as in temporal
not involving religion or religious matters
that's an issue for the secular authorities, not the church
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Recent Examples of secular
Isaac Chotiner, The New Yorker, 10 Mar. 2023
His selection of works, for example, mixed the sacred with the secular, interspersing chorale preludes (which use Lutheran hymns as their point of departure) with the six trio sonatas for organ.
—Luke Schulze, San Diego Union-Tribune, 8 Dec. 2022
Literary Hub, 22 Oct. 2025
Hamas wrested power from the more secular and internationally recognized Fatah party in 2007 after winning legislative elections the previous year.
—Matt Bradley, NBC news, 21 Oct. 2025
See All Example Sentences for secular
Adjective
There was a change of heart among the secular nationalists during the second intifada—which started in 2000 and ended in 2005—in which seculars also joined forces.
—Isaac Chotiner, The New Yorker, 10 Mar. 2023
His selection of works, for example, mixed the sacred with the secular, interspersing chorale preludes (which use Lutheran hymns as their point of departure) with the six trio sonatas for organ.
—Luke Schulze, San Diego Union-Tribune, 8 Dec. 2022
Noun
Scheeres’s work also inspired me to research the troubled teen industry, the hidden arm of America’s prison industrial complex, a largely unregulated network of religious and secular therapeutic boarding schools, wilderness programs, private youth programs, and drug rehabilitation centers.
—Literary Hub, 22 Oct. 2025
Hamas wrested power from the more secular and internationally recognized Fatah party in 2007 after winning legislative elections the previous year.
—Matt Bradley, NBC news, 21 Oct. 2025
See All Example Sentences for secular
Recent Examples of Synonyms for secular
Adjective
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The novella lacks the temporal markers that indicate how much time has passed between episodes and exhibits an abundance of characters with ruptured psyches.—
JSTOR Daily,
JSTOR Daily,
30 Oct. 2025
-
Integrative regions such as the temporal poles and insular cortex allow both positive and negative events to fit together, potentially into a framework that facilitates long-term well-being.—
Anthony Vaccaro,
Scientific American,
29 Oct. 2025
Noun
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In layman’s terms, there’s a little joint in the knee that helps connect the shin bone and the fibula.—
Greg Liodice,
MSNBC Newsweek,
16 Oct. 2025
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In layman’s terms, the car ran too close to the ground, something that yields performance benefits by increasing downforce.—
Luke Smith,
New York Times,
15 Oct. 2025
Adjective
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Many children raised by devout parents and teachers still embrace their parents’ beliefs, but ever-fewer young people raised in less committed or entirely nonreligious families and schools espouse religious faith.—
Foreign Affairs,
Foreign Affairs,
21 Oct. 2025
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The suit was filed by 15 Texas families with multifaith and nonreligious backgrounds against 14 school districts, including Fort Worth, Arlington, Northwest, Azle and Mansfield ISDs.—
Lina Ruiz,
Fort Worth Star-Telegram,
22 Sep. 2025
Noun
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Why OpenAI wants massive computing power The kind of numbers OpenAI and friends throw around—10 gigawatts here, $500 billion there—are somewhat staggering and mind-boggling in scope for the layperson who might not be familiar with the massive scale of Internet infrastructure.—
ArsTechnica,
ArsTechnica,
24 Sep. 2025
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By now, even the layperson understands that artificial intelligence data is a garbage-in-garbage-out conundrum.—
Adrian Bridgwater,
Forbes.com,
18 Aug. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Secular.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/secular. Accessed 2 Nov. 2025.
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