Question

How did religious revival and neo-orthodoxy fit into the culture of the 1950s

Answer 1

Even if those network families did not depict accurately the virtues of white, middle-class, suburban families (who never seemed to go to church), the Christianity of the 1950’s that blessed those families is not one that Eberstadt should use to support her case. For Protestants it was a time of neo-orthodoxy lite—more Niebuhr than Barth—when the American way of life (freedom and democracy)—not faith and repentance or word and sacrament—was synonymous with Protestantism. The situation among Roman Catholics was better but not by much. As Roman Catholics (in the United States at least) left behind their ghettos for suburban parishes, they assimilated American norms in ways that prepared the way for Vatican II’s engagement with the modern world, a posture that significantly undercut rationales for becoming a priest, nun, or monk. Of course, the families of the 1950’s were as responsible for increasing membership in conservative as in liberal churches. But in the case of liberal Christian families, domestic ties could not withstand the baby-boomers loss of faith.