Seems you are mistook secularization for secularism. Though they might sound the same they are not.
Secularism
is the principle of the separation of government institutions and
persons mandated to represent the state from religious institutions and
religious dignitaries.
A secular state is a concept of secularism, whereby a state or country purports to be officially neutral in matters of religion, supporting neither religion nor irreligion
Now what is Secularization
Secularization refers to the historical process in which religion loses social and cultural significance. As a result of secularization the role of religion in modern societies becomes restricted. In secularized societies faith lacks cultural authority, and religious organizations have little social power.
What is the relationship between secularism, the state policy; and secularisation, the social process?
Most
conversations tend to confuse the two, moving from one to the other.
However, we don't really have a clear map of how the two are related to
each other. Does the adoption of secularism as a policy lead to the
process of secularisation in society? Or is it the other way round? Is
it possible that groups such as the Islamists who oppose secularism may
be, inadvertently perhaps, facilitating secularisation?The general
understanding about the relationship between secularism and
secularisation is based on a reified reading of European history. The
potted version would run something like this: "Once the Catholic church
was challenged there was a lot of fighting and eventually people decided
that tolerance is the best way forward. They also realised that the
most convenient way to operationalise tolerance would be to separate
church and state, public and private spheres." There are many problems
with this narrative, including questions of historical accuracy, as well
as immense variations and reversals in the European experience.
However, it is important here to note that in this version secularism
and secularisation seem to have developed together.Paradoxically, for
the world beyond Europe the policy prescriptive has been the opposite.
Since the late colonial period – and particularly for predominantly
Muslim societies today – the policy dogma has been that the adoption of
secularism as a state project will lead to the process of
secularisation.
But secularism as a separation
of church (religion) and state does not make ready sense in societies
where there was no hierarchical, structured church that had inherited an
empire's state apparatus as the Roman Catholic church had in Europe. In
the various versions of Islam,
Hinduism, Buddhism etc there has been no one clerical figure vested
with the kind of power and authority that the pope excersised over
domains now assumed within the modern state.Secularisation is not just
the increase or decrease in visible markers of religiosity or in church
attendance, but also a fundamental shift in religious belief towards
rationalisation and objectification.
Works
about secularism and secularization have been scattered over time and
region, with the greatest concentration covering the "secularization
thesis," most popular in Great Britain, which posited a steady progress
of secularization, which has not since occurred outside Western Europe.
India, where secularism is a central political issue, has seen more
varied literature on the subject. Many works relevant to secularism and
secularization are centered on different concepts.
2. Secularism
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