Suczek, Mystery

It is a widely held notion that we are a disillusioned people living in a disenchanted age. Indeed, a belief that scientific advance inevitably leads to the demystification of the world - an eventuality that is sometimes celebrated and sometimes deplored - is so prevalent that is virtually a modern axiom.
But to interpret mystery so passively - to think of it as being merely the effect of ignorance - is to neglect the implications of the active verb form: to mystify. Mystification does not, exclusively, happen: it can also be enacted. To mystify and to demystify are valid alternatives which humans can, if they choose, use in the pursuit of their individual or collective purposes.