Abstract
Karl Heim (1974-1958) was probably the first theologian who defined secularism as a new quasi-religious movement and made it a subject of mission studies. According to him is the secularism closely related to an impassable gap between God and man and its essence can be seen in an attempt to cross that gap.
This is the result of the human efforts to grand to secular being a quality of God's eternity. According to Heim the secularism has the demonic character since it is based on self-divinization and self-worshipping.
Indistinctness of its religious features arises from its balancing act between negation of God and identification with the divine, between materialism and pantheism. Neither is the secularism a new phenomenon in a political and a cultural history of man according to Heim, nor is it the result of development of natural sciences and technical industrialization.
The sciences and technology can only accelerate its spreading because the secularism takes advantage of them for an eulogy of a future unlimitedness of human capabilities. The self-divinizing tendencies of the secularism are dangerous and restrictive also for the natural sciences.
In the fact, mythical capability of the secularism constantly sanctifies any final supports (absolutes) of human thinking and acting and thus binds the science into the closed systems. According to Heim a faith can precisely be of help here to recognize the mythological tendencies in a creation of the absolute principles and to encourage a man to uncover mysteries of a reality.