Digital Religion

This article focuses on the role of digital media in the shift toward a “post-secular society.” Whereas classical sociologists presented technology and religion as incompatible by depicting technology’s spread as a powerful force of rationalization, disenchantment, and, ultimately, secularization, such assumptions have been contested as modernist ideologies rather than empirical assessments. By reviewing the literature thereon, the authors suggest, firstly, that traditional religions spread through digital media; secondly, that religious contents play a large role in digital media; and, thirdly, that there is an emergence of religions of digital media, placing digital technology itself at the center of religious speculation. As a consequence, the authors argue that this digitalization of religion makes clear that sociological assumptions about the incompatibility between technology and religion and related theories about progressive secularization and disenchantment have become problematic.