As a child I grew up in a Lutheran church and studied the life of Martin Luther extensively. Luther probably had some form of OCD, he was stricken by anxiety over the idea that he might be condemned to Purgatory for centuries because he committed a sin and forgot about it by the time he had confession, or committed a sin without noticing…
As a child I grew up in a Lutheran church and studied the life of Martin Luther extensively. Luther probably had some form of OCD, he was stricken by anxiety over the idea that he might be condemned to Purgatory for centuries because he committed a sin and forgot about it by the time he had confession, or committed a sin without noticing (for example, he once freaked out because he stepped on some straw on the ground and noticed that two pieces of straw had fallen in such a way that they made a cross). Luther eventually significantly reduced his anxiety by studying the Bible and developing a theology where it is impossible for humans to achieve any sort of personal moral perfection and it wad purely through God's grace that they were saved.
Now that I am older, there is obviously much to criticize about this worldview. Many of the sins Luther was freaked out about were stupid stuff like having "impure thoughts," rather than stuff of consequence like not doing more for your fellow humans. It was also as motivated by a fear of supernatural punishment as it was by a desire to do good.
However, I think overall my upbringing inculcated a lot of positive habits of thought in me. I have always seen it as essentially unreasonable to expect moral perfection of humans or to punish people for failing to love up to perfection. I also tend to suspect akrasia rather than hypocrisy when people fail to live up to their standards.
My study of history in general probably also influenced this view. It was pretty obvious to me that lots of earlier societies had committed all sorts of grave moral errors, so probably mine was too. No sweat, I'm sure eventually someone will figure out what it is and then I can do something about it. There was no reason to get upset at average people in our society, for the same reason there is no reason to get upset at average people in the past.
As a child I grew up in a Lutheran church and studied the life of Martin Luther extensively. Luther probably had some form of OCD, he was stricken by anxiety over the idea that he might be condemned to Purgatory for centuries because he committed a sin and forgot about it by the time he had confession, or committed a sin without noticing (for example, he once freaked out because he stepped on some straw on the ground and noticed that two pieces of straw had fallen in such a way that they made a cross). Luther eventually significantly reduced his anxiety by studying the Bible and developing a theology where it is impossible for humans to achieve any sort of personal moral perfection and it wad purely through God's grace that they were saved.
Now that I am older, there is obviously much to criticize about this worldview. Many of the sins Luther was freaked out about were stupid stuff like having "impure thoughts," rather than stuff of consequence like not doing more for your fellow humans. It was also as motivated by a fear of supernatural punishment as it was by a desire to do good.
However, I think overall my upbringing inculcated a lot of positive habits of thought in me. I have always seen it as essentially unreasonable to expect moral perfection of humans or to punish people for failing to love up to perfection. I also tend to suspect akrasia rather than hypocrisy when people fail to live up to their standards.
My study of history in general probably also influenced this view. It was pretty obvious to me that lots of earlier societies had committed all sorts of grave moral errors, so probably mine was too. No sweat, I'm sure eventually someone will figure out what it is and then I can do something about it. There was no reason to get upset at average people in our society, for the same reason there is no reason to get upset at average people in the past.