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Modernity in its general and classic reading is regarded as the most important secularizing factor. It was expected that with the expansion of modernity, religion would be wiped out from minds and lives of modern humans. There is evidence, however, pointing to a lively presence of religion in the modern world. This casts doubts on the aforementioned theory and its predictions. Such skepticism has also provided some hopes for converging religion and modernity in some religious rethinking circles.
This article emphasizes the distinction among “revival”, “modernization”, and modernity, and considering the differences in teachings of Islam and Christianity, thus challenges such hopefulness. This is done by, first, illuminating the contradictory relationship between religion and secularization and the undeniable effect of modernity upon the occurrence of such process, and second, by insisting upon non-correspondence of the most important manifestations of coexistence between religion and modernity