Media in the '70s stressed the importance of self and popularized psychology. Amidst self-help best sellers, encounter sessions, and special interest groups, the author asks, "What has happened to civility?" and "Can a culture without civility call itself civilized?" Condensed and reprinted from "Daedalus," Summer 1980. (Editor)

In looking toward American life in the 1980s, we can see that the church has a great role to play in calling the American experiment to judgment, in intensifying accountability which can give birth to new possibilities, and in reengaging the passions of hope. (Author/SJL)