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Re: IT IS! IT IS! IT'S THE INDUSTRIAL RELIGION!



Jay Hanson <jhanson@ilhawaii.net> wrote:


>                  THE INDUSTRIAL RELIGION     revised 12/29/95
>                       by Jay Hanson

<snip>

>  In the 16th century, Martin Luther established a new form of
>Christianity that ultimately came to regard work as the only way
>to obtain love and approval.  But behind the Christian face arose
>a new secret religion that actually directs the character of
>modern society. 

Actually, Martin Luther established a new form of Christianity that
was based upon faith not works.  The Roman Church at the time was
teaching that salvation was by works.  Martin Luther rebelled against
that idea and taught that man is saved by grace through faith, not by
works lest man could boast of his salvation through his works.
Although Luther was a predestinarian, perhaps it was Calvin's doctrine
of predestination that caused men to seek to prove that they were
included among the saved by their industriousness.  However, you have
to consider the Enlightenment, and, as Peter Gay, Yale enlightenment
historian calls it, the rise of paganism, not a "new Christianity"
that really made it possible for the "industrial religion" to take
hold.

David Larkin
dcl@primenet.com




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