VII The ‘Religion’ of the Modern Age

The ‘Religion’ of the Modern Ag a recasting of a fundamental sort. It means the shouldering by man of ultimate responsibilities which he had previously pushed off on to God. What are these responsibilities which man must now assume? First, responsibility for carrying on in face of the world’s mystery and his own ignorance. In previous ages that burden was shifted on to divine inscrutability: “God moves in a mysterious way.”—Now we lay it to the account of our own ignorance, and face the possibility that ignorance of ultimates may, through the limitations of our nature, be permanent. (p. 133)2 It is indeed contradictory that faced with this admission, we still have the lingering hope that, one day, we shall solve the problems of life—when we have mastered the human sciences! It is equally a contradiction that discoveries, which should have alerted man to the necessity of turning to God, have served only to turn him in the opposite direction. 1. CA. Coulson, Science and Christian Belief, 1955, p. 8. 2. Julian Huxley, Man in the Modern World, Chatto & Windus, London, 1950.