Journal of Contemporary Religion, Vol. 15, No. 1, 2000 The Sacred-Secular Dialectics of the Reenchanted Religious OrderÐthe Lingsu Exo-Esoterics in Hong Kong 1 CHERIS SHUN-CHING CHAN ABSTRACT This paper aims to locate the essence of new religions which manifest themselves as part and parcel of the elusive reenchanted phenomena. It is based on an ethnographic case study of a new religious group, the Lingsu Exo-Esoterics, in Hong Kong. The study unravels how this new religious group reconciles the fundamental disparity between sacred and secular cosmologies. Instead of being pulled apart by the polar opposites between the sacred and the secular, the Lingsu uni®es the sacred-secular dichotomy through a dialectical process of `sacralization of the secular’ and `seculariza- tion of the sacred’. The paper investigates how sacred and secular cosmologies are mutually interpenetrating each other and interactively validating each other through the sacralization-secularization process. An in-depth analysis of this dialectical process offers new insights into the societal tide of reenchantment. Introduction The exponential growth of new religions in North America and in other modern societies since the 1960s has brought forth endless debates about the sociological implications. While some argue that the multiplication of the new religions is a revolt against disenchantment and a sign of reenchantment, others suggest that it is nothing more than a continuation of disenchantment. 2 These contemporary debates, I argue, are rooted in different preconceptions of reenchantment. For example, reenchantment in Weber’s sense is oriented towards modernity. It is not a counter-movement to modernizationÐinstead, it is a supplement to it. Since the presupposition of religion lies beyond the limits of science, religion supplies modern man with a meaning system for everyday existence. Nonethe- less, the chasm between science and religion remains because of their unbridge- able value spheres, that is, reason versus faith (Weber, 1958: 129±156). 3 On the other hand, Berman argues that reenchantment refers to the emergence of a post-scienti®c mode of consciousness and a post-mechanical philosophy (Berman, 1981). Likewise, Tiryakian conceptualizes romanticism and exoticism as manifestations of reenchantment. He de®nes reenchantment as one of the `counter-processes’ of modernity and a revolt against the disenchanted order of life and mentality (Tiryakian, 1992). I suggest that the concept of reenchantment and its relation to disenchantment should be delineated by empirical studies of the reenchanted religious order. The purpose of the present study is to explore the essence of one of the reenchanted religious groups, the Lingsu Exo-Esoterics. I conducted an ethno- 1353±7903/00/010045± 19 Ó 2000 Taylor & Francis Ltd