Secularity

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The condition of being separate from religious or spiritual matters
2. The quality of existing independently from religious influence or control
3. The characteristic of not being connected with or bound to any religious institution

Etymology: "Secularity" is a plain formation: the adjective "secular" with the suffix "-ity," which turns an adjective into a noun meaning "the state or quality of being" that adjective. The adjective "secular" itself came into English from Latin "saecularis," meaning "of an age" or "of a generation," from "saeculum," a lifetime or age of the world. Its sense of "worldly, not spiritual" grew out of that idea of belonging to the present age rather than to eternity. The noun shares its ending with many English words built the same way, such as "particularity" and "regularity." The French "sécularité" and the Latin "saecularitas" show the same pattern in their own languages, so the word is best understood as a term that has been built across several languages on one shared Latin base.

Synonyms: secularism, worldliness, nonreligiousness, temporalness, materialism

Antonyms: spirituality, religiosity, sacredness, holiness, piety