Source : Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

Modernism \Mod"ern*ism\, n.
   Modern practice; a thing of recent date; esp., a modern usage
   or mode of expression.

Modernism \Mod"ern*ism\, n.
   Certain methods and tendencies which, in Biblical questions,
   apologetics, and the theory of dogma, in the endeavor to
   reconcile the doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church with the
   conclusions of modern science, replace the authority of the
   church by purely subjective criteria; -- so called officially
   by Pope Pius X.

Source : WordNet®

modernism
     n 1: genre of art and literature that makes a self-conscious
          break with previous genres
     2: the quality of being current or of the present; "a shopping
        mall would instill a spirit of modernity into this
        village" [syn: {modernity}, {modernness}, {contemporaneity},
         {contemporaneousness}]
     3: practices typical of contemporary life or thought