ABSTRACT
In this brief concluding chapter, Luckmann characterizes the kind of argument he has put forward in the book. He cautions readers to acknowledge the tentative character of much of what he writes about the emerging new social form of religion. Engaging in an evaluation of the situation he has described in the preceding chapters, Luckmann posits that the increasing autonomy of social spheres is equivalent to a dehumanization of society at large. Against this backdrop, the modern sacred cosmos legitimates the retreat of the individual into the “private sphere” and sanctifies his subjective “autonomy.” Luckmann regards this trend as irreversible.
