Desacralisation

Desacralisation, also spelled desacralisation or desacralization, is the process by which something that was previously considered sacred loses its sacred status or is rendered secular. In religious studies and sociology, it is often described as the counterpart to sacralisation and as a feature of broader secularization processes in modern societies.

The process can affect objects, places, practices, or symbols—such as religious buildings repurposed for secular use, relics treated as cultural artifacts, or rituals stripped of their religious authority. Desacralisation may be intentional, through policy decisions and institutional reforms, or emergent, arising from social change, pluralism, or scientific rationalization.

Historically, desacralisation has been linked to modernization, bureaucratic centralization, and the privatization of belief. In the public sphere, it can involve removing religious symbols from state spaces, standardizing civic rituals, or converting sacred spaces to secular functions, while sometimes provoking cultural or political contestation.

Desacralisation intersects with related concepts such as secularisation, secularism, and sacralisation. The term has variant spellings in English: desacralisation (British) and desacralization (American). Some scholars emphasize that desacralisation is not uniform or total; sacred meanings can persist in private life or be reinterpreted in new contexts.

See also: secularization, sacralization, profane, ritual, religious reform.