Whatever Became of Sin? is a book written in 1973 by the pioneering psychiatrist Karl Menninger. He believed the American public was increasingly unable to discern what was right and wrong amid competing values. Menninger suspected this was because Americans no longer recognized a higher moral authority, leaving each individual to declare personal standards of morality as the only authority that counted. The result, he feared, would be a tendency to blame destructive behavior on illness or misfortune, thereby absolving individuals of personal accountability.
In 1993, Daniel Patrick Moynihan published an article in The Atlantic titled “Defining Deviancy Down.” Writing from memory, I recall that Moynihan was primarily concerned with beliefs and behaviors that had become normative in American society but would have been morally unacceptable just a few decades earlier. To him, it appeared that American society was losing its anchor in established civic virtues and normalizing behavior that led to social disintegration.
The decades since suggest that both men were right—but also that they missed the most serious threat to our moral life together.
Many of the behaviors that troubled them were connected to social norms around sex and gender, norms once thought to hold the moral fabric of society together. In reality, those norms often oppressed, subjugated, and denied rights to large numbers of people who, for the most part, wanted to live responsibly, be held accountable, and participate fully in civic life. Issues surrounding homosexuality were the most obvious example. Breaking down rigid restrictions on the roles of men and women in the workplace and the home was another. Neither of these broad areas posed a serious threat to the soundness of our social fabric, despite the anxiety and fear they provoked.
Where Menninger and Moynihan were most perceptive—but did not go far enough—was in recognizing how standards shift. Over the past two decades, we have defined deviancy down in a far more dangerous way. We have normalized cruel, vicious, and vindictive language as acceptable expressions of free speech across the public arena. Worse still, such language has become the dominant idiom of political leadership, most notably in the wake of Donald Trump.
Trump did not invent this language. It has always rumbled beneath the surface, restrained by social norms that recognized it as dangerous to the common good. What Trump did was to normalize it, making it acceptable as part of the moral vocabulary of American public life.
Language has power. The old adage that the pen is mightier than the sword is true. Language builds up and tears down. Through language we assert authority, establish norms, and shape the moral imagination of our communities. Language moves public opinion and creates momentum—for good or for ill. We have defined deviancy in language so far downward that its destructive force now dominates at least one part of the body politic, while the rest struggles to preserve what remains of the good and regain moral momentum.
Menninger and Moynihan were also right about something else. For much of American history, a shallow and unsophisticated generic Protestantism functioned as our de facto national religion. If nothing else, it lifted up the Ten Commandments as an authoritative moral standard for both private and public life—honored more in the breach than the practice, but present nonetheless.
That civic religion has largely disappeared. Polling suggests that 80 to 90 percent of Americans still believe in God in some form, but adherence to particular religious traditions continues to decline. It is difficult to know whether those who worship regularly observe the moral teachings of their faith in public or private life. Meanwhile, some denominations claiming the Christian name have subordinated their faith to right-wing nationalism, a posture far removed from the teachings of Christ and the church.
At the same time, believers of every sort wander about creating personal religions and personal gods—little make-believe deities with make-believe moralities—bumping into one another with no shared moral grammar.
Some respond by insisting the United States must declare itself a Christian nation. That would be a grave mistake. There would be little that is genuinely Christian about it, and it would undermine our constitutional democracy. Still, this does not mean we are without hope.
Jews and Christians share a universal moral vision anchored in the Ten Commandments and the prophets. Everything Jesus Christ taught and embodied was a fulfillment of the law and the prophets, leaving Christians with no excuse to accept any other moral authority as higher. These are the ultimate standards by which we must measure our lives, public and private. We are not expected to be perfect, but we are expected to do our best and to accept accountability when our failures cause real harm.
It will surprise many Christians to learn that Islamic moral teaching is largely consistent with Jewish and Christian ethics, and that Buddhist moral ideals are often compatible as well. This means that the faithful—acting individually and together—can and must influence political and social life for the good. They may not impose their beliefs on others; that would itself be immoral. Christ did not coerce. He invited: I am the way.
I cannot speak for Jews, but as a Christian priest and pastor I can urge all of us to be of good courage. We are called to confront the evil before us with godly language—language that affirms universal moral standards, demands accountability, protects human dignity, and makes room for human freedom. We are called to speak in ways that allow people to flourish as the persons they are, as best they are able, while honoring the dignity of every other human being.