Secularization as Kenosis

220 | postmodern condition and secularity
and mass media seem to serve a capitalist-consumerist society uncritically. 222 Instead
of emancipating citizens, mass media can easily manipulate public opinion and create
a distance between politicians and voters. Vattimo compares the media society with a
globe that is entirely self referential. Those who are in it can benefit from its blessings,
but those on the outside are increasingly primitive.
Der Rest der Gesellschaft wird immer ‘primitiver’ infolge der schnellen technischen
Entwicklung ständig neuer Dispositionen, die in der Blase stattfinden. Nur dass ein
derartiges Verschwinden der Grenzen zwischen links und rechts die These impliziert,
das die Verwandlung der Welt in eine einheitliche Gesellschaft reicher, freier, und demokratische
Bürger nur noch eine Frage von Informationen ist. Man bracht nur alle
mit dem Internet zu verbinden, um alle Konflikte zu lösen und eine neue Ära frei von
Entfremdung zu eröffnen. 223
Not only does Vattimo now have second thoughts about the promises of the information
society, he also sees the idea of an end of history as problematic. Instead Vattimo now
speaks of a “fortwährende Notwendigkeit der Revolution.” 224 The idea of Revolution
runs against the central thought of Weak Thinking, which saw a gradual Überwinding
of metaphysics as the only perspective for a postmodern culture. (“Nihilism is our only
chance”, says Vattimo repeatedly in The End of Modernity.) In the idea of revolution
as the only alternative beyond an alleged American imperialism, he seems to leave the
logic of weak thinking behind. It seems that the kind of communism Vattimo has in
mind will always be defended with very strong, or thick descriptions of the good, of
justice, and the nature of man. Without such notions it would be hard to grasp what is
actually lost in the supposedly capitalist and imperialist hegemony of the West.
5.5 evaluation
What is Vattimo’s contribution to the present debate on secularization and postmodernism?
In the first place, his genealogy of secularity convincingly shows how the
liberal picture of secularization onesidedly creates an opposition between religion and
secular culture. Secularity can be interpreted as in line with the Christian tradition.
Whereas for Rorty the whole idea of secularity is at odds with religion, Vattimo has
made a case for an intrinsic connection between Christianity and secularity. He establishes
a link between Christianity, modernity and postmodernity, by seeing secularization
as a constitutive trait within all of them. 225 In the history of secularization, Vattimo
sees the realization of Being. Vattimo is inspired for this by Joachim of Fiore, Lessing and
more generally a Hegelian account of history as the realization of the Spirit. Secularity
cannot be understood in a formal sense. It is embedded in a tradition that runs from
the Hebrew Bible and Christianity to the emergence of modern culture and its weakening
in postmodernism. This way of dealing with historicity is problematic, though.
Vattimo has a strong desire to make the whole of history fit into a single scheme. This
desire for a general scheme leads him on many occasions to conflicts with particular
222 Vattimo, Kommunist, 72.
223 Vattimo, Kommunist, 47.
224 Vattimo, Kommunist, 47.
225 Vattimo, Belief, 43.