistic elite in the eighteenth century found that way of life limiting, smothering, crushing, but such imagination wasn’t yet available for the non-elite. It took the relative luxury of the mid-nineteenth century and the post-war explosion of affluence and individuation to allow this previously elite experience to pervade all of society. Then, we got the events of the 60’s (which also carried well into the 70’s).

The pervasive sense of that time was of a need to bring all of human existence together “organically” rather than mechanically. Life was highly structured, rationally ordered, regulated—but was devoid of meaning. (Thus, Peggy Lee’s plaintive, desperate song, “Is that all there is?”) Modernity produced the means to destroy all of humanity in a heartbeat, but didn’t produce a way to live together that spoke to the depths of what it means to be human. (It was quite a time; you should have been there.) Such hopes and desires as claimed by the actors of the various protest movements were, of course, pretty utopian—not easily realized, if realizable at all.

Taylor references David Brooks’ BoBos in Paradise,1 in which he writes of the long-term results of the 60s’ unrest. Brooks speaks ironically of a “higher selfishness” among those of the “U.S. upper crust,” whose perspectives were influenced by the expressivist turn of those times. They made their peace with capitalism and productivity, but retained the importance of personal development and self-expression. So, the ideals were enacted selectively, in fragments. Contemporary people still value the goals of that time: equality, unrestrained self-expression, release of the sexual constraints, individuality, creativity, social bonding. Can we have it all? Well, in a word, no. Being free to fully express myself and being a true community of equals may just not play well together.

This dilemma leads to a rather uneasy accommodation many make. When a selection is made from the full range of values, the selected value/quality/stance must be defended at all costs, while the abandoned parts (parts that might somehow relativize the parts we’ve chosen) get sloughed off, out of the conversation. This leads us to choose language that seeks to win the war, not pursue the depths of the dilemma. Taylor cites a variety of words that get used this way; “argument-stopping universals,” he calls them. Words such as choice (which is quite devoid of content), freedom, rights, respect, and non-discrimination. The use of such terms sidesteps the depth of the actual situations they are employed to address, thus preventing, rather than enabling, real life deliberation between rival stances.

The social upheavals of the last seventy-five years have produced many gains. And, certainly, many losses. It’s easy to reflect on the shifts and either lament what’s lost or celebrate what’s been gained without recognizing that the opposite perspective also reflects the lived experience of many neighbors. What is beyond doubt is that there has been a real value shift. Some of the previous “givens” are no longer possible, and within the new cultural context there are options previously unavailable. Some of those options are better than others, and no position has a lock on the best options. Attacking a whole context because we disagree with some particular single position is not helpful.

Taylor writes of the relationship between expressive individualism and contemporary social imaginaries. Previous expressions of social imaginaries conceived of humans as equals in the realms of the economy, the public sphere, and as a “sovereign people.” But the new emphasis on finding and expressing our individuality creates a further element: the space of fashion, of mutual display. We get to (indeed, must!) choose, curate, decorate our lives in a way that shows just exactly who we are. It feels like a breaking out of conformity, out of the confining bonds of family or tradition. But it is often nothing more than linking myself to some realm that seems more real, significant, somehow higher, rather than merely doing what one has been told one “ought” to do. We’re all rebels now.

The expressive individualist shift also works out in how we view ourselves as sovereign people. In former times, our parents and grandparents held large-scale collectivities, (such as nations, churches, or political parties) of highest importance. Those entities imposed or assumed a certain moral structure on the lives of their adherents. The new, modern moral order of mutual benefit and allowing each person to do her or his own thing steps away from the constraints of those older institutions, with some novel consequences. Formerly, the “pursuit of happiness” was understood to function inside a framework of civil self-rule, family (sexual) values, hard work, amd productivity. To step outside the restraints of strong personal and social discipline and enforced character virtues was understood as a step toward, and into, destruction. But no more! The need to train character has receded far into the background, and in its place we value authentic self-expression—with disastrous consequences for those collectivities within which we all tried to be alike.

How does the the drive toward self-expression impact religion and religious affiliation? Well, this outlook requires the pursuit of religious affiliations that are not only chosen by me but which speak to me, which resonate with my spiritual path as I conceive it at this moment. And so, it seems plainly foolish to participate where I am not comfortable and where my individual path is not affirmed and enabled. Perhaps it was only natural that it came to this, as the coldly impersonal rationality of Enlightenment drained the personal experiential element out of faith. Movements like Pietism or Methodism, where “deeply felt personal insight now becomes our most precious spiritual resource” emerged, speaking to things reason alone could not. The goal is to connect with that which is greater than myself, which requires more of me than assent to correct formulae. Such an outlook has penetrated deep into our practice, whether religious or otherwise.

The shift we’ve been looking at expresses itself in countless ways in our daily lives. The individual consumer culture let loose by post-war affluence has shown itself a stronger magic than the previous bonds of community. It has undermined the long-standing link between civilizational order, Christian faith, and an ethic of discipline and self-control. This is not such a bad thing, as it imposes on us the necessity of figuring out what each of those is really about, how they relate, and where the conflicts are. But it is uncomfortable and inconvenient.

Charles Taylor isn’t a pessimist. He is intrigued by the paths our Western cultures have taken to get where we are. As do others in his discipline, he believes we moderns find ourselves on a quest—typically an individualistic, self-absorbed quest, to be sure. But there is no reason the search must stay within the confines of self-absorption, and it often does not. I think of my friends in our church who are on this quest, none of whom are out to benefit themselves. They wouldn’t be with us if they were easy prey for religious platitudes or self-serving mantras.

The search is on for the wholeness, higher purpose, and depth of commitment and participation that seems to call all humanity. The quest is the basic mode of spiritual life, Taylor says. So, much as we might all like to have everything spelled out, set in stone, given since time-out-of-mind, we wouldn’t like it for long. “Seek,” Jesus said long ago, “and you will find.”

Thanks again to Jim for his thoughts here!

Did you miss earlier posts in this series? You can find them all here.

If you are looking for another overview of a helpful text, don’t miss this recent post from our friend Ragan Sutterfield, in which he takes a look at the book Poverty of Spirit by Johannes Baptist Metz. There is much to consider and reflect on in Ragan’s post!

It is almost cliche now to describe this as a time of distraction and anxiety. We place the blame on many causes, and they are all agents of our avoidance, but Metz would have us see that behind them all is a denial of our humanity.