Defining Modernity

Hart again: “a society is truly modern to the extent that it is post-Christian.” That is, “modernity is not simply a ‘postreligious’ condition; it is the state of a society that has been specifically a Christian society but has ‘lost the faith.’ The ethical presuppositions intrinsic to modernity, for instance, are palliated fragments and haunting echoes of Chrstian moral theology. Even the most ardent secularists among us generally cling to notions of human rights, economic and social justice, providence for the indigent, legal quality, or basic human dignity that pre-Christian Western culture would have found not so much foolish as unintelligible.”