One Tuesday after class, Ben lingered, visibly upset. He had just lost his grandmother and had been missing from school for a few days to be with his family and attend her services. Here in front of me was one of my top students, struggling to express how he felt.

“I don’t know,” he said. “It’s like she’s just gone. I said goodbye at the funeral before they closed the casket and it didn’t seem right. I guess I just was wondering … what if there is nothing else?”

He seemed both saddened and embarrassed, trying to make sense of a world that suddenly felt cold and hollow.

“Ben,” I said, “why did it feel so unnatural to see her that way?” He looked at me, the question lingering. He shrugged his shoulders and I let him walk away.

My experience with Ben took place more than 15 years ago, and I can still remember the feeling of failure as a rookie high school theology teacher. Since that time I have worked to improve my own understanding of why so many of my students come to feel as though they are living in a world bereft of wonder (and hope) and emptied of the transcendent. I sought to do better by my students and I set a goal to be the kind of teacher they could rely on when they encountered hard questions or were in tough situations.

During that time I have uncovered an evolution of thought that I am now convinced lies at the core of the issue. In order to trace this evolution back to its source, I had to first acknowledge where we (and my students) are: Modernity.

Modernity’s Disenchanted World

Modernity can be characterized as a significant shift in worldview, where traditional structures and beliefs are replaced by new forms of knowledge and social organizations. Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age described modernity as an era marked by the “disenchantment” of the world, a transition from a universe filled with sacred meaning to one governed almost exclusively by secular principles. This is the world that Ben had been enveloped in.

Unlike the “porous self” of pre-modern societies, which was far more open to spiritual influences, the “buffered self” of modernity is one of autonomy and self-sufficiency. Taylor argues that recognizing this “buffer” is central to understanding the modern experience, as it reflects a decline in the belief that the world is infused with divine significance.

Where Did This Shift Begin?

But how exactly did this happen? How did we get to the point where modernity has buffered itself to the point of God’s unrecognizability? While Taylor offers a very good intellectual genealogy, Michael Gillespie’s Theological Origins of Modernity extends this discussion by “contact tracing” how theological shifts have influenced modern thought.

Gillespie contends that modernity emerged from long theological debates and transformations, particularly those associated with William of Ockham, Martin Luther, and Thomas Hobbes. These figures challenged medieval views of divine sovereignty and human knowledge, laying the groundwork for the modern buffered worldview.

One particular way in which this occurred was the gradual shift from an “analogical” view of being to a “univocal” view — from a world where creation reflects the divine and shares in its attributes, to a world where terms and concepts are applied uniformly and without reference to the divine.

Relativism’s Roots in Nominalism

William of Ockham, who (along with Duns Scotus) is a progenitor of nominalism, emphasized the limitations of language and concepts in capturing the essence of divine reality. Nominalism argues that terms are merely names without inherent metaphysical significance, which contributed to the modern subjective and relativistic understanding of reality — the typical attitude and disposition of many young people today. This shift is impactful because it undermines the analogical framework that previously allowed for a richer, more relational understanding of God’s presence in the world.

The ramifications for nominalism, as articulated by Ockham (and Martin Luther soon afterward), emphasized the subjective nature of concepts and categories. This view undermines the objective basis for truth, leading to a fragmented understanding of both human and divine realities.

Furthermore, this led to a rejection of Aristotle's classical understanding of causality and saw the outright rejection of the formal and final causes, leaving only the material and the efficient to stand on their own. In this new universe, devoid of awe and the warm beauty of the spiritual, only rationality, mathematics and techno-mechanical coldness remain.

No one articulated the dangers of this better than Pope Benedict XVI who, before becoming pope in 2005, warned against what he called the “dictatorship of relativism,” as well as the reduction of all forms of knowledge to the scientific forms (scientism).

Hobbes and the Hollowing

Modernity’s embrace of such a scientistic/mechanistic worldview has roots in the works of Thomas Hobbes. It was Hobbes who helped transform the understanding of God from a relational being to a more impersonal force operating through fixed laws. Hobbes’s materialist philosophy reduced the divine to a distant and abstract principle rather than an active presence in the world, eventually subordinating God to politics.

This reordering challenges traditional theological notions of God’s immanence and personal relationship with creation, as well as the biblical notion of the Spirit’s continuous action within the world.

From this shift in modernity’s way of thinking, power is the most obvious and common factor traceable. What arises from a loss of the analogical is a competitive perspective of God and humanity who are at odds with one another in the same ontological arena. This leads to a view of God (and his power) as a limitation to my freedom and personal power.

It is no wonder that Jean Paul Sartre was able to see his own freedom as evidence of God’s nonexistence, for if God did exist, Sartre could not have been free at all. This sad development and distorted understanding of God as summum esse and not ipsum esse allowed substitutes for God to become more commonplace.

The most frequent of these substitutes are wealth, honor, pleasure, and (of course) power. It is power, as alluded to already, that has dethroned God as modernity’s highest good. This has had a ripple effect which manifests itself, at least partially, in the move to institutionalize power within complex bureaucracy and corporate systems.

Beauty, Reform and Renewal

Few have exemplified an awareness of the dangers of institutionalized power better than Ivan Illich. In his conversations with David Cayley in The Rivers North of the Future, Illich critiques modern institutions for their tendency to create dependency and undermine human autonomy.

Illich’s call for reform aligns with a broader theological concern for how institutions impact human flourishing and spiritual life. Reforming institutions to align with human needs and values is essential for recovering a sense of divine purpose and community in a secular age. This can be done — and I dare say Illich would insist, it must be done — within the Church. Reform from within is the answer — not rejection, which leads to rupture and withdrawal.

A compelling example of this kind of renewal is emerging in the person and papacy of Pope Leo XIV. Before becoming Pope, Robert Francis Prevost’s scholarly focus was on ecclesial authority within the Augustinian tradition. Now he brings that same spirit of reform to the universal Church. His early gestures have not emphasized grand spectacle or institutional muscle, but rather a quiet, Augustinian attentiveness to what is essential — communion, truth and humble leadership. In this way, Leo XIV is answering the call of thinkers like Illich not by dismantling institutions, but by remembering what they are for. His vision evokes a Church that is both ancient and new, built not on control but on conversion, not on dominance but on dialogue.

Remaining within allows us to appreciate the beauty of the divine, something called for by both Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis. For them, the via pulchritudinis allows beauty to act as a magnet drawing our young people to Christ. The experience of beauty is transformative to the point of allowing the soul to be reborn and renewed in ways that the sciences and technology, with all their usefulness and utility, cannot provide.

Recovering Wonder and Worship

Students like Ben are in every classroom and in every school. They are restless for the good, the true and the beautiful, yet modernity has denied them these by shifting perceptions of reality, divine presence and institutional roles.

The loss of enchantment, the shift to a univocal view of being, and the mechanistic understanding of God all reflect profound changes that must be addressed. Catholic families, teachers, pastors and parishes must rally together to collectively explore new ways to recover a sense of the sacred in contemporary life.

With Pope Leo XIV at the helm, a man formed by Augustine’s restless heart and Illich’s urgent critique, we may just be witnessing a quiet re-enchantment beginning. He reminds us that the answer is not to abandon the modern world but to re-enchant it from within, beginning with our worship, our institutions, and our witness.

Ben, if you are reading this, I hope it finally helps.