50 years ago ...

Now that there are six times as many people on earth as in the year 1600, we also realize that large numbers paradoxically entail a greater solitude. In the large city one may walk unnoticed and have little contact with neighbors and passers-by, whereas in the village of former times all behavior was supervised within the purview of a common attitude toward life, essentially kept within certain limits by religion, faith and worship. True, this may have given rise to a feeling of constraint, but it also led to a feeling of being provided for, of safety. But now the word "adrift" is pertinent to describe all those drifting about, out of control, after they have seen that the old answers no longer suit their modern forms of cosmic consciousness. That is the situation and this is the moment for ethical humanism to step forward and help.... Because humanism respects the person and because it does not have any dogmas or presupposed doctrines, it obviously cannot convert anybody.... Humanism does not want anything but to set each person free as a human being; it does not want to solve his problems for him by a set of rules. Each person should solve them for himself. But humanism can set itself the task of furthering knowledge and insight in order to facilitate personal decision.

--Karel Cuypers, "Humanism in Personal Life," September/October 1987