Abstract
This paper will analyze various themes in the philosopheis of Heidegger and Rorty to
frame a discussion of Charles Taylor’s relatively recent and monumental work A
Secular Age. We will examine the limits of Taylor’s philosophical arguments to handle
concepts of secularism, atheism, religion and the very process of modernization itself.
The paper concludes with a return to the philosophical complexity of Hegel to
evaluate early twenty-first century attempts, such as Taylor’s, to get at the problem at
hand, namely the fate of religion and secularism in our contemporary times.