What has taken the place of religious commitment is the "economy" in the form of an even greater consumption of the goods that science in the service of technology and industry delivers. Combined with an ever more malleable and mercurial "self" defined in terms of the fufillment of material desires, the urge for infinite acquisition has become the default religion even of believers. This "religion" prevails even though in acting it out Christians violate their own religion's claims that self-love and covetousness are close to the essence of sin. The religion is that of Cole Porter's "Anything Goes," or, more recently, "Whatever."
Dale Van Kley, professor of history at Ohio State University
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