The idea of the sacred locates the source of ultimate power and authority beyond this world and, as such, it can make freedom possible by de-legitimizing the claims of demagogues and tyrants. Furthermore, the experience of the sacred has proven itself to be ineradicable. Today, a reaction against this radical secularizing effort is taking place and New Agers are willing to sacralize everything in sight. Today there is a debate about whether it is really possible to find a common ground for rational discourse and tolerance that cuts across different perceptions of the sacred, different convictions about what constitutes the humanly good. For example, in the book, Two Faces of Liberalism , John Gray calls us to abandon all attempts to seek a consensus on values by rational discourse.
None can reasonably claim to embody the flourishing that is uniquely human.
If there is anything distinctive about the human species, it is that it can thrive in a variety of ways. Gray suggests that toleration be structured politically as a condition for peace that welcomes divergent ways of living as marks of diversity in the good life. It definitely is. There is the sacred and there is The Sacred. There is unlimited power, and there is true Transcendence.