The St. Louis Teen Eagles (TE) have released the final video in their three-part series explaining the major worldviews. This video tackles the Secular Humanism worldview. Last month’s installment featured the Marxism-Leninism worldview.

Secular Humanism attaches prime importance to human beings, rejecting any concept of the divine or supernatural, and accepts that humans are capable of morality and self-fulfillment without a belief in God. The theology of Secular Humanism can be summed up by its founder, Paul Kurtz, who said: “Humanism cannot, in any fair sense of the word, apply to one who still believes in God as the source and creator of the universe.” This worldview rejects the truth of man’s sinful nature and instead believes humans are perfectible and that we should strive to perfect every human person.

Secular humanists believe in the theory of evolution, but as the video explains, there are multiple theories of evolution because none of them can explain away the evidence of a supernatural power.

Generally, Secular Humanism accepts Neo-Darwinism, the premise adopted by scientists in the 1930s that blended original Darwinian theory with the then-new science of genetics. Neo-Darwinism claimed that it can take millions of years for one species to transform into another species. But when additions to the fossil record essentially disproved this theory, another was invented called “Punctuated Equilibrium,” which posits that species remain in “punctuated equilibrium” for a while, and then over a much shorter span of perhaps several thousand years, quickly transition into another species.

Since even Punctuated Equilibrium cannot account for the appearance of an initial species, secular humanists accept that “the first species just happened to appear from chemicals mixing in a swamp somewhere billions of years ago.” But as the TE video points out, Charles Darwin himself believed that “probably all the organic beings... have descended from some one primordial form into which life was first breathed.”

Politically, Secular Humanism favors democracy, but not as most Americans understand it. Rather, they believe in a secular government with concentrated power. Some go so far as to advocate for a secular world government rather than many separate local or national governments. As may be expected, secular humanists are progressive, and seek to move America away from the traditional Christian values that created Western civilization.

Economically, Secular Humanism favors socialism, which proponents believe can work because they also believe human beings are perfectible — which is the very basis for this worldview. However, some secular humanists prefer capitalism, given the many documented failures of socialism.

This worldview believes in what it calls “Historical Evolution,” the notion that humans have evolved unguided by a higher power, and whose history has resulted solely from human intelligence. Secular humanists believe human beings are inherently good, and that since they have free will, they are sometimes driven to evil by their environment.

Secular Humanism further contends that human history is shaped by human ideologies rather than on the actions and behaviors of human beings themselves. For example, while they concede that Christianity shaped human history in the past, Christian ideology is now outdated and cannot address modern problems.

Ultimately, this worldview believes the human race is evolving toward perfection and that perfection will eventually be achieved on earth by human beings alone.

Editor’s NOTE: This concludes the Teen Eagles’ video series on “Worldviews Explained,” produced by Eagle Nest Productions. Please visit their website often for updates.

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