پيامدهاي عرفي كننده توجيه كاركردي دين

Secularist consequences of a functionalist justification of religion

Though functionalist justifications existing in a religion or religious views of some theologians lead some to widely use functionalist justifications to expand or protect a religion, the dominance of functionalist justification of a religion leads to its secularization. The present paper aims to challenge an extensive and thoughtless usage of fiinctionalism through explaining its secularist peculiarities and relating their differences with the apparently common functionalist justifications of a religion existing theologiansʹ words. What distinguish functionalist justifications advocated by sociologists from the functionalist justifications existing in religious texts as well as in many theologiansʹ words are the secularist characteristics of this approach. Reducing a religion to a mere worldly tool, preferring this world to the next world, recommending pluralism at the cost of ignoring a true religion, distorting a religion or making it ineffective and making a religion teleological or ideological are among the top qualities of the current functionalist approach that leads to the secularization of a religion.