Meaning

Not specifically religious; lay or civil, as opposed to clerical..

Definitions by Sense

1. Not specifically religious; lay or civil, as opposed to clerical.
2. Temporal; worldly, or otherwise not based on something timeless.
3. (Christianity) Not bound by the vows of a religious order.
4. Happening once in an age or century.
5. Continuing over a long period of time.
6. (literary) Centuries-old, ancient.
7. (astrophysics, geology) Relating to long-term non-periodic irregularities, especially in planetary motion or magnetic field.
8. (atomic physics) Unperturbed over time.

Example Sentences

Near-synonym: nonmonastic

secular clergy in Catholicism

Near-synonyms: centurial, centennial

The secular games of ancient Rome were held to mark the end of a saeculum and the beginning of the next.

The long-term growth in population and income accounts for most secular trends in economic phenomena.

on a secular basis

In this event, the s#92;phi(k) curve in Fig. 15.5 will be subject to a secular upward shift, resulting in successively higher intersections with the #92;lambdak ray and also in larger values of #92;bark.

The skewed distribution of productivity gains is thus less a new phenomenon than a secular trend.

Word Forms

• more secular
• most secular
• sæcular
• seculars

Synonyms for secular

Antonyms for secular

Related Words

When Should You Use Secular?

Use secular when its meaning, tone and grammar fit the full sentence. A synonym is not always a direct replacement.

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