Huh -- sounds very interesting. I wonder if his analysis would pertain to America in the same way as it might to France or Europe, though. I think the notion that society is founded on guilt grew out of the Freud / Levi-Strauss line of thought? But American Calvinism, not to mention Protestant messianism, seems like a different tradition, and at any rate has been exempting Americans from guilt since long before the notion of being born again.

Actually, when *did*people start to become born again?
KB | 09.09.04 - 2:10 pm | #

Let's see what my mom has to say about whether Puritans feel guilt. But anyway, since the 19th c. (at least) there have been all those Jews and Catholics around stirring up trouble.
rabbit | 09.09.04 - 2:13 pm | #

Calvinism is all about guilt. But it's also about predestination--you're either saved or you're damned. One way to tell who's saved (the elect) is how prosperous and successful they are on earth (hence the Puritan work ethic). The Puritan work ethic seems like it would fit in pretty well with a focus on proving how well you can adapt to changing economic conditions--or be up to whatever job is placed before you at all times (even sex...)
KL | 09.09.04 - 5:25 pm | #

Yeah, this is the insidious part. You're either saved or you're damned, but if you work like hell just maybe you can show the world (and yourself) that you're saved.
I'm getting far afield from my area of expertise, but I seem to remember Puritans took the marriage debt pretty seriously.
But the kind of flexibility demanded by our current economic conditions, I'm not so sure. If you're amassing wealth and not spending it, you're not a lean velociraptor, you're a big old Brontosaurus, right? Not to mix metaphors or anything.
rabbit | 09.09.04 - 6:30 pm | #

Where does depression come in in all this? If you're born again, and therefore exempt yourself from guilt, does that mean that you can cure yourself of depression? Is the epidemic of being born again in America related somehow to its "epidemic " of (economic, social, physiological) depression?
KB | 09.13.04 - 10:13 am | #