For the last few centuries Christianity and Enlightenment views have formed western culture. The contribution of Christianity has been downplayed by modern secular thought, but it has been seminal in area after area: personal formation, economics, social life, politics, art, music, learning, science and healing, yet its influence has receded.
In the 20th century the secular movements of Fascism, Marxism, Modernism and State Socialism flourished. The Fascist belief in the pure power to shape history glorified militarism. Marxismsought salvation in the proletariat and Modernism posited belief in the human ability to capture and control the future without faith. They all tried to write Christianity out of the script, but failed, partlybecause the fruits of these movements were political evils like the Holocaust, the Stalinist Gulag and Fascist self-belief. The costs of these failures were enormous, and Europe forfeited the right to cultural leadership. Its self-congratulation was expressed in imperial movements of conquest around the globe and these too faltered as the self-glorification of empire turned out to be hollow and destructive. By contrast the Christian missionary movements, often self-sacrificial and largely committed to local language and culture (for example, with the Wycliffe Bible Translators), produced fruit that has flowered in every continent of the globe.
Not only political but also economic leadership passed to the United States. It was more explicitly Christian than Europe, but the Christianity was increasingly formed by secular forces. The United States adopted the role of superpower, taking on board some of the characteristics of Fascism, both in its militarism and support of military dictators, and in its trust of leaders who turned out to be footloose to justice, peace and truthfulness. In its economic policy the United States worshipped the so-called free market as a self-validating and supreme economic instrument, supposedly incapable of wrong. They also worshipped capitalism as the self-directing power of the entrepreneur to shape human economic history whether in the form of General Motors or McDonald’s.
This economic faith had already been challenged in 1929 by theWall Street Crash and the subsequent recession, but the advent of World War II and the assertion that State Socialism was the only alternative saw the model through. In the late 20th century it asserted worldwide influence and spread. The culture that the United States has conveyed to the world in the decades since has been a long way from Christianity. Especially in the era of Reagan and Thatcher a further recrudescence of laissez-faire capitalism and individualism spread round the world, accompanied by an individualistic consumerism that triumphantly proclaimed the creation of wealth.
It was feted, because it produced servility in other nations to its way of operating. But that way was dramatically divergent from the Christian way. It ignored the truth that most of what has value is initially given by God in the creation ‘energy, food, bodies, water’ and we merely add value to what we have been given, mainlythrough labour. It also ignored the fact that markets are human communities requiring fairness, good products and services and trust in transactions.
There are good and bad markets, and apart from arms, drugs, prostitution and alcohol, there have been many other addictive and destructive markets or ones that operate unfairly. For
decades people have been flattered and bribed into overspending through adverts and credit. This has created a bankrupt culture in which government debt, national trade debt and a personal credit crisis will require years of adjustment. Moreover the global warming crisis, again led by the United States’ levels of consumption, hangs over this profligate
consumer culture in judgment on all of us.
The United States therefore faces a point of cultural judgment, and it is especially one which requires the dissociation of Christian norms and culture from those of a terminal western indulgent individualism. This will not be easy. The Gospel of peace has been locked in the same room with superpower militarism. American nationalism has been dressed in borrowed Christian clothes that do not fit. The proclamation of self-gratification and self-worth has drowned out self-denial and the acknowledgement of sin. The good life has moved from righteousness to affluent consumption. Piety has become entertainment, and selflessness the promotion of personalities.
As a result of this antimony, the United States has been losing cultural authority in the Christian world, as is much of the west. This larger problem of compromised Christianity dwarfs the problems of the Episcopal Church in the States, but supplies much of its context. This dissociation will require decades and be very painful, but Christian ways are the decisive alternative to this bankrupt westernism.
We in Britain will also face a similar process, but the Kingdom of God insists on coming on its own terms and for that we should all rejoice.
–This article appeared in the Church of England Newspaper, January 15, 2009 edition, on page 9
Pretty standard jaundiced European anti-Americanism. Of course it targets Reagan and Thatcher as particularly nefarious, despite their being responsible for victory in the Cold War and Eastern Europe’s freedom from the Soviet yoke.
Evan, the standard jaundiced European anti-Americanism would have accused us (hilariously wrongly) as dumb religious fanatics. This is much closer to the mark. Are you denying that US and Western culture have sharply diverged from the Christianity that gave birth to it?
From my conservative, Latin mass going point of view, it’s ridiculous to refer to the US as a Christian country anymore, even if there are still a lot of titular (and real) Christians living in it. We live spendthrift lives, waste tremendous resources on pointless luxuries, are obsessed with entertainment to the point severe distraction, our popular culture is vile poison that can only come from Hell itself that we work frenetically to spread to every corner of the world, and we’ve killed 40 million+ of our own children since the early 70s with complete legal sanction because they would cramp our style. Defeating the Soviets doesn’t absolve any of that.
If you are a Christian in 21st century America (or almost anywhere in the West), you are living in alien territory in many ways. And it is only going to get worse.
#2
this is simply the Christian version of european anti-Americanism. I agree completely with everything you say about the wretched state of popular culture. I simply resent the implication by liberal Europeans (and I think their remarks about Reagan and Thatcher mark them as such) that the US society is somehow less Christian that the rest of the world, when, for all of our very real faults, we are light years more Christian than any European nation.
Sounds like the pot calling the kettle black to me. #2 you are spot on regarding the moral, ethical and spiritual decline of americans. Those of us who remain faithful to the gospel will witness, I believe in our lifetimes, persecution and marginalization that has never been seen in this country. Humanism, secularism and socialism is on the rise. Satan has enlisted the weak minded and pleasure addicted to accomplish his goals. I think the time for trials is at hand. God fearing people, stand your ground and hold the faith, for great will be your reward in heaven!