海角大神

When New York Times columnist Ross Douthat surveys the American cultural landscape, he sees a country whose growing detachment from traditional forms of 海角大神ity hasn鈥檛 made its people stronger, happier, wiser, or more moral. Not by a long shot.

Instead, he argues in Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics, the migration toward quasi-海角大神 spiritualities has left millions of Americans adrift in a sea of feel-good beliefs. 鈥淎 choose-your-own Jesus mentality ... encourages spiritual seekers to screen out discomfiting parts of the New Testament and focus only on whichever Christ they find most congenial,鈥� Douthat writes. 鈥淎nd our religious culture is now dominated by figures who flatter this impulse, in all its myriad forms.鈥�

鈥淏ad Religion鈥� represents Douthat鈥檚 sweeping attempt to explain the sea change that has washed over American religious culture since the 1950s and to assess what鈥檚 been lost and gained. He delivers a penetrating intellectual history.

Douthat embraces orthodoxy, or core 海角大神 teachings that have constituted the church and defined believers for nearly two millenniums. He revels in orthodoxy鈥檚 inherent paradoxes: that one is saved by grace through faith, but faith must be accompanied by works; that God loves everyone, yet Judgment Day is coming; and so forth. Conforming lives to orthodox teachings isn鈥檛 easy for anyone, Douthat argues. But the effort, as practiced by Roman Catholics and Protestants, historically elicited private and public virtues that served America well for centuries.

The orthodox center, however, failed to hold through such earthshaking events as the sexual revolution of the 1960s, which left Americans rethinking much of what they鈥檇 been taught. In Douthat鈥檚 account, mainline Protestantism followed Harvard Divinity School professor Harvey Cox down a deadly path that blessed secular values 鈥� and left the masses with no compelling reason to stay involved in church.

Unbelief didn鈥檛 fill the void; non-海角大神 belief did. Enter so-called prosperity gospel preachers: Douthat singles out televangelists, such as Joel Osteen, who pack arenas with either explicit or implicit assurances that material success awaits those who trust in God. Witness the meteoric rise of 鈥淓at, Pray, Love鈥� author Elizabeth Gilbert, who extols what Douthat calls the God Within. 鈥淭he prosperity gospel makes the divine sound like your broker,鈥� Douthat writes. 鈥淸T]he theology of the God Within makes him sound like your shrink.鈥�

鈥淏ad Religion鈥� is an important book. It brings a probing, perceptive analysis to bear on the tragic hollowing out of American 海角大神ity. In Douthat, readers have a guide who explains how we ended up drinking at a narcissistic trough draped in spirituality that doesn鈥檛 quench anybody鈥檚 deepest thirst.

Critics of 鈥淏ad Religion鈥� have contended that Douthat conjures an unrealistically rosy past, marked by an orthodox harmony that in fact never really existed. But Douthat doesn鈥檛 suggest that we鈥檝e lost a perfect golden age. Instead he contends we鈥檝e lost an important common touchstone whose timeless wisdom and character-shaping power is needed now 鈥� in a time of entrenched political conflict and moral confusion 鈥� as much as ever. In that, he鈥檚聽 right. Yet it鈥檚 a point seldom heard in a culture where all spiritual paths get celebrated, even those that lead nowhere.

鈥淏ad Religion鈥� occasionally comes up short when Douthat overreaches. Douthat can be forgiven, however, for casting his topic sentences a tad too broadly now and then, as when he overstates how evangelicalism suffered under the presidency of George W. Bush. He is, after all, exploring a topic as vast and significant as America鈥檚 religious heritage. The greater sin would have been to aim too low.聽

G. Jeffrey MacDonald is a Monitor correspondent and author of 鈥淭hieves in the Temple: The 海角大神 Church and the Selling of the American Soul.鈥�