How the West Really Lost God: A New Theory of Secularization

by Mary Eberstadt

In this magisterial work, leading cultural critic Mary Eberstadt delivers a powerful new theory about the decline of religion in the Western world. The conventional wisdom is that the West first experienced religious decline, followed by the decline of the family. Eberstadt turns this standard account on its head. Marshalling an impressive array of research, from fascinating historical data on family decline in pre-Revolutionary France to contemporary popular culture both in the United States and Europe, Eberstadt shows that the reverse has also been true: the undermining of the family has further undermined Christianity itself. Drawing on sociology, history, demography, theology, literature, and many other sources, Eberstadt shows that family decline and religious decline have gone hand in hand in the Western world in a way that has not been understood before—that they are, as she puts it in a striking new image summarizing the book’s thesis, “the double helix of society, each dependent on the strength of the other for successful reproduction.” In sobering final chapters, Eberstadt then lays out the enormous ramifications of the mutual demise of family and faith in the West. While it is fashionable in some circles to applaud the decline both of religion and the nuclear family, there are, as Eberstadt reveals, enormous social, economic, civic, and other costs attendant on both declines. Her conclusion considers this tantalizing question: whether the economic and demographic crisis now roiling Europe and spreading to America will have the inadvertent result of reviving the family as the most viable alternative to the failed welfare state—fallout that could also lay the groundwork for a religious revival as well. 
How the West Really Lost God is both a startlingly original account of how secularization happens and a sweeping brief about why everyone should care. A book written for agnostics as well as believers, atheists as well as “none of the above,” it will permanently change the way every reader understands the two institutions that have hitherto undergirded Western civilization as we know it—family and faith—and the real nature of the relationship between those two pillars of history. 

Genres: Religion, History, Cultural, Politics, Philosophy, Nonfiction, Theology

268 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2013

About the author

Mary Eberstadt is a research fellow at the Hoover Institution, consulting editor to Policy Review, and contributing writer to First Things. Her articles have appeared in the Weekly Standard, the American Spectator, Commentary, the Los Angeles Times, the London Times, and the Wall Street Journal. Her previous books include The Loser Letters and Home-Alone America.

Reviews

[John Hancock · Rating 5 out of 5]

Forget everything you thought you knew about religion and the West, and prepare for a paradigm shift. This book elucidates the symbiotic relationship between faith and the family, and how the decline in faith, particularly Christianity, is actually preceded by and a byproduct of the decline in the family. In "How the West Really Lost God", Eberstadt takes Nietzsche, Rousseau, Descartes, Freud and their post-modern intellectual offspring out to the proverbial woodshed, while providing thorough evidence and research to support her new theory of secularization. Her thesis will leave honest atheists, agnostics, and even believers, reeling.

[Jeremy]

I've heard it said that this book is better than anything Smith or Leithart have written on liturgy.

[Kris · Rating 4 out of 5]

While I agree mostly with the premise, that the disintegration of the family is related to the downfall of the West, I still can't help feeling that I missed something -- that there was a flaw, a hidden angle, a piece that should have been explored or that I don't understand. Some defect in this book is still nagging at my brain, yet I can't put words to it. Will have to return to these theories again in future, or maybe find another book that approaches it a different way.

I would recommend reading this alongside Total Truth: Liberating Christianity from its Cultural Captivity, where Pearcey has chapters devoted to similar themes of the breakup of family, single motherhood, and so on.

This is what I lovingly like to call a “the-world-is-going-to-heck-in-a-hand-basket” book. For similar books, see also:
--Saving Leonardo: A Call to Resist the Secular Assault on Mind, Morals, and Meaning
--Ten Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child
--The Vanishing American Adult: Our Coming-of-Age Crisis—and How to Rebuild a Culture of Self-Reliance
--Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business
--Who Killed Homer? The Demise of Classical Education and the Recovery of Greek Wisdom
--The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure
--The Decadent Society: How We Became the Victims of Our Own Success
--How to Save the West: Ancient Wisdom for 5 Modern Crises
--Why Johnny Can't Preach

[Tracy Dobbs · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was an interesting look into the steadily decreasing interest in religion(christianity) in western civilization, ie Europe and North America. I thought the author had some interesting insights. I agreed with her diagnosis of the problems with current solutions, but I'm not entirely happy with her solution of "the family factor", either.

Yes, the dissolution of the "nuclear" family and religion seem to go hand-in-hand. But I think that even more important than the loss of the nuclear family, is what actually has LED to the loss of the nuclear family. That factor, to me, would be the increasing freedom of women. That is even more important than whether or not there are nuclear families - for the very reason the author states, women drive religious attendance. Once women realized their freedom on one axis, financially through better employment, we reached for freedom along all fronts - freedom from bad marriages, freedom to be seen as whole people, sexual freedom, freedom from religious rules meant to keep women "in their place".

The fact that even the religions that attempted to change with the times have lost membership bears this out to me. Because no matter what other changes have been put in place, none of them have managed to completely get rid the anti-woman bias built in to christianity at it's core. Any minor changes around the edges of this misogynistic core are mostly cosmetic and don't address the real problem in religion.

Maybe this is just my feminist bias , but I see the hard won freedom of women to be the ultimate cause of BOTH loss of the "nuclear" family and loss of religion. And, honestly, I think it's for the best.

[Elham Yaghoobi · Rating 4 out of 5]

کتاب قابل تاملی بود.
استدلال نویسنده که تقریبا تمام فصول کتاب حول محور آن بنا شده، این است که کم شدن تعلق به دین در کشورهای غربی، ریشه در گسست در خانواده‌ها دارد. جالب آنجاست که از سالها قبل توسط کلیسا مجوز یا سکوت در برابر برخی کارها مانند عدم ممنوعیت قرصهای پیشگیری از بارداری، سقط جنین و روابط هم‌جنس بازان داده شده و
این‌ها به ساختار خانواده‌ طبیعی آسیب زده و بروز این آسیب به خانواده هم، در کم شدن دین‌داری مردم موثر بوده!
فرض نویسنده در تمام کتاب از دین، تنها مسیحیت بوده نه اسلام و یهود اما بنظرم در این‌ها هم جای تامل داره!
بعبارت کلی اعتقاد نویسنده این است که خانواده طبیعی مستحکم‌تر=خدای بیشتر.

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this book, but did not realize it would read so much like a sociology text.
The basic premise seems to be, that although we think of Christianity as having a strong influence on the traditional family, it is a two way street; that the traditional family also has a strong influence on Christianity. Could the decrease in the traditional family, with the increasing options of non-traditional families, have something significant to do with the apparent decline in Christianity.
She discusses the ebb and flow of family/religiosity around the world historically.
She discusses the moral code inherent in Christianity from the beginning; the Reformers and their rejection of the Roman Catholic church's doctrine of marital indissolubility and other aspects of it's marriage doctrine. She points out that even divided Christianity was united in it's stance that artificial contraception was wrong, until the Lambeth Conference of 1930. How both of these (divorce and contraception) started out to be considered/allowed only rarely, in restricted situations, but as we continue to see with other activities, advance quickly and steadily to frequent, and then even to be considered the norm. She discusses the sexual revolution.
She explains that once these thresholds were crossed, that sexual activity was for delight and it was divorced from procreation, this opened the door to the population's acceptance of active homosexuality, including certain church's, and even the inclusion of such into the ranks of clergy.
All of which is demonstrative of a change from the more permanent moral code of Christianity to that of a 'situational ethics' framework.
Overall, though the history and the relationship between all these issues was interesting to think about, it does read like a sociology text.

[Tara DuBose-Schmitt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Western Europe and the US have seen increasing secularization and a decline of traditional family structures in the last sixty odd years. Eberstadt examines the various explanations for these two trends and deftly argues that while there are many contributing factors, none of these are the smoking gun for waning Christianity or the family. Instead she posits that religious faith and intact families are two strands of a helix, so interwoven that damage to one by necessity harms the other. More than just a philosophical study, this theory is supported by a wealth of sociological studies and demographics. Eberstadt presents a convincing case, as well as expounding on how the loss of faith and family renders other harms to society at large.

This book was written before the legalization of gay marriage and the burgeoning transgender movement. I think it may be due an appendix.

[Garrett Mullet · Rating 5 out of 5]

The first book I’ve finished this year is a game-changer. Mary Eberstadt’s exploration of crucial questions in ‘How the West Really Lost God: A New Theory of Secularization’ takes all the dots we’ve been connecting together for years and connects them in somewhat the opposite way I had assumed.

We all know, for instance, that America is decreasingly religious and increasingly secular and godless. Similarly, we all know that both the marriage and birthrate in this country is much lower than it ever has been before. And knowing these things together at the same time, the popular theory is that fewer of us are getting married and having children because fewer of us believe in God in any serious way.

But what if the relationship between these trends works in the opposite direction?

Perhaps the reason we believe in God less is related to the fact that fewer of us are getting married and having children. Even just to posit that possibility opens up fresh lines of inquiry we would all benefit from exploring with Eberstadt’s help.

As with most chicken and egg dilemmas, the ultimate explanation is probably comprised of more both/and than either/or. All the same, all of the attention elsewhere has been invested in the other direction, and I am grateful to this book for having gone a long way to balancing the discussion.

For more thoughts and reflections on 'How the West Really Lost God: A New Theory of Secularization' by Mary Eberstadt, check out this episode of The Garrett Ashley Mullet Show podcast.

https://thegarrettashleymulletshow.co...

[Anne Lucas · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thought I would have trouble with Mary Eberstadt's assertion that it was the decline of the nuclear family that resulted in the weakening of religious connections in society. The answer to the question of where did God go in our society - a loss I have decried since the 1960s -seemed to have no starting point. After reading How the West Really Lost God I could tie the elements together more cogently and move forward in helping others - the aged who are now marooned without family support, mature adults who are driven by ambition and material goals but are otherwise empty, and young people who can't see ahead of where they are today. Without the basis of family, faith traditions are weak in the face of education, governance and social morality. Thank you Mrs. Eberstadt for giving me a place from which to find hope for our society.

[Jared Wilson · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really wanted this to be better than it was.

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've been interested in the last few years in the big question of how our culture has become secular. Put one way: in 1500 basically everyone believed in God while in 2000 believing in God has become a much more contested claim. Even those who grow up in church or mosque in the west live with the understanding that many other people do not believe, there are numerous options.

Mary Eberstadt tackles this question in this book, arguing that most accounts of how we became secular miss one huge reason. She argues that if they mention the family at all, the order they go through is something like, people stop believing and because of that they stop marrying and having children. In essence, the lack of belief leads to lack of family. Eberstadt wants to turn that on its head and ask, what if the real order is that people stop marrying and having kids and then stop believing?

To some degree, this is not surprising to me. Drifting away from church in your early twenties and then returning when you get married and have kids is common. When I talk to pastors, they recognize starting a family draws you back to church. I shared I was reading this book with a friend and his response was "of course she's right!"

At the same time, I am curious about which came first. Eberstadt does not necessarily argue that diminishing families came first, instead she seems to say there is a symbiotic relationship between family and faith. Thus, they both rise and fall together. But if we go back to 1500 (or 1600 or whenever) what was the first turning point? I'd suspect the invention of the printing press and the rise in literacy led to more options for women (and men) which began to move them away from traditional families. The beginnings of the industrial revolution, moving more people into cities and away from farms also affected family. Eberstadt would not discount these things, she'd say family needs to be included. Fair enough. But what causes led to the shifts away from traditional family and faith?

One other question that comes to mind is whether she idealizes the impact of Christian morals prior to 1500. She does address this to some degree in a chapter where she engages with those who question the entire myth of secularism (if western culture was never as religious as we nostalgically recall then it has not become secular in a new way). Yet her argument does rely on the questioning and overturning of a moral code. She often speaks of the high moral call of Christian ethics in terms of sexual morality. I'm curious about how many medieval Christians gave lip service to these codes while practically ignoring them. We all know the stories of priests who kept mistresses and did not keep their celibate vows. I imagine common people were the same. If today most Catholics ignore the church's teaching on birth control, why would we not assume they've ignored it in the past? Perhaps the change is in a more connected world more of our culture recognizes people ignore it.

This does not really challenge her thesis, per se. I think it goes back to my question above: if family and faith have both fallen on hard times in our secular age, what has caused this? One of the clearest causes for the change in family is the invention and acceptance of the birth control pill. It seems clear that this new technology caused a huge shift as more people could have sex without worrying about children, which leads to later marriages and less children in marriages. But again, this happened in 1960 and seemed to mostly help accelerate the changes in faith and family. In other words, those changes had been happening and she does not get into the cause of why as much.

Overall, she succeeds in arguing that family is a missing part of the story of secularization. Discussions of family deserve a place, even a primary place, in all this. But she does not show that family is the main driving force and she does not address those driving forces.

Of course, there are tons of books that probably do address them. She mentioned one of my favorites, Charles Taylor's A Secular Age. It is kind of depressing to realize how many others there are since, apart from professional scholars, who ahs time to read all those!

[Ietrio · Rating 1 out of 5]

God as a personal pocket knife. And if you don't leave it at home, or zip up the pocket, guess what? You are bound to lose it.

[Shakiba Kamrava · Rating 4 out of 5]

چرا در سال ۱۵۰۰ میلادی در جامعه غربی عملا نمی‌شد به خدا باور نداشت، ولی در سال ۲۰۰۰ بسیاری از ما می‌بینیم که این کار نه تنها ساده بلکه حتی گریزناپذیر است؟ این پرسش را چارلز تیلور در کتاب خود با نام عصر سکولار مطرح کرده است. احتمالا جواب این سوال برای خیلی‌ها در اینجا بی‌اهمیت باشد شاید چون نمی‌توانیم تصور کنیم عاملی که در غرب سبب فروپاشی مسیحیت شد ممکن است زمانی به شیوه‌ای دیگر ما را هم در دام خود بیندازد. ما در جهانی زندگی می‌کنیم که گاهی آنقدر درستی یا غلط بودن نظریه‌ای را تکرار می‌کنند که بدون آنکه خودمان متوجه بشویم در درون ذهن ما به عنوان امری غیرقابل تغییر پذیرفته می‌شود. وقتی چنین اتفاقی می‌افتد نه خودمان حاضر هستیم باب جدیدی را در جهت رشد باز کنیم و نه حتی تاب این را داریم که فرد دیگری این کار را انجام دهد. شبیه به این اتفاق را می‌توان در نظریه سکولاریزاسیون نیز مشاهده کرد‌. نظریه‌ای که تا به امروز تنها از یک جهت به آن نگاه شده است اما بالاخره ایبرشتات توانست ماجرا را از زاویه‌ای دیگر برایمان روایت کند. طبعا من در جایگاهی نیستم که آن را رد کنم و یا بپذیرم اما ایبرشتات با نوشتن این کتاب چه چیز مهمی را می‌خواهد به ما بگوید؟ اگر ما جهان را همچون ماشینی با قطعات مختلف در نظر بگیریم افول و رشد هر کدام از آن‌ قطعات در بخش‌های بزرگ‌تری از دنیای ما تاثیر می‌گذارد پس لازم است ارزش و شدت هر کدام از این متغیرها را به روی جهان‌مان مشخص کنیم‌. کاری که در اکثر نظریات مرتبط با سکولاریزاسیون انجام شده است وقتی از بالا به عوامل مطرح شده در نظریات تا به امروز نگاه می‌کنیم قضیه را بی‌نقص می‌بینیم اما کافی‌ است تا کمی در موضوع مورد بررسی دقیق شویم و آنجاست که متوجه می‌شویم بعضا شکاف‌های عمیقی در نظریات مطرح شده وجود دارد که با تجربه همخوانی ندارد اینجاست که ما به سمت متغیری هدایت می‌شویم که هیچگاه به عنوان‌ عامل اول در نظر گرفته نشده است. متغیری به نام خانواده که جز اساسی چرخ‌دنده‌های جهان محسوب می‌شود و هرگونه تغییری در آن نهاد سبب تغییرات گسترده‌تر در جهان پیرامون می‌شود. نهادی که اگر به خوبی از آن مراقبت نشود پایه‌های اساسی دین را متزلزل می‌کند. شاید عامل خانواده قطعه‌ی گمشده‌ی این روزهای ما باشد آن هم در جهانی که عوامل متعددی در حال تضعیف کردن آن هستند.

[Alan Marchant · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mary Eberstadt succeeds in making accessible the full range of sociological theory, data, and professional bias regarding secularization and the demise of the traditional family in Western culture. Unfortunately, she fails to make a convincing case for her titular hypothesis.

The traditional interpretation is that the demise of Christianity leads the decline of the family, e.g. by undercutting social structures and ideology that previously propped up rigid marriage customs and birth rates. The author convincingly shows that this interpretation is not evidence based: it's just as reasonable to suppose that deterioration of the family undermines Christianity and encourages secularization.

Chapter by chapter, I kept hoping that Ms. Eberstadt would present evidence for causality, or at least propose some clever statistical tests or predictions. But no, it seems that sociologists are trained to ignore the scientific principle that a theoretical hypothesis must be falsifiable. In the end her idea that family and religion are the "double helix of society" is just as shallow a fable as Nietzche's insane secular superman.

[Scott Kennedy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve had my eye on this book for some time, and when a friend kindly gave me money to purchase a book, I snapped this up quick smart. The central thesis of the book is that just as religious decline leads to a decline in the family, so too, the decline in the two-parent nuclear family contributes to the decline of the church. Eberstadt describes family and faith as ’the invisible double helix of society – two spirals that when linked to one another can effectively reproduce, but whose strength and momentum depend on one another.’

In the first chapter, Eberstadt turns her attention to whether there has been a decline in Christianity in the West. There are some who argue this decline is itself an illusion. Although I didn’t need convincing of this fact, she argues fairly convincingly that there really has been a decline.

Eberstadt moves on to outline the conventional views regarding how the West lost God. The first view she investigates is that people stopped needing the imaginary comforts of religion. She spends time investigating this but dismisses it because the demands of Christianity do not make it some crutch that makes life easier.

The second view she deals with is that Science, the Enlightenment and rationalism caused secularization. This is an extremely widely held view, but it just doesn’t fit the evidence. Christianity does not wax and wane in the way this theory predicts it should. Interestingly, in this section of the book, she highlights some interesting research on education and faith. The Enlightenment theory teaches us to expect that the more educated and wealthy people are, the less likely they are to have faith in God. This is precisely the opposite of what we see, and ’contrary to popular belief, literacy and money do not drive secularism.’

Next, she moves onto the theory that the two world wars caused secularization. This is the view of Peter Hitchens in “Rage Against God”. While admitting this theory is not totally wrong, she highlights the fact that nations with disproportionate burdens of wartime all experienced a decline – Switzerland along with Germany and Great Britain. Furthermore, she wonders why perhaps later generations have not returned to the faith since they have known nothing by postwar prosperity.

The next theory she addresses is that material progress caused us to realise we didn’t need God any more. But this theory is contradicted by the fact that religion seems to increase as the social ladder is climbed. Furthermore, faith has existed with great wealth throughout the ages. Why should ii disappear now?

It seems that the believers of the secularization theory assumed faith was on its way out. They didn’t believe religion could wax as well as wane. It clearly has and does, so a theory is needed that can take this into account. This leads Eberstadt to explore the circumstantial evidence for her theory in chapter 3. She points out that sociologists have assumed that secularization and human development impact negatively human fertility rates. But this is an assumption. Perhaps the relationship goes the other way.

She notes that married people with children are more likely to go to church and be religious than single people. But why is this? Does faith drive family, or does family drive faith? Again she points to a link between faith and fertility. Those who are religious tend to have more children than those who are not. Eberstadt argues that instead of this being a one way street with faith driving family, at least some of the time, family drives faith, and sometimes this makes better sense of the facts.

Next, in chapter 4, Eberstadt moves on to consider some snapshots in the demographic record. Here she shows that family decline accompanies religious decline. Secondly, she notes that the trends of industrialization and urbanization mesh nicely with the decline of the family and faith. Both of these trends led to family decline, which in turn caused people to reject faith. The third piece of data she points to is the clear link between the most irreligious parts of the West and those that have the smallest, weakest and fewest natural families. A final and most interesting piece of evidence she investigates is the link between ‘family boomlets’ and ‘religious boomlets’. One example she highlights is the post-war mini religious boom, which overlay the better known post-war baby boom.

Next, in chapter 5, she demonstrates how her theory answers the problems that the current theories of secularization have been unable to answer. It answers the problem of ‘American exceptionalism’. Why is America so religious, despite being one of the most advanced nations on earth? In America, there are more families following the traditional model, more marriages, and more children per woman than there are in Europe. According to Eberstadt, it also explains the male/female religious gender gap. She speculates that perhaps ‘women who are mothers tend to be more religious because the act of participating in creation, i.e., birth, is more immediate than that of men. Perhaps that fact inclines women…to be more open to the possibility of something greater than themselves.” The family factor also helps explain why 1960s was a pivotal year in secularization. The birth control pill approval changed relations between the sexes – and thus altered the natural family. Extramarital sex became much easier, and that had a seismic impact on family formation and strength.

The Church has not helped, and according to Eberstadt has participated in its own downfall by ignoring the family factor. Here she explores reformist efforts in the church which made divorce more acceptable and allowed contraception and homosexuality. She sees these efforts as undermining the very thing the church relies on – strong families.

Chapter 7 ties all that she has written together. She points out that the experience of the natural family drives some people to religion. In addition, the Christian story is itself told through the prism of the family – without family, it makes less sense. For instance, God himself is described as our Heavenly Father. But for those who have not had a dedicated and loving father, this makes little sense. Moreover, the Christian code "becomes a lightning rod for criticism”<\i>. None of us likes to be told that the way we do things is wrong. In an age of nontraditional and anti-traditional families, more and more people will take offence at the Christian message and its teachings on the family.

The book concludes with two chapters on the future. The first is a case for pessimism. Here we see that fewer people are getting married and having children. Fewer of those who are having children sustain a two-parent home. This is bound to negatively impact the church. But in chapter 9, we are presented the case for optimism. In essence, great catastrophes often lead to religious revival. The situation of the Western world, might be the decline necessary for faith to rise from the ashes. Secure and wealthy societies have been able to bankroll the decline of the family, but this might not be able to go on indefinitely.

[Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

Eberstadt argues a different hypothesis for secularization theory by focusing on the correlation between the family and religious subscription. Much of this book builds on her earlier work, but this is definitely a stand alone powerful defense of the family for flourishing in churches and society. Highly recommended.

[Russell Hayes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good, readable book about how the decline of the family leads to the decline of Christianity (not just vice versa) and how both are vital to society.

[Andrew Figueiredo · Rating 4 out of 5]

In How the West Really Lost God: A New Theory of Secularization, Mary Eberstadt argues that we should rethink our story of secularization in the West. Her main argument is that family and religious belief are tied together, such that "family is not merely a consequence of religious belief"; "it can also be a conduit." Like a double helix, she claims, family and faith go together. They strengthen and support one another, and they also decline together too. Unfortunately, both have fallen together in the past few decades.

Eberstadt starts by examining the state of play among secularization theorists. She picks apart each of the most common arguments, noting that they each miss something or other while drawing attention to a real issue.

She then begins to examine the circumstantial evidence for a family --> faith relationship. She's right that this explanation does better than conventional ones in explaining both the gender gap in religious adherence and America's seeming exceptionalism among western countries.

Eberstadt then covers both economic and social factors, from the industrial revolution undermining family self-sufficiency to the sexual revolution lowering birth rates. Direct evidence is difficult to find on this issue, so she ends up evaluating tons of different factors, including religious groups (primarily Protestant ones) watering down faith tenets. Religious doctrine holds faith and family together, so weakening its rules might weaken family too. I don't necessarily agree with where she takes this point, but it makes sense on a select few issues.

Some may seem a bit scattershot, but she does identify a number of potential causal mechanisms. For example, Eberstadt claims that having children could lead people to want to transmit a moral framework to them. That makes perfect sense. Then she writes that perhaps family helps people make sense of the Bible, which seems more tenuous to me.

Eberstadt's argument definitely leans right, as she blames the welfare state a bit without actually explaining with evidence that it is behind the decline in family formation and stability. Indeed, measures like the recent Child Tax Credit suggest that the welfare state can support family formation as long as its incentives are properly aligned.

I may not agree with all of her claims and I surely disagree with her politics, but Eberstadt is a creative scholar who convincingly argues her points. If the people concerned about religious decline rethought the connections between family and faith in the way Eberstadt proposes, they might think differently about the goals of politics and cultural advocacy.

[Kian · Rating 3 out of 5]

کتاب خیلی خوبی نبود ولی خب شاید بشه گفت ارزش یک بار خوندن رو داشت.
ایبرشتات یک حرف مهم و عجیب نمیزنه بلکه حرف های دیگه رو به علاوه عنصر خانواده مجددا صورت بندی میکنه و به نظر خودش جاهای خالی رو پر میکنه اما حقیقتش رو بخواید به نظرم کار پر قدرتی نیست و خیلی چیزی که میگه (البته بعضی جاها) قانع کننده نیست و من ازش ضعف در آوردم مثلا به این استدلال نگاه کنید:
نویسنده میگه اگر دین عامل بچه اوردن باشه پس چرا غیر کاتولیک ها هم به اندازه کاتولیک ها بچه میارن؟( کاتولیک های سفت و سخت یا همون ارتدکس ممنوعیت سقط جنین و پیشگیری از بارداری دارند و بقیه مثل فرقه ها مثل پروتستان ها یا تبشیری ها نه) یعنی فرض میکنه اگر چیزی جلوی بچه دار شدن رو نگیره (دینی) مردم طبیعتا نباید اینقدر بچه بیارن ولی خب ایرادی که من وارد میکنم اینه که هر نوع مسیحی ای بچه میاره، چه با ممنوعیت چه بی ممنوعیت پیشگیری و سقط چون توصیه خداست و نتیجه گیری نویسنده به نظرم غلطه.
قدرت استدلال ها در کل خیلی بالا نیست اما ارجاعات مداوم نویسنده به کار دیگران کتاب رو خوندنی میکنه، در واقع ایبرشتات با مواد خوبی شروع میکنه اما به نتیجه مد نظر نمیرسه
از نکات مثبت کتاب بررسی نظریه های توضیح دهنده سکولار شدن غربه اونم با آمار و ارقام و ریز بینی که برام جالب بود. مثلا این ایده رایجه که دین مال فقراست ولی نویسنده با یکی دو ارجاع خوب و معتبر نشون میده که تو انگلستان و فرانسه قرون صنعتی شدن این طبقات بالای جامعه بودند که بیشتر کلیسا می رفتند.
یا مثلا ایده ای که میگه دین تسلی بخشه یا افیون توده هاست رو اینطوری نقد میکنه که دستورات دینی اتفاقا سخت کننده زندگی مومنینه ولی خب ایراد من اینه که باشه اما مومنین در ازای پاداش اخروی این سختی ها رو میکشن پس مشکلی نیست.
——
حرف حساب کتاب اینه که اقایون و خانومای تز دهنده، اره راست میگید، چیزایی مثل علم و رفاه باعث رخت بربستن مسیحیت شدند اما از طریق تضعیف عنصری به نام خانواده. یعنی اینطوری نیست که فرد در انزوا دین دار بشه، دین یک امر جمعیه و خانواده واحد اجتماع. رابطه بین دین و خانواده هم دو طرفه ست، یعنی دین کم خانواده کم و خانواده کم دین کم، رابطه یک طرفه نیست.
——
در کل اگر به اینکه چی میشه که یه ملت کمتر به خدا احساس نیاز می کنند علاقه دارید کتاب درگاه خوبیه که بعدا برید مثلا عصر سکولار تیلور رو بخونید ولی در نهایت کتاب از سطح یک نظر نه چندان جالب و عجیب اما شاید لازم بالاتر نمیاد و صرفا باید یکبار نه بیشتر خونده بشه.

[Bob · Rating 5 out of 5]

Intact families are the most important argument for our survival as a culture. Some, maybe many will scoff at that.
“How the West Lost God” is compelling. The basic premise of the book is that religious practice & the intact, male-female natural family are mutually reinforcing social phenomena such that, sociologically speaking, the weakness of the family correlates with the weakness of religious practice, & vice versa.
A thought provoking well researched, documented & noted read for all. The author’s theory of secularization does not intend to negate the many other factors involved in the all-but overwhelming power of secularization as a western social phenomenon, but it does intend to add the 'collapse of the intact family' & the 'collapse of institutional Christianity' as two other important factors to be amended into any comprehensive theory of secularization.
This really is a brilliant compilation of social science data showing the linkage between faith & family in the recent history of Western culture. The fact that the health of these two institutions track so closely together -- whether trending up or down -- argues for a strong correlation between the two.
In the end we see that it’s not only important but we must commit ourselves to work to build strong, healthy families, while striving to repair & defend the intellectual foundations of the Christian faith. If we neglect either front, things don’t bode well.

[Eduardo Garcia-Gaspar · Rating 3 out of 5]

La autora, con un estilo claro y organizado, muy propio del nivel académico inicial, presenta una explicación acerca de la secularización de la civilización cristiana. Después de realizar una breve revisión del fenómeno y lo esencial de las teorías que tratan de explicar esa secularización, propone otra.
La nueva teoría propone considerar el «factor familia» para explicar la caída de creencias religiosas cristianas. Es usual que en la explicación estándar se afirme que la secularización es la causa del debilitamiento de la familia tradicional. La autora da reversa a esa afirmación y propone que el debilitamiento de la familia es causa del debilitamiento cristiano. O, mejor dicho, que entre los dos debilitamientos, hay idas y venidas en términos de causa y efecto.
La idea puede parecer primitiva en una primera impresión, pero no lo es. Los argumentos y evidencias presentados y persuasivos, yendo en dirección de concluir que la defensa de la familia tradicional es también una defensa de la religión.
La obra interesará a quienes defienden a la religión y a la familia al presentar argumentos que no tienen bases dogmáticas cristianas, sino sustento en evidencias, investigaciones y textos científicos. Recomendable.

[Matthew · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was an interesting popular level book on the topic of the reasons behind the secularization of the West. The first part defends the secularization thesis while the second part outlines and defends the idea that the decline of the family led to decline in Christianity in the West rather than the other way around. To me the first part was a little bit unnecessary but was interesting nonetheless. Declining marriage rates, and declining birth rates have made the story of Christianity centered on the Holy Family less relatable to Western audiences. We've become atomized as consumers and employees primarily rather than family members. The pro-social community values of Christianity make less sense and are less desirable in such an individualized world. God as Father doesn't draw people who have an attenuated relationship to their own fathers as so many of the great atheist writers have had.

To me, Eberstadt's argument is undeniable. I see it clearly in the statistics out of Europe and see it currently playing out that way as the United States secularizes.

[Nicholas Perez · Rating 4 out of 5]

Actually listened to the book in audio format. But the thesis was clear...

Usually people think that first people abandon God and this destroys the family. Eberstadt says that is only part of the picture. She makes the case, and it is a strong case, that the issue has more in common with the "chicken-or-egg" problem than at first blush. She argues that it may be that people destroy the mores of family, eroding the very definition of what is a family, has led to a full-scale abandoning of God in the West.

Which came first? Did the West abandon God thereby destroying the family? Or did the West destroy the family which led to the forsaking of God? Eberstadt does not deny the former while arguing for the latter as well.

[Soren Chargois · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is very relevant given the current status of our society. Atheist, Catholic, Christian or anyone else will find reason here. However, I must say it is very dry in some parts. Truthfully, after the first half I skimmed the rest of the chapters and, I must say, I feel as if I didn't miss anything signifiant by just skimming. Mary Eberstadt keeps the language relatively simple, but detracts from so by using way too many words.

I have been able to bring up the arguments in this book in many a conversation since I started reading it last month, so for me, that is enough of a reason to read it.

[Cal Hackett · Rating 1 out of 5]

Who let this lady out of the nursing home?? How The West Really Lost God was required summer reading at my Christian high school and I couldn’t be more disappointed. All of her arguments and premises are weak and arbitrary. All of chapter 6 she essentially argues that inclusivity has been the problem with modern church attendance. In my opinion, this is in conflict with the actual teachings of Jesus. Throughout the book, she blurred the line between traditional cultural church teachings and the actual teachings of Jesus. Maybe if people actually looked at the teachings of Jesus, then Christianity would be more appealing for people today then the church that she appears to long for

[Tim Webb · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a must read for any Christian pastor, evangelist, or missionary serving in the United States. The author makes a compelling case for a causal relationship between the decline of the traditional family in the West and the rise of secularization. The decline of the family is often seen as an outgrowth of the rise of secularism, but in this work compelling evidence is presented to demonstrate that the actual relationship between the decline in the traditional family and the rise of secularization is possibly the opposite of what we have believed.

[Trevor Atwood]

Thought provoking.

The author’s thesis is that it is the experience of family that opens one up to a pursuit of and delight in God. So, as the family declined (less marriage, less babies, more divorce, hyper focus on individualism) so did the secularism of the west.

A very fascinating case is made here that gives testimony to what i find is a mysterious, transcendent power of family that points us to God.

[Sam Eccleston · Rating 3 out of 5]

In a sense I am reluctant to say this, as this book is full of interesting information and analysis. However, the overwhelming experience of reading it is one of discomfort, because the prose is appalling. Alternating between folksy Americanisms and grandiose exaggerations, simple arguments laboured to the point of absurdity, bizarre mixed metaphors and revolting neologisms (‘boomlets’!?)- it’s hard going.

[Josiah Young · Rating 4 out of 5]

A provoking and insightful look at the relationship between faith and family. Her empirical argument that the health of the family predicts religious health on a personal and societal level is very persuasive. She proposes that we should think of the pair not as faith and family but actually as family and faith.

[Mar · Rating 3 out of 5]

read for a course. Interesting to read and flows easily. I don't know that I agree with everything Eberstadt says, but I appreciate the connection between family and religion as a double helix--so they go up together and down together. Lots of food for thought for sure, although I still struggle a bit with the "so what?" part--where do we go from here?