....Then after WWI, there was a sudden explosion of unmarried sex. That was the "Roaring Twenties." It was a lot like the explosion of the hippies and their sexual revolution in the 1960s, but with one big difference. The hippies continued their sexual revulotion into the present. But the Roaring Twenties, and its sexual revolution, were stopped cold in less than a decade, by the Great Depression of the 1930s.
The Great Depression took the wind out of everyone's sails. Suddenly, in the great troubles of that time, the 'Twenties' generation rediscovered the bedrock values. Family and home gained a new respect and new meaning. A whole nation celebrated the joys of home and family. The huge change can easily be seen by comparing movies from the 20s with those of the 30s.
To most people, the 1930s was a period of severe poverty. That is true: it was. But it did not seem so to the children growing up then. Their parents may have missed what had been lost, but that did not affect the children much. Since almost everyone was poor, they were poor together, so it seemed normal.
Read this and I had one of those "grew up Pentecostal paranoia moments"TM, kind of like when I read that most of Europe will be majority Muslim at the same time that CERA says oil production will peak, was the Great Depression a divine warning shot against immorality? Of course, it could also be the discarding of sexual norms was one of many cavalier rule changes at the time, and some of the reckless decisions were made with nations and fortunes.
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During times of widespread economic problems or cyclical weather problems, there are many unscrupulous ministers who will claim that these things point to us being in the "last days" in an effort to get more converts and more money. People get fearful, and will give up all their pleasures in order to please the higher power who will supposedly protect them from bad things happening. Of course, when the bad things happen anyway, then the convert is told that they are being tested. Religion has messed up a lot of people. And it's surely going to happen again.
I still have my faith, but I've lived thru enough of the hype that I don't get too nuts about this stuff any more. I still remember "88 reasons the Rapture will be in 1988" (actually I think I have a copy stashed somewhere). Most of the best Religions have outlasted the worst of their adherents, and I suspect that will be true in the future as well (which gives me hope the Middle East may be something more than a sad mess someday).
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