"Except that I don't think the above-average religiosity of the U.S. population can be explained by contemporary developments -- it was noted by many 19th-century European visitors, and probably can be traced back to pre-Revolutionary times. Perhaps it is due to a tendency for the more religiously devoted Europeans to migrate to the colonies, leaving their more free-thinking contemporaries behind? (Just a wild guess.)"
Whatever happened two hundred years ago is no longer relevant--there may have been once a movement to the U.S. seeking religious freedom--Emily Dickinson was religious in a real sense. But now, American religiosity is not inspired by love but by fear. As my favorite mystic puts it: "Without love there is no morality -- there is conformity to a pattern, a social or a so-called religious pattern. Without love there is no virtue. Love is something spontaneous, real, alive. And virtue is not a thing that you beget by constant practice; it is something spontaneous, akin to love. Virtue is not a memory according to which you function as a virtuous human being. If you have no love, you are not virtuous. You may go to the temple, you may lead a most respectable family life, you may have the social moralities, but you are not virtuous because your heart is barren, empty, dull, stupid, ..." American religiosity pursues "morality and virtue" through fear and rightneousness; it is a movement against freedom and generated out of the fear of freedom. It is hell on earth. As a native american friend put it once, "when I hear all these people talk about "spirituality," I think they should wash their mouths out with soap."
Joanna