IMPLICIT RELIGION. In the age of secularization and debate within the social sciences on how to approach the religious factor, two trends have intersected. One proclaims a progressive disenchantment with a decline of the religious factor's role and plausibility; within a wide range of social attitudes, religion seems destined to social irrelevance or to occupying a purely personal dimension. The second trend of thought sees a recovery and renewal of the role of religion in contemporary society, after a period of neglect, with particular reference to ancient religions.

The concept and problem of implicit religion is situated within a different perspective. Beyond the oppositions that locate the religious factor amongst those "religious" institutions balanced between death and resurrection, this concept initiates the observation that there is a widespread separation between believing and belonging, and in particular between the numerous paths of existentialism within a culture and...