Book Review
Prognosis Pending
An Anxious Age: The Post-Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of America by Joseph Bottum
Image, 2014
(296 pages, $25.00, hardcover)
reviewed by John C. Chalberg
A more accurate subtitle for this book might have been "The Post-Protestant Ethic and a Dis-spirited America." After all, the thrust of Joseph Bottum's story of our "anxious age" is the "catastrophic" collapse of an American Protestantism that did so much over the course of the nineteenth century to buttress the American experiment—and the American spirit. Not so in the twentieth century, laments an anxious Mr. Bottum, who worries that what's left of mainline Protestantism is out to redefine the American spirit, rather than revive it.
Behind this story is a "back story," or what Bottum calls the Erie Canal Thesis of American History. At issue is less the building of that canal than the "burned over district" that resulted from this massive project. As workers swept in and a canal was dug, the spirit of a missionizing American Protestantism swept in and "burned over" the entire region.
With this back-story briefly front and center, Bottum proceeds to remind us that many of the most important stories of a spirited America simply cannot be understood "without recognizing the central role played by Protestant Christianity." What makes our dispirited age such an anxious one is that the vibrancy of a confident, independent, biblically grounded American Protestantism has given way to a thoroughly secularized, mainline, "post-Protestant Christianity."
The Children of Post-Protestant America
Bottum traces the roots of this shift to the progressive movement of a century ago. More specifically, he dwells on Walter Rauschenbush and the Social Gospel movement, or, as Bottum so wryly puts it, the Social Gospel "without the gospel."
Wryness quickly gives way to irony, as Bottum cannot resist noting that today it is the most biblically based churches that offer their members the most positive social benefits, and all without claiming to provide such benefits. Here is a form of the social gospel—and social justice—with the gospel.
Such irony escapes the intellectual and cultural descendants of the original Social Gospelers. In fact, Bottum opens this book with telling sketches of his "poster children" for "post-Protestant America." Like their grandparents, they are full of "insufferable self-righteousness," especially when it comes to expressing their "moral and spiritual concerns." Mostly devoid of anything approaching biblical Christianity, they cannot avoid parading their moral and spiritual superiority. By their own self-assessment, they are good people. Bottum puts this a bit differently: they need to see themselves as good people.
While his subjects would be horrified at the comparison, Bottum labels them "highly judgmental" Puritans, who are also highly selective about what deserves to be judged. Highly anxious about matters of health, they are generally unconcerned about matters of sex. In Bottum's judgment, their amorality on the subject of sex represents one of the "most fascinating" shifts in modern American history. Not all that long ago the "moral center of human worrying" about the human body dwelt on sex. Today it zeroes in on food. He might have added exercise as well.
No Replacement for Dried-Up Mississippi
John C. Chalberg writes from Minnesota.
A Journal of Mere Christianity—Delivered to Your Door
- Essays on theology, culture, and the Church
- Contributors from across the Christian traditions
Six print issues (one year) of Touchstone, plus full online access and PDF downloads for only $39.95.
Get a one-year full-access subscription to the Touchstone online archives for only $19.95.
bulk subscriptions
Order Touchstone subscriptions in bulk and save $10 per sub! Each subscription includes 6 issues of Touchstone plus full online access to touchstonemag.com—including archives, videos, and pdf downloads of recent issues for only $29.95 each! Great for churches or study groups.
Transactions will be processed on a secure server.
more on america from the online archives
29.4—July/August 2016
Russell Kirk: American Conservative by Bradley J. Birzer by Hunter Baker
30.5—Sept/Oct 2017
The Christian Cure for What Ails Modern Politics by David Bradshaw
29.2—March/April 2016
The History of Family Strength in America May Reveal Good News by Allan C. Carlson
more from the online archives
18.8—October 2005
European Islam & the Doubtful Future of Christian Europe by William Murchison
calling all readers
Please Donate
"There are magazines worth reading but few worth saving . . . Touchstone is just such a magazine."
—Alice von Hildebrand
"Here we do not concede one square millimeter of territory to falsehood, folly, contemporary sentimentality, or fashion. We speak the truth, and let God be our judge. . . . Touchstone is the one committedly Christian conservative journal."
—Anthony Esolen, Touchstone senior editor
